Imagine this scenario: you are a doctor – a heart surgeon – who is away on a much needed vacation overseas. You booked your flight months in advance, followed all the rules, and after 2 weeks away, as you get ready to board your flight home, you are told, “Sorry, sir, but the flight is overbooked and there are no seats available for you. Not even in business class or first class.” Now imagine you are supposed to fly home on a Monday so that you can perform open heart surgery on Tuesday on a 6 year old child who, if she doesn’t have this surgery, will die. Instead, you are stuck in a foreign country, with no way of getting home.
I am not a doctor. Obviously. But the subtext of this scenario, getting bumped from a flight, happened to me recently. And according to the concierge at the Courtyard Marriott in Amsterdam, this happens at least 15 times a day.
My wife and I booked our flight to Italy on KLM, via Amsterdam. We were excited to fly the Royal Dutch Airline, as our last experience with them, two years ago, was a breeze. Not this time, unfortunately.
The way to Italy had its minor issues, but nothing that was to set off fireworks. However, the way home made me wonder how the airline industry as a whole, and KLM specifically, can operate the way it does currently.
Our flight path was supposed to be: Naples to Rome; Rome to Amsterdam; Amsterdam to NYC…first plane at 11am, second flight at 1:30, third flight at 5:45 (all local European time). First two flights, on AlItalia, had no issues. In fact, we had a row to ourselves from Rome to Amsterdam. There was a bit of plane traffic at the Rome airport, but we landed on time at Sciphol.
We arrive at the large, international hub and proceed to go through the necessary transfer process. In Naples, we were told since we were switching airlines, we’d have to print out boarding passes in Amsterdam. Fine. No problem. However, when we got to Schiphol, there was a problem with the first three machines. Of course, not a good omen. We booked to the transfer station to have a real life human being assist us, but when we printed out our reservation, we no longer had the seats we booked. We were on standby. I had a bad feeling about this.
At the gate, we were told KLM overbooked the flight. There were no business class or first class seats to bump up to; there were no economy seats. Nothing. After traveling for two weeks, and on planes all day, my fuse was short as I could not comprehend how this happens. I felt like Seinfeld in his classic episode where he reserves a car, and I wound up quoting him to the KLM attendant, who spoke fluent English, yet apparently didn’t understand the definition of “reservation.”
Jerry: I don’t understand, I made a reservation, do you have my reservation?
Agent: Yes, we do, unfortunately we ran out of cars.
Jerry: But the reservation keeps the car here. That’s why you have the reservation.
Agent: I know why we have reservations.
Jerry: I don’t think you do. If you did, I’d have a car. See, you know how to take the reservation, you just don’t know how to *hold* the reservation and that’s really the most important part of the reservation, the holding. Anybody can just take them.
The attendant informed us that KLM overbooks most every flight because there are, typically, a small percentage of flyers that wind up missing or cancelling their flights. So instead of having empty seats, the company overbooks the flight. They don’t want to lose the $1,000+ ticket. There is some interesting math happening. But first, a side discussion of social media.
You ask, How does social media fit into this? Well, here you go: When we found out we were bumped off our flight, I did what I’ve been conditioned to do over the past several years: go to Twitter to report what’s happening (as you may or may not know, I am a habitual Twitter; yes, it’s a dirty habit, but I rather enjoy it). While I was away, I did not Tweet. I did check it sporadically, but just to keep up with the news (learned about Oslo, debt ceiling and Amy Winehouse via Twitter, as we didn’t really have any English-language stations at most of the places we stayed at – though we did watch the Women’s World Cup Final in Sinalunga on the Eurosports Network, though it had German telecasters.)
So I tweeted the following:
Which elicited this response from the KLM Twitter account:
It was a pointless tweet. Clearly, there’s nothing they can do, as I’m now stuck in Amsterdam. If the person behind the account could magically get me two seats on a plane to NYC this evening, then it’s worth tweeting that out. But, they cannot. What this shows is that many companies still have not figured out that social networks are not for pointless chatter like this. Just because you can respond to a customer’s complaint, doesn’t mean you should; especially if all you’re offering are empty platitudes.
Maybe I’m overly sensitive to this inanity as a) I just got bumped from my flight home and I’m beyond frustrated and b) I am deeply entrenched in the social networking communities.
Anyway…
The next two hours were spent in KLM purgatory, as a hoarse KLM attendant started the paperwork on our new flight (now scheduled for 10:50 the next morning), hotel room and accompanying voucher. Emails were sent to friends and family alerting them to our delay; all of them responded “Are you getting compensated?” Typical Americans.
