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The Travel TroubleshooterLayover blues on PricelineBy Christopher ElliottQ: I will never use Priceline again. Here's the reason: I had a three-day weekend to myself, and I wanted to go to my Aunt's 85 birthday party in San Francisco from Phoenix, Ariz. I made a bid on Priceline, and even agreed to fly in to San Jose Airport instead of San Francisco International. So what do they do? Then have me leaving late in the afternoon on Friday (the whole day wasted), a layover in Salt Lake City, arriving at San Jose at 11 p.m. (Friday... shot!). Then they have me leaving to come home at 6:30 a.m. on Sunday. That gave me exactly one day with my Aunt. Thirty hours in San Francisco, and half of that was spent sleeping. Wow, now there's a real good deal! And you have no recourse, once you say you will accept its offer. And you don't know what the offer is until you say you'll accept. I will encourage others to think twice before even thinking about Priceline. - Lynn Farrell What a horrible itinerary. Priceline really gave you the runaround - and it could have done better. But it didn't have to. I contacted the company to ask about your schedule and it offered no apologies. Priceline representative Brian Ek reminded me that although you get to pick the dates you want to travel, the airlines choose the flights and times where they have seats available. Priceline offers the following guarantee: You'll always depart between 6 a.m. and 10 p.m. and arrive by 12:30 a.m. the next day for domestic travel. You'll also fly on a major full-service U.S. or international airline or its affiliate. Basically, Priceline did what it promised. Ek reminded me that the maximum layover had recently been shortened to three hours and that Priceline has also added more non-stop flights to its inventory. "I can sympathize, but there was nothing hidden about what the customer could get," he told me. "We're a tradeoff - you name the price, but you have to be willing to fly whenever the airlines have the empty seats." Still, I think Priceline did a pretty awful job getting you from Phoenix to San Francisco. You could have almost driven there in less time. Considering that many airlines are phasing out the inefficient "hub-and-spoke" system that makes Priceline's proviso necessary, maybe the site should consider dividing the country into zones. If you're flying within a zone, it should assure a shorter transit time. The longer the flight, the more waiting times you would have to endure. But that's only one of many possible solutions. In the end, however, you're responsible for carefully
reading Priceline's fine print (actually, the fact that Priceline can
sometimes give you an inconvenient itinerary is almost common knowledge
among travelers). The site even requires customers to initial a page
indicating that they understand the parameters of a Priceline ticket It's no excuse for Priceline's poor performance - but you were warned. Christopher Elliott is a travel writer based in Key Largo, Fla. E-mal him at chris@elliott.org |
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