Our JetBlue Nightmare
Posted: Sun Jan 06, 2013 5:11 pm
We just returned from a fabulous holiday vacation in St. John. I plan to write a full trip report but did not want to taint it with the JetBlue debacle that occurred at the end of our trip. So I decided to write a separate post to warn everyone about what can possibly happen when you book JetBlue.
We were scheduled to fly out of St. Thomas at 5:18 p.m. on Thursday. It was a quick 30-minute flight. We had an hour layover in San Juan and then we were scheduled to fly up to Hartford.
We arrived at the airport just before 4 p.m. and the customs line was out of control. I asked the JetBlue ticket agent if we would make it in time and they assured us that we would. (Yes, I was well aware that we were cutting it close.) We waited in line for more than an hour and were starting to get nervous. As we approached security, we noticed that the other airlines had representatives there to pull passengers out of line to ensure that they made their flight. We asked where JetBlue's representatives were and were told that there were none. Ok, I thought, no big deal. We still had a few minutes to spare. I truly was not nervous at this point, though I found it odd that JetBlue was nowhere to be found.
So we arrive at the gate with about five minutes to spare. There was no plane and no sign about the JetBlue desk giving any information. We soon learned that the flight had been delayed. Our group of six was then told to go back up to the front desk to get a voucher. Yes, a voucher. I immediately knew that meant we weren't going anywhere.
So here is where the nightmare begins:
When I got back to the desk, the same desk that I checked in at at 4 p.m., I was told that they knew the flight was delayed at 2 p.m. and that they called me and left me a voicemail. I showed the representative my iPhone and that no call was made and no message was left. She assured me that it was. She stated that there were not enough planes in the Caribbean and that they knew all day that this flight would be delayed for several hours, prompting us to miss our connecting flight. Now this is what really annoyed me- why did JetBlue allow me to check in two hours after they said they called me to tell me that I would not be able to fly out that night? And if they really did call me, I would have been able to book my own Cape Air flight so I could have made the second leg. But because we didn’t learn about this until 5:30 p.m., we were stuck. (I learned the next day that a robocall was made to me, not a live person. Clearly there was a glitch in their system. This was especially frustrating seeing that JetBlue has emailed me numerous times over the past several months when our flight changed by a minute, yet email was sent the day of the trip. Odd and frustrating.)
Ok, an extra night in the Caribbean – that doesn’t sound too bad, right? Well that’s what I thought … at first.
I’ll spare you all the horrible details so here is a quick glimpse of what happened next:
• Rather than being put up in one of the three hotels right next to the airport, we were sent to Sugar Bay, which is on the other side of the island. This hotel is a dump and is nothing like what it appears to be on its website.
• The taxi that JetBlue put us on decided it was more important to bring a TSA agent home first instead of bringing us to our hotel. This doubled our travel time and brought us through one of the island’s scariest neighborhoods. Even my husband who is a retired police officer was nervous by the area.
• When we arrived at Sugar Bay, we were given two twin beds for four people. (My parents scored and got a king sized bed, though their room had a rancid smell.
• All of the restaurants were closed. We were forced to eat nearly inedible pizza at the hotel bar.
• We were flown to New York 24 hours later, which is three hours away from Hartford, which is where our cars were.
• Lastly, JetBlue lied to me on the phone and said there was a medical emergency on our plane, which is why it was late. This is after the supervisor of airport operations told me the truth that there were not enough planes in the Caribbean. They told me they would not credit us anything; however they finally threw $600 at us to shut me up. Little do they know, a mere $600 will not shut me up after enduring this hellish trip home.
I have always liked JetBlue but this experience was truly a nightmare. They treated us all like garbage and lied on top of it. I am very frustrated with JetBlue.
But to end on a positive note, we truly did have a fabulous trip in St. John and I cannot wait to plan my next trip!
We were scheduled to fly out of St. Thomas at 5:18 p.m. on Thursday. It was a quick 30-minute flight. We had an hour layover in San Juan and then we were scheduled to fly up to Hartford.
We arrived at the airport just before 4 p.m. and the customs line was out of control. I asked the JetBlue ticket agent if we would make it in time and they assured us that we would. (Yes, I was well aware that we were cutting it close.) We waited in line for more than an hour and were starting to get nervous. As we approached security, we noticed that the other airlines had representatives there to pull passengers out of line to ensure that they made their flight. We asked where JetBlue's representatives were and were told that there were none. Ok, I thought, no big deal. We still had a few minutes to spare. I truly was not nervous at this point, though I found it odd that JetBlue was nowhere to be found.
So we arrive at the gate with about five minutes to spare. There was no plane and no sign about the JetBlue desk giving any information. We soon learned that the flight had been delayed. Our group of six was then told to go back up to the front desk to get a voucher. Yes, a voucher. I immediately knew that meant we weren't going anywhere.
So here is where the nightmare begins:
When I got back to the desk, the same desk that I checked in at at 4 p.m., I was told that they knew the flight was delayed at 2 p.m. and that they called me and left me a voicemail. I showed the representative my iPhone and that no call was made and no message was left. She assured me that it was. She stated that there were not enough planes in the Caribbean and that they knew all day that this flight would be delayed for several hours, prompting us to miss our connecting flight. Now this is what really annoyed me- why did JetBlue allow me to check in two hours after they said they called me to tell me that I would not be able to fly out that night? And if they really did call me, I would have been able to book my own Cape Air flight so I could have made the second leg. But because we didn’t learn about this until 5:30 p.m., we were stuck. (I learned the next day that a robocall was made to me, not a live person. Clearly there was a glitch in their system. This was especially frustrating seeing that JetBlue has emailed me numerous times over the past several months when our flight changed by a minute, yet email was sent the day of the trip. Odd and frustrating.)
Ok, an extra night in the Caribbean – that doesn’t sound too bad, right? Well that’s what I thought … at first.
I’ll spare you all the horrible details so here is a quick glimpse of what happened next:
• Rather than being put up in one of the three hotels right next to the airport, we were sent to Sugar Bay, which is on the other side of the island. This hotel is a dump and is nothing like what it appears to be on its website.
• The taxi that JetBlue put us on decided it was more important to bring a TSA agent home first instead of bringing us to our hotel. This doubled our travel time and brought us through one of the island’s scariest neighborhoods. Even my husband who is a retired police officer was nervous by the area.
• When we arrived at Sugar Bay, we were given two twin beds for four people. (My parents scored and got a king sized bed, though their room had a rancid smell.
• All of the restaurants were closed. We were forced to eat nearly inedible pizza at the hotel bar.
• We were flown to New York 24 hours later, which is three hours away from Hartford, which is where our cars were.
• Lastly, JetBlue lied to me on the phone and said there was a medical emergency on our plane, which is why it was late. This is after the supervisor of airport operations told me the truth that there were not enough planes in the Caribbean. They told me they would not credit us anything; however they finally threw $600 at us to shut me up. Little do they know, a mere $600 will not shut me up after enduring this hellish trip home.
I have always liked JetBlue but this experience was truly a nightmare. They treated us all like garbage and lied on top of it. I am very frustrated with JetBlue.
But to end on a positive note, we truly did have a fabulous trip in St. John and I cannot wait to plan my next trip!
