When poor people travel Delta

The hubby has been stuck overseas for 8 days because he’s been unable to get a seat on Delta (He traveled on a Delta buddy pass and all the flights were booked). Such is to be expected when traveling on buddy passes. Recommendation: do not travel on buddy passes. 8 days is a lot of days to be stuck overseas and unable to get home.

The Delta customer service was not remotely interested in helping to suggest alternatives. Eventually we called American Airlines. They were completely booked as well, but once we explained what was going on, how there was the very real possibility of the hubby losing his employment as a result of going over his vacation time by 8 days, they told us there was a seat opened on a flight to San Juan Puerto Rico the following day. He could fly to San Juan and then catch Delta back home.

So we called Delta to make sure he’d still be able to use his buddy pass. We were informed that he would not be able to use his buddy pass. He would have to purchase a ticket to get on a Delta flight out of San Juan. They told us this without even pretending to sympathize with our predicament. What could we have done? We needed to get him home, so we asked them to hold the seat. We needed to figure out if there would be enough on the credit cards to afford the two tickets.

We called back Delta a few hours to pay for the ticket and a very rude customer service rep handled our call. She sounded as if she was filing her nails in boredom while taking our information, and if we asked for clarification on anything she replied with exasperation. We decided we wouldn’t let it get to us. It’s been a tough 8 days. The trip cost money we did not have to begin with but he needed to go home and visit with his mother and his daughter. One is getting old and doesn’t have much time left and the other is talking about wanting to kill herself. So we ended up spending between $1200 – $2000 between the buddy pass and the things he had to take home. ( You don’t go back home to a poor country to visit your poor relatives and have nothing for the mother, the daughter, the sisters, the alcoholic brother, the nieces and nephews. They think you live in America so you must be rich because everyone in America is rich). So a lot of money was spent. Where it came from is a mystery.

Now we had to add another $1000 to the total expense of his trip in order to get him home because Delta was looking like they wouldn’t have any seats available for another 8 days. Yes, that is literal. They only fly out of his country on Thursdays, Saturdays and Sundays and there were no seats available on the Thursday flight yesterday or the flights on Saturday and Sunday. He would have had to wait until next Thursday and there would still not be any guarantee of a seat on the plane.

We found the money and paid for the tickets; but he still isn’t home as of this moment. He will miss his 7:45 flight because Delta gave him the run around once he arrived in the city where he was scheduled to catch another flight to home. He’ll have to wait until 9:20 this evening to fly out on the second flight.

Another reason to stay motivated to become a rich bitch. Traveling while poor can be hazardous to your sanity.

In case you might think I’m alone in my assessment of delta here are a few links where even seasoned Delta travelers seem to be of the opinion that delta sucks.

1. Delta sucks (and modest proposal for how to treat people during delays)
2. Delta Airlines Sucks… BIG TIME
3. I think the service at Delta Air Lines really sucks!
4. Notes From Atlanta: Delta Sucks
5. Yet Another Reason to Never Fly With Delta Airlines
6. The Pool Bar: When Delta sucks, they REALLY suck
7. Delta Airlines sucks!
8. Random Thoughts from Joel’s World: Delta sucks
9. Delta Airlines Sucks – MoreMerchant
10. DELTA AIRLINES SUCKS!!!! | Don’t Fly Delta

This is only a small sampling of thousands of Google pages that contain the words “delta sucks”.