Hello Lovelies.

Where have I been?…..Well, hm.  How about we start with this – which is mostly just a rant to express how you should never fly Delta ever, ever again.  I mean, EV-ER.

Last Thursday, Tim and I had to fly up to Rochester, NY (where his entire family lives) because his uncle passed away earlier in the week.  I don’t know if any of you have ever booked a bereavement fare but holy hell.  Eighteen hundred dollars.

Wait…did that sink in?

EIGHTEEN. HUNDRED. DOLLARS.

For two plane tickets.

Two plane tickets that weren’t even direct flights.

Two plane tickets that went from Denver to Atlanta to Rochester.  Flying through Atlanta makes no sense, Delta.  Just sayin.

And this is the treatment we received from Delta:

Tim and I left the house around 4am on Thursday for our 6:15am flight out of Denver.  As we’re walking into the airport, Tim receives a call from Delta all, “Your flight has been delayed two hours…until 8:15am.”

Why?  Why was the flight delayed?

Crew rest.

Fabulous.

The line of people waiting in front of the Delta kiosks to be re-booked on flights was ridiculously long.  Apparently our flight wasn’t the only one with this “crew rest” issue.

Where is the planning, Delta?  Foresight?  Something.

Anyhow, thanks to “crew rest” we would miss our connection in Atlanta and, in turn, miss part of the services in Rochester that were scheduled for Thursday.

Delta didn’t fix that.  At all.

The customer service person who helped us did seem to be sensitive to the situation.  Whether or not she did everything she could possibly do is up for debate.  We sat in the Denver airport for hours, finally boarded the flight and were off to Atlanta.

Only to sit in Atlanta to wait for the new flight they put us on.  We arrived in Atlanta around 1pm-ish…the flight to Rochester?  That flight didn’t leave until 3pm.

We were supposed be in Rochester at 3pm.

At the end of that very long day, we didn’t end up landing in Rochester until somewhere around 5:15pm.  And I had to change into my dress in the airport bathroom.

Gross.

So, let’s revisit.  All of this for EIGHTEEN HUNDRED DOLLARS.

One would think it really couldn’t get any worse, right?

So, SO wrong.

On our flight back to Denver we, again, had a connection through Atlanta.  The plane to Rochester was late (surprise, surprise), so we were already delayed around 30 minutes, which shrunk the connection time down to around 40 minutes.

Then?

Not only was the plane late, they SENT THE WRONG PLANE and FAILED TO LET ANYBODY KNOW.

Communication is a beautiful thing, Delta.

So, instead of giving the Rochester airport a heads up all, “FYI: Sent wrong plane,” allowing the terminal employees to try and sort this out since the plane was late anyway, no one knew what was going on and people ended up with tickets for seats in rows that didn’t exist because why would they send a bigger plane?

Exactly.

They wouldn’t.

They sent a smaller plane.  With less seats.  Which meant that eight or so people weren’t going to fit.  Period.

Delta played ring-around-the-cabin for the next 45 minutes while we watched the same people walk down the walkway, out of the plane and up to the terminal only to return ten minutes later and then do it all over again, bags in hand.

Seriously, Delta?  The F?

Tim and I were fairly certain we wouldn’t make our connection.  But, what’s worse?  Over half the plane had connecting flights and THEY didn’t make theirs, either.  One would think somebody would be like, “Wow…there sure are a lot of people with connections in Atlanta on this flight…better make sure we send the right plane.”

As we were trying to board the plane in the first place, one of the Delta terminal employees, as he was coming down the walkway to get onto the plane and hold up the entire process FOR THE SECOND TIME was all, “if you all don’t hurry you’re all missing your connections. Hardee har har.”

Well, thanks for that bit of knowledge, Sherlock.  Maybe if you got your own shit together and stopped running back and forth, up and down the cabin of the plane, we could actually get on the plane.  Ass.

