Ease of Travel

Gerri Willis writes a daily column of five tips and today they feature things you can do in the event of bad service or a bad product, as it relates to travel. Some of these are common sense, you may already do these things, others are on that border of where you aren’t sure if it’s customary to ask or if the company will laugh at you. This covers airlines, cruises, hotels, tours, and online travel agencies (Expedia, Travelocity, etc).

For flights:
For delayed flights, ask the airline to switch you over to another airline with the airline paying the difference. For delays, ask for meal vouchers. For overnight delays, ask for a hotel room. If it’s just a bad flight, ask for frequent flier miles and they may give you 500 or 1,000 miles. It’s harder with airlines because they’re in financial trouble.

If you want to file a formal complaint against the airline, you can e-mail the Aviation Consumer Protection Division of the Department of Transportation at airconsumer@ost.dot.gov. Or you can call at 202-366-2220.

For cruises:
Go straight to the services desk to try to get the problem resolved immediately, sometimes if you complain they’ll give you some free onboard credit for services like the spa, drinks, etc. If bad weather makes you miss a destination or something, ask and you will get cash to spend on the next cruise if it’s serious enough.

To file a complaint about your cruise, contact the Federal Maritime Commission at www.fmc.gov.

For hotels:
Solve problems on the spot, a complaint later won’t get a good response. You probably won’t get free stuff out of it but you usually can get your problem resolved.

For online travel agencies:

Online agencies like Expedia.com are doing millions of transactions over a period of a month. [travel writer and ombudsman Chris] Elliott says there’s bound to be some errors. “They’ve developed this system that deflects complaints. If you send them an e-mail, they may send you a voucher. Don’t take that funny money. Get a check,” he says.