I recently flew to a college town, inexplicably the site of a marvelous wildlife symposium. The flight there and back involved 4 legs. I selected seats on 3 of the legs. To save money, I didn’t take advantage of airline offers to upgrade the seats for extra fees. When it came to the last leg, the website said seat selection wasn’t available at that time. Huh.
Even if it’s been hours and you haven’t seen the mother, this fawn is not abandoned.
It was one of those curious things where some of the flights are “operated” by one airline for another, which has never caused me any problems.
I went to the fabulous symposium and learned wonderful things. Two days before I was to leave, I got email from one of the airlines (let me just say that the initials of the airline sending the email are U.S. AIRWAYS and the initials of the one operating the flight are AMERICAN AIRLINES) saying it was time to pick my seats.
Okay.
I tell my kids, ‘If anybody wanted these cherries they would have eaten them. Or picked them, taken them inside, locked them in an iron safe, and surrounded the safe with barbed wire. Like that would work.’
It showed me a seating plan. Almost every seat was labeled “Unavailable.” The only seats shown as available were seats that required a $58 or $61 upgrade fee. THE ONLY ONES.
We have a principle in my family: NO PAY EXTRA.
I called the airline (canned babble hold hold hold babble babble hold hold hold etc.) and finally spoke to a woman with a nice voice I’ll call Lilith. I explained that I had booked and paid for my flight, and they could not change their minds and force me to pay more money. Because that would be ILLEGAL.
“Oh no no,” Lilith said. She seemed familiar with the situation. “You don’t have to pay more money! When you get to the airport, they’ll assign you a seat.”
“So I can ignore the email?”
“Yes.”
I’ve reconstructed the wording above, but the next line I wrote down:
“I apologize for that confusion.”
“I wouldn’t call it ‘confusion,’” I said. She uttered a warm and delightful laugh.
I don’t think it’s confusion. I think it’s a way to get people to pay extra by making it look as if they have no choice. It’s dishonesty. It’s probably not illegal, but calling it “confusion” is a cover-up.
Turns out osprey chicks play dead when a possible predator flies over.
Lilith didn’t institute this misleading plan. Lilith would lose her job if she was heard admitting it was misleading. The oddly worded apology is probably direct from a script that includes the word “confusion.”
The airline makes money off this. In the process they distress people. In cases like mine, they waste people’s time when they could be wandering around the symposium talking to people about loons, bears, and the betting pool on the date the first baby squirrel comes in to the wildlife center.
When I got to the airport they had indeed assigned me a seat. But I had to wait in line. Because a passenger’s time, as we know, is worthless. Once the airline has the money.
I’ve had similar experiences, where the only available seats that don’t cost extra are middle seats several rows apart and there are 2 of us. I bet a lot of people grit their teeth and pony up, fearing that waiting until they get to the airport will put them into the last boarding group and there will be no more room for their carry-ons. And they’ll get stuck in a middle seat. Flying is the pits these days.
Argh, I didn’t even think of the trying-to-fly-together pressure!
Oh, many are the terrible experiences of flying nowadays, including the airlines trying to trick you to make a buck off of you. At least you remained gracious to Lilith, considering it’s part of her job to perpetuate a lie. Ugh.
I think it must be a horrible job.
I wonder if their script was written by a British person. Seems to me i’ve encountered a few cases of a British person using the word “confusion” to describe a failed attempt to hoodwink me out of a few euros. Or maybe it’s crept into being used this way in American English and i just haven’t noticed bcs i’ve been away.
Oh, so “boot” means “trunk” of a car, “lorry” means “truck,” and “confusion” means “too bad you didn’t let me cheat you”?
Neat.
Another old British use of “confusion” was that British officers during the Napoleonic wars were said to drink to the toast, “Confusion to Boney!”
I gather it was too gauche to wish something worse on someone at the dinner table, and besides a sufficiently “confused” Napoleon should be easy to defeat.
That said I’d bet it was an American Airlines PR dept. person who came up with that phrase for the Airline situation.
“Confusion” here is related to “confound” which means to be blocked and rendered helpless in one’s schemes. In that case, wishing someone confusion is not a genteel request, it is an expression of deep animus. The whole toast runs “Confusion to Boney and Disappointment to his Schemes!”
Ah USAirways/American. I booked a last minute flight on AA to see my ailing mom with frequent flyer miles, and paid a $75 nonrefundable expedite fee for booking less than 21 days in advance. 35 minutes later, USAirways sent me an email saying the flight had been canceled. It took several phone calls (each, of course, involving being on hold) and emails to get them to refund the $75. “The terms clearly state the fee is nonrefundable but we’ll refund it as a good will gesture just this once.” Wait – YOU canceled the flight, not I.
And complaining on Twitter during the three weeks it took to finally get the refund elicited no response.
Oh that is so low.
The time it takes to do this stuff is outrageous.