Are you a custom order guy? Or gal? You know the person who orders something off the menu, then changes like 5 things about it. Lets say extra crispy this, hold the that, not allot of this, and cut the crusts off. And then you get upset with staff when they mess up your order that NASA scientists would mess up? If so, get over it. Don’t be like my mom, or Danny and get upset about it. What did you expect?
I have a theory, and it is usually accurate. Well usually. It goes like this, you can make ONE change to any order. After that you are asking for it to be messed up. You want no lettuce and no mayo, ask for no mayo because you can pull lettuce off something. if you ask for both removed you will get both. This theory is except if it is Kai going to BK for me at the drive through! Then no matter how small the change is, they will mess it up. But I digress.
Why I am going off about food order changes? Tonight I have learned (well I knew it already but I let myself believe it was not true) change requests no matter what industry you are talking about cause chaos. Why you may ask? It goes to another theory I have. Well make it a law, it is that certain. It goes like this. 95% of the people out there are stupid. They are. I am not pessimistic. Prove me wrong! Really I want you to!
Today I flew home from Portland. I got to the airport really early so I asked to see if I can fly standby on the earlier flight. They (US Airways) said the earlier flight was booked but they would put me on standby. Boarding time comes around for the early flight and I am in luck, there are extra seats. As they give me my boarding card I ask for the second time “will my luggage get on this flight ok”? I am reasured by the gate agent that she is calling the luggage people right now and it will be taken care of. There was 20+ minutes to departure so no issues. Sure enough we waited on the ground for a while. I figure, plenty of time to put my bag on.
I get to NYC and proceed to get my bag. Well it doesn’t come off the carousel. Why you may ask? Well change is the answer. A simple change like modifying someone’s flight to an earlier one caused the system to be messed up. It was a simple change, one that you would think happens all the time, but it got messed up anyway. You may be saying “Scott, it was just one bag. Maybe they made an honest mistake”. That is a good theory. It gets flushed down the toilet when I tell you a lady with 2 missing bags (and a 2 year old) also lost 2 bags on the same flight for the same reason. The US Airways people called it a communication issue in Portland. I laughed and told them I can’t understand that because the gate agent said they were going to call right as I asked. So either one person is retarded or someone didn’t do their job.
The moral of this story. If I is food or flights, change is just a way of asking for your plans to be messed up.
Oh, and on another note. I do technology for a call center. We go to great lengths to make sure the customer always has choices, and can always get to a live person. it is possible to operate a Call Center like that, so NO ONE should tell me it is ok to have an IVR that does not have any way to get to a live agent. US Airways, a bit of a heads up. If I press 0, I better get a f–king live agent. if I press 0 several times I better get an agent, not an automated response telling me to try back later when I have my proper information. I am going to goto sleep tonight knowing that you are in chapter 11 for a good reason!!!
Yes I am pissed. But the agent at LGA was at least halfway decent, and I did get my luggage 7 hours later. I did however miss returning my Tux, and will have to pay the late fee when I return it.