Dear Mr. Yablon,
Your email to Ms. Fiorillo was forwarded to my attention for immediate response. Our thoughts and prayers are with you and your family.
Thank you for taking the time to write to us. We appreciate the opportunity to address your concerns regarding the fare difference incurred on your flight October 4, 2012.
In order to keep our fares low, certain restrictions must apply. It appears you purchased a non-refundable fare when you booked your flight with us. Only if changes or cancellations are made within 24-hours of the original booking can the charge be reversed back to the original form of payment. Any changes or cancellations outside the 24-hour timeframe incur a $100 per person change/cancellation fee, and any fare difference would either be collected or would go into a credit for future travel.
The fare difference at the time of the reservation change was $434.00 plus $100 change fee each. We have made the exception and will be refunding the $200.00 in change fees back to your original form of payment, but regretfully, we apologize that we are unable to make an exception and issue a refund for the fare difference. We understand that this is not the resolution you were seeking but hope that you will understand our position.
Thank you again for taking the time to provide us with your feedback. Whether bad or good, we appreciate your comments, as we are always looking to improve our service. We truly appreciate you as our guest and hope that you will allow us the opportunity to welcome you on board in the future.
Best regards,
Carl Ewaskowitz
Supervisor Guest Relations
Direct: 650-762-7339
Fax: 650-648-0493
carl.ewaskowitz@virginamerica.com
P please don't print this e-mail unless you really need to.
Begin forwarded
message:
From: Jeff Yablon <jeff@answerguy.com>
Date: October 8, 2012, 8:25:33 PM GMT+02:00
To: "frances.fiorillo@virginamerica.com" <frances.fiorillo@virginamerica.com>, "david.cush@virginamerica.com" <david.cush@virginamerica.com>, "Ross.bonanno@virginamerica.com" <Ross.bonanno@virginamerica.com>
Subject: Customer Complaint, Reservation # 0QQAMX
Good afternoon:
I'm writing you today to lodge a complaint about a situation I ran into with your airline last week. I apologize for "carpet bombing" the three of you, but as I was unsuccessful in reaching a high-level, "presidential support line" when I requested that on the telephone, I've decided that "more is better" and trust you will sort out the appropriate action.
My wife and I live in New York. We were scheduled to fly on your 3:40 PM flight from LAX to JFK on Friday October 5. We were in Los Angeles for a service for my sister, who recently passed away. That service took place on Thursday the 4th at 4 PM, and several hours before we received a call from back east informing us that my wife's 88-year-old father was hospitalized, ventilated, and septic. We were told by a family member who happens to be a Registered Nurse that if we waited to take the flight we were scheduled on we might be too late to see him.
As such, we called you and requested a change to the 11:45 PM flight on Thursday night, explaining the situation. Please remember that we were on the way to another very difficult event at the time, and so when I was informed by your agent that a change would cost over $1,000 my immediate reaction was shock and horror, under duress. I thanked the agent, and on our way out of our hotel spoke with the concierge who offered to try and talk some sense into your agent(s).
Ultimately she failed. We booked the flight, paying your—please excuse the categorization—extortion fee. Amazingly, our hotel allowed us to leave our things in the room, attend the service, and check out at approximately 9 PM without charging us anything. They in fact lost inventory; our room went unused that night, and the hotel ate it in the name of customer service.
Virgin America, on the other hand, did no such thing. But we hadn't asked you to. We merely took up two seats on the same route we had already been booked on, and I hope sincerely you managed to rebook the seats we vacated.
I've spoken with a customer care agent today and she tells me she's refunding the "change fee" portion of the moneys your company demanded from us to make it so my wife had a better chance at averting what was sounding like a truly dire circumstance. She was lovely. Truly, your original agents were also polite and sounded like they wished they could help us. "Polite" is not at issue.
What is at issue is that regardless of esoterica such as "class changes", fare changes, and the like, I'm requesting that in the name of customer service you refund the money I was charged on October 4. I didn't cause you to lose money. I didn't add extra cargo, require extra services, or take up extra room. I simply flew from LAX to JFK 16 hours earlier than I had planned, and feel taken advantage of.
Regardless of your disposition toward fulfilling my request, I would appreciate a response. Having flown both Virgin America and Virgin Atlantic in the past, been very happy, and told many people as much, I would hate to see the application of rules or computer-driven policies overcome common sense. Again, I make this request purely as a matter of customer service.
Thank you very much,
Jeff Yablon
President & CEO
Virtual VIP Group
646 827-3800
TWITTER: http://twitter.com/virtualvip
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