Comments on: Open Letter to the CEO of Northwest Airlines

By: david quintanilla

david quintanilla — Mon, 25 Jan 2010 17:01:10 +0000

I am glad that tommytrc had a good experience w/ NWA because it’s probably going to be his last. Here’s my story. My wife and I had tickets to fly to Minnesota from Texas. Unfortunately, a heart attack left us no alternative but to cancel the trip. NWA refused to refund out tickets and instead said we can use a “credit” to re-book another flight within 12 months. Well we just tried to do that and found that our trip would cost more than the original…and then they tacked a $150 “change fee” on top of that! That all meant that we would have to pay an additional $582 per ticket for this new trip. What a scam. Needless to say, I am peeved at this airline and will never again book with them. Those bastards can keep my original $630 and I will badmouth them every chance I get. By the way, we booked with Southwest Airlines and got a better deal.

By: Yufeng Huang

Yufeng Huang — Thu, 22 Oct 2009 23:01:34 +0000

I am glad that you are the lucky one to have your question solved quickly. Wish the Northwest had the same efficient way to help passengers to re-schedule their flights when the original schedule was canceled by the Northwest.

We bought the round tip tickets around July this year for my parents from Pudong, Shanghai to Salt Lake City, UT. My parents came UT on August 13 and will be return on Feb 4th, 2010. We chose the Northwest airline since the new flight line from Salt Lake City to Tokyo and to Pudong Shanghai was opened on June 1st this year. We are all excited about it since it will make us easy to visit China from Salt Lake City, UT. We spent $1,500 for each to buy the round trip ticket. Now the Northwest closed this flight line. When i called the Northwest airline, I was so frustrated on their service. If the tickets were for me, I would take their re-scheduled flight although the new flight will add one more stop on my trip since I understand their business and I will take lessons from this bad experience. The question is now that these tickets are for my senior parents and they do not know any piece of English. We bought airline tickets from Northwest in the beginning since we would like to make our parent’s trip easy and less stressful. This trip will take more than 20 hours. Currently, when i contacted the Northwest if they can give the passengers some credit so that my family member can travel with my parents to the first stop in USA. They told us there is no credit for the re-scheduled flight. Then I asked if we can ask for refunding the tickets. They told us that we can get the tickets refunded but they reminded me that one-way trip ticket is much expensive than the round-trip tickets and i may not get any money back to buy the return-ticket from another airline. I asked them to tell me how much percentage we can get refunded under this situation because i do not want to loose my money. There is no reason for us to loose money. So far nobody in the customer service office helped me to solve these problems yet and some just handed up the phone or told me they can not tell how much i get back for the refunding tickets. They may not mind to loose my interesting in their business in my whole life. I believe that they will loose more or their future if they would not change their service since they did not care the passengers’ benefits at all.

By: Chuck Gosh

Chuck Gosh — Sat, 17 Oct 2009 19:51:51 +0000

As long as Northwest doesn’t lose any of your stuff . . .
I’ve recently learned that Northwest (and probably every other major airline) has a lost & found system that’s about 50 years out of date.
Lost your stuff? It’s sitting in a room somewhere with a lot of other ‘lost’ stuff. Don’t sit by the phone waiting for them to call, even if they know who you are. They don’t call people. You go get your stuff.
So, your stuff ends up in some other airport? Good luck. Pick an airport, any airport. Northwest is unable to tell you where your plane went after you got off. Press them and they’ll hang up on you. Now THAT’s customer service.
Geez, you’d think they’d get some computers or something. Or figure out how to dial a phone.

By: Polprav

Polprav — Fri, 16 Oct 2009 16:18:08 +0000

Hello from Russia!
Can I quote a post in your blog with the link to you?

By: Using what you have « PEG

Using what you have « PEG — Sun, 11 Oct 2009 06:45:33 +0000

[...] connections. One bloke, after the flight from hell which was delayed due to weather, found out that Northwest Airlines had made the obvious connections and solved the problem before he arrived for his…. So let me see if I got this right. I don’t need to find a free ground agent to get re-booked. I [...]

By: Using what you have « PEG

Using what you have « PEG — Sun, 11 Oct 2009 06:41:36 +0000

[...] It's nice to see some companies weeding through the pile of data available to them, and make some of the obvious connections. One bloke, after the flight from hell which was delayed due to weather, found out that Northwest Airlines had made the obvious connections and solved the problem before he arrived for his…. [...]

By: Brian

Brian — Sat, 10 Oct 2009 19:47:49 +0000

Glad to hear that you had a great experience. We love to hear these stories. Hope to have you on a flight someday soon!