Finally, the seat issue was sorted out or everyone just gave up and sat down somewhere.  A dude from the back of the plane (where the seat issues were) ended up sitting behind Tim and I, so we heard his rendition of “What Happened.”

Apparently, the ring-around-the-rosey was all because of one lady who went ape because she couldn’t have HER EXACT SEAT SHE WAS ASSIGNED.

Whatever the reason, we ended up in Atlanta about seven minutes before our original plane left at 4:20pm.

And does Delta hold planes for people when they only need about ten minutes to get to the gate because their other Delta flight was late because of Delta?

(that question is a joke, right?)

We thought we could get re-booked on the next direct flight to Denver that left around 5:20pm.

Why we even thought that, I have no idea.  Why we thought Delta would try to fix an already terrible situation…no idea.

Because noooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo we paid EIGHTEEN HUNDRED DOLLARS for them to put us on a plane that went to CINCINNATI.

Then?  Because this flight left about twenty minutes after we landed, they made us check our carry-on luggage because they ran out of space in the overhead compartments (which is a whole different issue that I won’t even get started on here) and they sat us the the very back of the plane next to the engine.

Oh, wait, valet gate check, you ask?  The one where you get a little pink tag that means you get to see your bag right after your flight?

Nope.

They sent our bag on a journey all its own.  The tag they gave us said we’d have to go to the special customer service desk in Denver to find our bag.

Again, Delta, what the F?

And then?  A THREE HOUR LAYOVER in Cincinnati.  We weren’t scheduled to get into Denver until 10:00pm. Which was midnight eastern time.

We were originally supposed to get into Denver at 5:00pm (7:00pm eastern).

We paid for a one stop flight.  EIGHTEEN HUNDRED DOLLARS.

Yet, somehow, we ended up with a multi-stop flight that probably would have been CHEAPER than what we paid for…

Does Delta care?

Nope.

Whoever I talked to on their “Help Line” told me – within the span of, ohhh, five seconds – that she had checked EVERY SINGLE airline and there weren’t any seats available anywhere.  Not in Coach.  Not in Business Class.  Not anywhere.  So sorry.

This additional connection to Cincinnati was the last straw.  I literally had a melt down, sobbing the entire way to the gate to get on the plane to Cincinnati.

Did Delta even think to provide any kind of voucher for a meal, given we were now going to be in varying airports and in the air on their planes for close to fourteen hours?

Of course not.

Did Delta think to do anything at all to make this situation better?

Why would they do something like that?

They’re literally scraping the bottom of the barrel when it comes to customer service.  They came in LAST PLACE in the 2011 ACSI survey.  DEAD. ASS. LAST.  So, no, Delta doesn’t do anything for its customers other than take their money and run.

This is why they’re at the bottom.

Delta is zero percent helpful and makes a bad experience absolutely horrific – to the point we’ve decided never to fly Delta ever again.  We’ll pay more to fly another airline before we even think about Delta.  Which? Sad.  Delta used to be Tim’s airline of choice.  We have a sky miles card that we pay an annual fee every year just to HAVE.  That one is probably going to the shredder.  We fly multiple times a year.  Tim flies for work almost every month.

Guess who isn’t getting the benefit of THAT revenue?

Why remain loyal to an airline when this is the kind of treatment one receives?

I am so glad we paid Delta EIGHTEEN HUNDRED DOLLARS to be late to a funeral, put up with their varying levels of incompetence and lack of communication, resulting in late planes and the wrong planes and seat disasters and traveling backwards on a multi-stop flight where we had to live on a wing and a prayer that our bag actually made it back with us.

All because of Delta’s screw ups.  We were where we were supposed to be, on time and ready to go.

Delta wasn’t….helpful…accommodating…Delta wasn’t anything but a massive disappointment of epic proportions.

Tim and my asses are still beyond chapped that we gave Delta EIGHTEEN HUNDRED DOLLARS and received this kind of treatment.

Bravo, Delta.  You just lost two more customers.