Never Fly on JetBlue (A Word of Warning)

A Quick Update on 7/23/07: JetBlue did read this blog post and attempt to make things right. You can read about their response in this blog entry: http://www.briankotek.com/blog/index.cfm/2007/7/23/JetBlue-Addresses-My-Complaints

I was recently in New York City for a quick, two day trip. What should have been a simple thing turned into a disaster, and it was due to the incompetence of the airline JetBlue. This was my first time flying with JetBlue. It was also the last.

My flight out of JFK airport in New York was canceled on a Thursday night. Normally this wouldn't be a big issue; flights get cancelled. But this goes beyond the normal cancelled flight. The way JetBlue handled this was really quite unbelievable.

The most damaging blunder that JetBlue made in this situation was that they did not cancel the flight until one hour before it was to leave. I was literally arguing with a JetBlue representative who was telling me that the flight was not canceled. I had to point HER at the departure screen at the airport to show her that it was. I had checked the flight status just before I left for the airport to be sure it was still on time.

Now I want to know how the hell JetBlue did not know until 1 hour before the flight was to leave that it would be canceled. This is either a very bad mistake, or proof that their logistics systems are terrible. Knowing beforehand that the flight was canceled would have saved me $120 in cab fares alone. That's the whole point of checking the flight status!

So, the first thing I did when I found out the flight was canceled was to try and call JetBlue. Unbelievably, I was met by a recorded message that essentially told me they were too busy, to call back later, and then hung up on me. Nice, huh? This is how they deal with customers when they are at their most vulnerable.

I waited for over an hour in line to finally be told that I could not fly out for more than 40 hours. No attempt to compensate me for this huge delay or help me find lodging was made. I was now stuck in New York City with no clothes, no money, and no place to stay, for 2 more days.

Since JetBlue does not offer WiFi internet access at their terminal (why I can't imagine unless, as seems to be the trend, they actually WANT to irritate their customers), I went to another terminal. From there I was able to plan an alternate route to get home. It took me 9 hours, a train ride to Philadelphia, a ticket on another airline (Southwest), and $350 to do it, but I got home. Again, I must point out, no thanks to JetBlue.

When I contacted JetBlue about this, the response was almost hilarious:

Our records at this time indicate your flight did not qualify for compensation. Our Compensation Team carefully reviews every aspect of our Bill of Rights before making that determination. Even though we cannot provide you with all of those details, we want you to know that we cannot reverse that decision. What we can do, is sincerely apologize and ask that you give us another opportunity to serve you.

Isn't that great? We can't give you anything. We can't tell you why we can't give you anything. But we're really sorry. Fly with us again.

Well, I won't be flying with JetBlue again. And I would urge anyone reading this not to either.