Per KLM’s “Assistance and Compensation in case of cancellations, delays and denied boarding” pamphlet, we were given the choice of accepting either a “Transportation Credit Voucher” of 800 Euro, or cash compensation of 600 Euro (as of this writing, the conversion is $784 US, or about 80% of the cost of the ticket). Additionally, we received “free of charge: meals and refreshments in reasonable relation to the waiting time; hotel accommodation in cases where an overnight stay or a stay in addition to that which you originally intended becomes necessary (transport included); the cost of two telephone calls, fax messages or emails.” And buried at the end of the pamphlet is this gem: “You may also contact Customer Care to send us a complaint or compliment, or to share your travel experiences.” Well, clearly there’s no need to send an email when one can write a blog post, right?
We took the cash. By this time, it was around 7pm and all I wanted to do was be on my flight to NYC. And since that wasn’t a possibility, get to the hotel and decompress. We were told that our luggage would be avaiable downstairs and we just had to go down and get it. Apparently, though, that wasn’t the case. When we hit the baggage claim area, we were told by another KLM person that if we wanted our bags, we would have to wait three to four hours for them to come down to them. We were given ‘complimentary overnight toiletry bags” and told to have a nice day. The anger started rising up again; if we were staying overnight, we would have liked our bags. You know, clean clothes and all.
To be fair, though, in hindsight, it was the better play not having our luggage, as we didn’t have to wait on any lines at the airport the next morning for our flight.
It would be another hour until we got to the Courtyard Marriott, as KLM doesn’t pay for a taxi to take you to the hotel, but for the hotel’s shuttle. Which was scheduled to arrive at 8:15. Oh, by the way, it was cold. We were wonderfully unprepared for chilly weather, as we just spent the past 2 weeks in Italy. So we had that to fume on, as well.
Cold, exhausted, frustrated and just downright sad, we approached the concierge with our KLM voucher in hand. He saw it and flashed a wary smile. He’s done this a lot. I ask how often does this happen and he responded, “More than I like.” I followed up by asking if he could give a number. “We have a standing order with KLM for 15 rooms per day. They are filled every night. We’ve gotten as much as 60 booked rooms for one day.”
So I laugh, as I do some quick mat. $159 x 15 x 365 = $870,525; this doesn’t count the $785 (600 Euro) the airline gives customers who are bumped on flights longer than 1,500km – KLM offers 300 Euro for flights less than 1,500km, nor the 25 Euro per person for meals, and other expenses like the overnight toiletry bag they give you. And this is just at one airport. I don’t have access to KLM’s (or any other airlines) financial decisions, but if they’re spending over $1 million per year on accommodating passengers who are victims of overbooking, just so they don’t lose money per flight on the statistical chance some people don’t show up for their flight, then there are economics out there that my little brain can’t fathom. If a ticket on my flight cost $1,100, KLM just spent that on me for not getting on that flight. Even worse for them, they lost a customer. Over the span of a lifetime, I probably would have flown KLM several more times – a drop in the bucket for them, for sure – but loss of revenue is still loss of revenue.
I am not a professional traveler; I fly between 2 and 3 times a year, mostly domestic, but have flown internationally the past 3 years (and hopefully will be lucky enough to continue this trend in the future). But I do understand that I, not a frequent flyer, am an airlines dream: I will incur the costs of things precisely because I don’t travel often (compared to a frequent flyer who gets all the perks). And I understand that every airline overbooks many, if not all, their flights. But I’ve never been bumped before, and it sure does leave a bad taste in my mouth.
I was talking to a buddy about this and he said, more coherently than I could, that the issue is the injustice: you pay a lot of money for a ticket, follow all the ridiculous rules of flying and after two weeks away, all you want to do is get on the plane and head home. It’s not right, he said, how the airline industry doesn’t care about its customers; in fact, it only cares about one thing: pleasing its shareholders.
Now that I’ve had a few days to simmer down, as I’m back in NYC, I can reflect on the situation with a bit clearer mind and realized that while it was a major inconvenience, I did get home safely. And $1,500 richer. And a better understanding of how airlines make their money and value their customers. Also, I do feel bad for the attendants (who, by the way do not have names. They call each other “my colleague”) as they have to deal with angry customers like me on a daily basis. So I apologize to “my colleagues” at the Schiphol KLM desks.
I will do everything in my power to never fly KLM again (although I will still fly Delta).
I’d love to hear your horror stories on KLM – or any other airline.
