Airport Hell – Part 2

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Ok, so I am sitting on the floor at gate in SFO waiting for the United flight to take me home to SD. Please note, the above does not say business lounge. Why you ask? Well just when I thought that things couldn’t get worse, they did. I blame my sister actually. She sent me a very nice send off message and commented that after Bangalore the trip home will be a breeze…yea, Jane, it was real easy.

Ok, so when I last left you I had not eaten in 14 hours, and I was waiting to board my plane in Frankfurt. Apparently, Jan 8th is Germany’s National Mushroom and Shrimp Holiday. My menu selections on the trip from Frankfurt to SFO consisted of a number of mushroom and shrimp dishes. The air hostess was very nice on this leg though, and tried everything to accommodate me. Unfortunately everything he had to offer had mushrooms it in. I did have a couple of rolls though. He did bring me steak tartar, but I really couldn’t bring myself to eat steak tartar made by an airline. (Come on now, what airline serves steak tartar????). I don’t really have much else to report as I was too weak from hunger to do anything so I basically slept for the 10 hour flight. At least I got some sleep.

Well I landed in SFO, and got through customs without a problem, ran outside had a cig, and figured I would check in, finally get a Starbucks Venti Iced Mocha, Soy, no whip, then head to the business lounge for something to eat (24 hours and counting). Well imagine my surprise when I tried to check in at United Domestic and was told that I needed a boarding pass and that they gave me the boarding pass in Bangalore. So I explained to her the situation from the day before (was it actually only one day, it feels like a week ago) and she was very helpful, but really couldn’t do anything. You see, I was flying United from SFO to San Diego but as part of the Star Alliance, and my ticket was really through Lufthansa. So after about 30 minutes of her calling everybody she possibly could she had to send me back to the international terminal to deal with the fine folks a Lufthansa.

So I leave Terminal 3 and head to the International terminal. I vaguely remember going there as I am completely famished at this point and unfortunately at the SFO airport all of the food is inside the terminal. So I get to the International terminal, and stand in line for about 15 minutes and am helped (I use the word loosely) by who I think has to be the rudest person in the history of customer service. So this fine employee of Lufthansa tells me that they don’t fly to SDO. Well I obviously know this and explain that they had set me up with their Star Alliance partner, United for that leg of the trip. So she tells me that I should have gotten my boarding pass when I checked in at the Bangalore airport.

I explain what happen and she tells me I have to get my boarding pass from them. Well now I am a little pissed off. I haven’t eaten in a day, and I just want to get home, so I ask her if she is saying I have to fly back to Bangalore to pick it up, and if so, when is the next flight. Granted I was a bit snippy, but her response was a bit uncalled for. She made a kind of slur against Americans (she was German) and walked away. I mean she literally just left the desk. Now there is a line of people behind me, and she was the only person working the desk. So I wait a couple of minutes thinking she maybe went to get help, or perhaps just needed to have a cig or I don’t know a bong hit. Well after about 10 minutes when she doesn’t return, I seek out the supervisor. So frustrated, I walk up to the Supervisor’s counter, and say “Hey”. Now I am sure she took one look at me and had to know that something was wrong, I had to have looked completely defeated at that point. So I say “hey” and she says to me “if you are going to be rude, I am not going to help you” and she walks away.

Now I am looking around, convinced that somebody is filming me. I have now used up 1.5 of my 3 hour layover, just trying to get my boarding pass. Ok, so I ask around and find the manager. I explain the situation to her, and she tells me, oh, you need to go to the United International counter to get your boarding pass. So I head over to the United counter and lucky for me the ticket agent barely speaks English. After trying to explain to her what happened, she calls somebody and then tells me that I have to back to the United Domestic counter. Actually that is not correct, she tells me that I need to go to United in Terminal 2. Well Terminal 2 is not United, they are in Terminal 3. I know this because I was just in Terminal 3 talking to the United people. So I head back to Terminal 3 and speak to another ticket agent. She tells me that she can see my reservation, but they don’t have a seat for me. But that I can go talk to the people at Lufthansa and they should be able to get this straightened out.

So back to International (after stopping for a quick call to my parents and a couple of well deserved cigs). This time, I head directly back to the manager that helped me before. I explain what has transpired, and she punches a few things into her computer and says, you have a seat it is 1B. So she tells me to go to United and they can issue me the boarding pass. Well I am not going to fall for this again, so I ask her to come with me to resolve the conflict.

Now a little commentary by me. Almost two hours have passed at this point and not one person has said they were sorry to me. Everybody is pointing the finger at the other company, but none of the ticket agents, supervisors, or the manager have even said they were sorry this was happening. The first rule in customer service is to apologize when something is going wrong, even if you don’t feel it is your fault, you still say something like, I am sorry this is happening. Nobody has done that at this point.

Ok, well back to the manager, so I am discussing the situation with her, and the Supervisor comes up, and snarls at me, and has the nerve to say to the manager, “why are you helping him”. I mean come on, this is supposed to be somebody in a position of authority. I don’t care if I had called her a bitch and spit on her, she is supposed to be there to resolve conflicts not start them. Well I have had just about enough at this point, so I kind of lose it. Well not kind of, I actually made kind of a big scene, big enough that the security guards came over to see if everything was ok. So now that I have their attention, the manager decides to come with me to United. So we go over to the International United counter, and she talks to the manager there, who punches something into the computer and gets me a boarding pass. Finally, after a little over 2 hours I can get into the airport and get a Starbucks.

Well while I was in Bangalore, SFO switched from Starbucks to Peat’s coffee, so I didn’t get my mocha either. Well they are calling us to board, so I will post when I get into San Diego.

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