I tried to post this while on the road yesterday and for whatever reason it didn’t post, so I’m re-posting today:

Yesterday I had a planning trip for SCIP’s 2007
conference at the Marriott Marquis in Times Square. I had a flight up
Monday night that was cancelled so I was re-booked for yesterday
morning and the flight up was fine.  Unfortunately the return flight
last night was cancelled due to weather (along with at least a dozen
other flights) and in the typical fashion of modern airlines Delta
assigned exactly one person to their registration desk so re-booking
took forever.  They also offered no help in finding a room, but I was
lucky to find a hotel with the help of a fellow traveler who does a lot
of travel to NY.  Since this is peak tourist season almost everything
was booked solid.

So after four hours sleep and wearing the same clothes as yesterday I
sit in Atlanta waiting for my connecting flight (let’s forget that I
paid for a direct flight) and am feeling tired and smelly. The only
positive note is that they originally had me going through Cincinnati,
but when I showed up they  were oversold for that flight and they gave
me a $200 travel voucher to switch to the Atlanta flight.

I also feel fortunate compared to the woman who was in front of me in
the line to re-book; she was travelling with her 7-ish daughter and
wasn’t sure where she was going to stay.  She disappeared before I or
the guy who helped me find a room could offer help.  Hopefully she made
it home.

Conclusion: Delta’s customer service sucks. Not necessarily the people,
although the kid they had working the counter either wasn’t too bright
or very well trained, but the management structure that allowed them to
do such a poor job of staffing and a horrendou job of communicating
with the customers as flights were repeatedly delayed and eventually
cancelled.  There were a LOT of pissed-off Delta customers in NY last
night.