I fly KLM all the time. Only since the Air France merger has service gone down hil but only on the air france parts of the company. Got stuck in Paris once due to weather. Took us 3 hours to get the hotel sorted, anohter 90 minutes to reach it (including the bus driver getting lost twice). Time we got there we had 15 minutes to scoff down the left overs of a dinner buffet..
Complaining got me 10000 miles on my klm account.
The “my colleague” is typical Dutch, no native would think twice about that.
Posted by wijnands | December 10, 2011, 7:36 pmI was supposed to travel from Birmingham to Bucharest (via Amsterdam) together with my wife and our 1-year old daughter on 6 September 2011.
The flight to Amsterdam was slightly delayed and, as we were landing in Amsterdam, one of the flight attendants announced there were “no connections” to Bucharest and we would have to go to the Transfer Desk.
I was seated, together with my wife and daughter, in the last row. Having heard that we would no catch our connection and since my daughter had just fallen asleep shortly before landing and given also that we were in last row, my wife and I decided to wait for all passengers to go out and then we made our way out of the airplane.
Since my wife was carrying my (sleeping) daughter on her arms, we decided that it would be best for her to wait close to the arrival gate, while I would go and book us on the next available flight. As I was walking towards the Transfer Desk, I heard an announcement requesting two passengers for the Bucharest flight to get to the gate. I started to run and arrived at the gate very quickly – there were about 5 minutes (brisk pace) between gates (probably 2 minutes running).
There, I explained my situation to the KLM employee behind the desk and asked whether there would be time for me to go and get my wife and daughter to embark for the flight. I explained I would be there in 5 minutes. The person I was speaking to replied that if my wife was not already on her way and would not get to the gate in 2 minutes, then we would be unable to embark, since the gate would be closing “in 2 minutes”.
I was then reassured by her that she would make all the arrangements for us to be booked on the next flight, to have a room at a hotel near the airport for the night and to be transported with the shuttle back to the airport. I took this to mean that she would do this shortly after the gate would be closing, so I waited there. As I was waiting, a passenger from Düsseldorf, who was scheduled to go to Bucharest arrived, but he was not on the passengers’ list. He was registered and given a boarding pass. After about 10 minutes of waiting, I asked the same officer whether I should go and get my wife and daughter to board the flight, but I was told that it was too late, since the gate would be “closing in 2 minutes”.
I decided to run to get my wife and daughter more than 10 minutes after my initial discussion with the aforementioned officer. At that point the passengers that I initially heard being called for boarding were not there, since another announcement had just been made. When I arrived with my wife and daughter at the gate, the gate was closed.
We went then to the Transfer Desk. The person I spoke to suggested that perhaps the initial announcement that there were no connections to Bucharest had been made because it would have been impossible for the luggage to be taken in such a short time to the next flight. Of course, he acknowledged that we should have had the option of choosing to fly and get our luggage later, rather than being told there were no connections.
Yet, on the next day, our luggage did not arrive with our flight. Moreover, we received one piece of luggage on 8 September and the second one on 9 September.
Unfortunately, there is more: at the Transfer Desk in Amsterdam I asked about the possibility of making a complaint and I was advised to use the KLM website. I was told I can place the complaint on the same evening and ask for a refund. I tried to do this on that evening, but the KLM ecomplaint system was not working. To register my complaint, I completed a refund form and I also sent the complaint by email to KLM Reservations, mentioning that the ecomplaint system was not working and requesting them to forward my complaint to Customer Care.
On the evening of 19 September, in Bucharest, when I tried to do the online check-in for the return (the return flight being scheduled on 20 September), I noticed that my ticket was not on the system. I phoned KLM the next day in the morning (to: +44(0)8712310000) to double-check everything was fine only to be told that my ticket had been cancelled, since my request for refund was processed, approved and the transfer was executed between 8 and 19 September! I was told that a request for a refund made before the return flight automatically cancels my tickets. Yet, nobody mentioned about this when I was advised to make a complaint and request a refund at the Transfer Desk, nor was this mentioned on the KLM website. On my return to the UK I noticed that an email was sent to me about the refund on 12 September, but there was no mention of the cancellation of my ticket in that email either.
The person I spoke to on the phone on the morning of the 19th (I was calling from Bucharest to the UK number above) advised me that there was nothing they could do and I should go to the Airport to try to sort out the problem there, since she had made a note to my records, so the KLM employees at the Otopeni Airport would be aware of the situation. To cut a long story short, I should say that at the Otopeni Airport nobody was aware of my situation and nobody could help – I had to buy a new ticket to be able to travel with my family on that day. I was under a lot of stress, since my wife had back problems and could not travel on her own with our daughter (who was quite big for her age) and also because I had important meetings on 21 September and I needed to get in the UK on 20 September.
