8:09 PM
| Sunrise at | 9:21 AM | in direction | 127° | Southeast |  |
| Sunset at | 4:50 PM | in direction | 233° | Southwest |  |
If you are a resident of Alaska, this airlines goes out of its way to be sure you get what you need. Gary and I are flying to Anchorage next week. Gary is a bladder cancer and prostrate cancer patient. For several years, he has been in remission for both of these cancers, but last fall, a biopsy confirmed the bladder cancer had recurred. We are going to Anchorage for another biopsy of a suspicious area. The drive is six hours or more and could be quite uncomfortable on the return drive home.
Because I am an Alaska Airline credit card consumer, I receive one companion ticket per year, to fly anywhere that Alaska Airlines flies. My husband flies with me for $100 plus whatever fees and taxes are charged at airports, etc. We bought tickets last summer and then did not use them. They sent us the E-ticket numbers and today I got online to claim them for our flight to Anchorage on Tuesday. I made a mistake and purchased my ticket first because I was following the directions on the email telling me how to claim them. The balance of my fare price went into what's called "My Wallet" for later use. Then when I went to claim Gary's ticket, I received an error message because I needed to claim it over the phone so it could be attached to my trip.
Arrrgh!!
I called Alaska Airlines and the customer service representative was willing to see what he could do - given that they needed to be reserved and purchased over the telephone together in order to ensure they were treated as a companion fare price. And, he wanted to be sure I knew that I was claiming my companion ticket for a $250 fare when I could continue to hold in it reserve for another joint trip - one that was far more expensive. I can see it logically now; since the ticket numbers are separate, they would be able to apply it to any joint trip. Still I wasn't thinking all of those things through and I was glad he pointed it out. I considered, but finally decided I wanted to claim them now anyway. Our expenses may continue to be high as a result of Gary's health and we do have another companion ticket to use this year.
He was talking about costs for this and fees for that, to be sure I understood what it was costing me. I had a $100 change fee on top of the companion fare price, for example, which brought the cost of the ticket almost to the regular price; I commented that it was still worth it because I didn't need to take it all out of pocket and we were flying there for my husband's surgery. He asked if reducing the change fee would help; he could do that since we were Alaska residents and were flying there for surgery. I accepted the offer with alacrity.
After completing the reservation; he explained I still had an unused balance. They could not put it into my wallet (and the reason made sense, but I forgotten what it was), so the balance of Gary's original fare would come to me in a certificate I could use on any fare for anyone at any time and I could do so online. He also told me that despite the fact that we had two separate confirmation numbers, he listed us as traveling as a group of two, so if there were any flight changes, we would be moved together.
He totally covered for me. I goofed and he cleaned it up! This is not the first time I have had to turn to a customer service representative to help me with details in planning an unusual circumstance and I realize as I type this, I was very comfortable in asking for help. My experience with the company is that they will help me. My father told me representatives have gone out of their way to help him in his travel plans up here this summer.
In addition to My Wallet and flight certificates, if you are a mileage plan member with the airlines, you can buy miles ahead of time and hold them in reserve, much the same way I am holding the balance of our previous fare in reserve. Since we have to fly so frequently, it is not likely to be money wasted and you make the purchase when you have spare funds, instead of scrambling for it in an emergency. Not only is it easy to use cancelled flights and fare balances, the company acknowledges that as Alaskans, we often need to travel by air to accomplish what others can usually do locally since there are only two cities with populations over 100,000 in Alaska. I could cite many more examples, but it's probably enough to say - nice people and really classy planes.
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| Boeing 737-800 (from Wikipedia) |
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