Part 1: Cathay Pacific/NAIA
In 2005, we were invited to a Louis Vuitton event in Hong Kong. Four of us were booked on a Cathay Pacific flight departing at 12:30 noon from NAIA 1.
Alex Vergara and I agreed to carpool on the way to airport and arrived around 10 AM at the airport.
Upon checking in at Business Class, we were told that the 11 AM flight prior to our flight wasn’t full—would we like to take that instead of the 12:30?
Alex and I looked at each other and said why not?
We had barely enough time to plant our asses in the lounge as were nearly boarding.
The other two in our party, however, arrived at NAIA around 11:30 AM, only to find out that our original 12:30 noon flight was delayed to a much later flight.
Alex and I were lucky! Arriving in Hong Kong earlier than planned meant we had extra time to relax before attending cocktails that night.
Photo: Paulo Ordoveza
Part 2: Singapore Airlines/Changi
Jeroen and I were checking in for a 2:10 PM flight to Manila when the ground staff looked at our tickets and told us our fight was actually booked for the next day. Say whuuuu????
My head started to spin. How could I make this mistake? Our flight was booked for July 22, not 21.
What do we do now? Do we go back to the city and try to book a hotel? What do we do for the next 24 hours?
I did not say a word. I didn’t freak out like Claudine Barretto. I let Jeroen talk to the Singapore girl, who then told us the 2:10 flight wasn’t full—she could actually squeeze us in today!
Whew! I can’t tell you how relieved we were to be able to go home that same day.
Photo: Jerry Wong
Part 3: Philippine Airlines/Caticlan
Luckily this did not happen to me or Claudine Barretto. I’m sharing it because it could happen to you and PAL needs to know something is really wrong with their customer service.
Read about what happened to Roxanne Lu as she tried to board a Manila-bound Philippine Airlines flight from Caticlan: it’s called Airline Bullying.
Originally published at Chuvaness.com. You can comment here or there.