Unfortunately, there is more: in Amsterdam, before boarding on the flight to Birmingham, we asked one of the KLM employees from the gate desk whether we had time to change our daughter’s nappy; we were told we had plenty of time – a few minutes later, however, another KLM employee from the same desk came to the toilet tell us that we needed to board “immediately”, that “there is no time for baby dippers”. When I mentioned that we had just asked for permission to do this and that we had just been told that there was plenty of time, we were told that that was wrong – no apology, no word to explain how KLM employees one minute tell us something and the next minute something else.
Finally, just before boarding, I had to fold the baby’s pushchair to hand it over to be taken to the luggage compartment; the KLM employee who had to take it to the airplane told me that I had to empty the small bag attached to the pushchair (there were only a few items there). She told me that it was too heavy for her to carry. I explained that it was difficult for me on the spot to carry the things in the bag (mostly baby food), that on the way from Bucharest to Amsterdam we were not asked to do this and that it should be made clear from the beginning that this was what we had to do in order to be able to prepare ourselves properly. Not only was there no apology or polite request, but the next KLM employee we encountered, who had initially rushed us out of the baby changing room, went with us on the plane and started to complain (in Dutch!) to the flight attendant. Fortunately I know German, so I could understand some of the things said and these were inaccurate (no mention for instance about the heaviness of the small pushchair bag and emphasis was put on security!).
I sent a complaint to the KLM shortly after 20 September and have corresponded with them since then. My request was to have the flight from Bucharest to Amsterdam refunded (the one I had to purchase on 20 September), which I was told by the KLM representative in Bucharest would be done for me, and to be compensated for the disruption to the flight on 6 September. I also requested that the phone conversation on 20 September be refunded.
The responses I received denied any responsibility and most recently I was told I exhausted all avenues for complaint with the airline. KLM does not deny providing the wrong information – they only claim it was my decision to place a refund on their website and, hence, that I am not entitled to a refund. Concerning the missed connection, they claim that it was standard procedure to be given the wrong information – which I am sure cannot be the case.
It seems to me we can say about most of the actions we do that they are in a sense our own responsibility (unless we qare physically constrained to do them), but this is not the relevant sense for the situation here. If we act by following the advice of an authority, then that authority should take some responsibility for what they say/do. I cannot suddenly stop trusting what a flight attendant tells me and start thinking whether I should decide as advised or act otherwise.
I mention that I have been travelling with various air companies (including KLM) at least twice per year since 1996 and I have never had such a bad experience. I also mention that I requested KLM to send me their complaint procedures several times – I still have not received it, although my request is acknowledged; all I am told is that the procedure had been followed from the moment of my first complaint.
If I will be able to avoid it, I will never fly KLM again.
Posted by Sorin Baiasu | December 29, 2011, 11:06 pmKLM is the worse airline ever. I will NEVER fly with them Again. I was in a motorbike accident in Romania. My friend was in the hospital. I tried to have KLM help me change my return flight for 2 days, and they won’t. NOT even for a fee. They wanted me to buy a new ticket. Customer service was rude. “Ismail Gamcal” the customer representative would not even try to help me. He said, there is nothing he can do. He did not even attempt a resolution.They made me spend 4 hours calling various KLM offices. At the end they said, you need to buy a new ticket. I have flown many airlines. Never was I ever treated like this. NEVER. F*** YOU KLM. Never flying with you again.
Posted by Matt Kane | January 31, 2013, 5:42 amall airlines overbooked their flights and will do it if law doesn’t not forbid that…KLM is not the only one to do it!! I did’nt have bad experiences yet with airlines because I tried to prepare my flight long time ago…and I have to experience that one day,I will stay calm and send a complaint to the airline when I go back home..that’s my way of life..Rgds
Posted by henry | January 15, 2013, 8:08 pmPre booked flights cancellations, even when ur a gold member including klm yearly business contracts, even when u explain u have to be on the flight as family circumstances require, getting lousy excuses and communication, than a computer compensation for 10.000 miles ? If we don’t have to book Klm for me as a person, or the company we will not do. Really…..try Lufthansa or Emirates, price and quality wise its of a better level, and no arrogant behaviour at all.
Posted by Wibo | March 2, 2013, 9:31 amJust dropped my mate off at Birmingham airport on a KLM flight to Amsterdam and they have no seat for her they,ve overbooked. Her brother in law has Cancer thats why she,s going out there. This is absolutely disgusting how they can give flights away or overbook. Something should be done about this… Will never fly KLM again
Posted by vicki | March 28, 2013, 4:18 am