Trip to Hell, With Sunshine | Lost Myths Ink, LLC

Trip to Hell, With Sunshine 
MedioCom 
©2002 by Debora Hill

It should have been a fantasy holiday, ten days in Paradise for a perfect little family. Instead it was an agonizing, exhausting trek that only provided relief when it ended. Susan and Robert Colombo chose SunTrips as the provider for their Hawaiian vacation, and nothing was ever the same again. 
May 27, 2001, Susan and Robert Colombo, Robert's mother Eleanor, and their daughter Nicole and Son Tyler were scheduled to leave San Francisco airport at 9 a.m. Because they live 1.5 hours from the airport, they stayed with relatives the night before, and arrived at the airport at 6 a.m., only to find no one manning the ticket desk. Help arrived at 7, and it was then the Colombos discovered their flight was delayed due to a mechanical problem.
At 8 a.m., they were informed their plane would leaved at 11 p.m. that night. At 9 a representative from Ryan International came to tell them that they would be compensated for meals and transportation. The Colombos returned to their relatives and finally left S.F.O at 11:30 that night. They arrived in Lihue, Hawaii at 2:00 a.m. on Saturday, May, 27th -- they were supposed to be there at 11:30 the previous morning. Their luggage went to Honolulu, with Tyler's asthma medication in it.
The airline told Susan that their bags would be delivered to their condo by 10:00 a.m. the day following their arrival, but it never arrived. When Susan called the airline she was told that 40 other people had their luggage sent to Honolulu by mistake, and nobody knew when it would be delivered. Susan and Robert drove to pick it up themselves, and then spent the remainder of their first day in Hawaii sleeping. The condominium they reserved at the Aston at Poi Pu Kai was still waiting for them, having been prepaid as part of their package, but for two nights it was vacant. After arrival they discovered they would be unable to swim at the hotel -- the pool was empty.
The second day of the trip a flat tire occurred on their rental car. Dollar Rentals refused to come and change the tire, and wouldn't bring them another tire, so Robert Colombo put the spare on, and they drove back to the airport to exchange the car. Another day wasted.
The remainder of the trip was uneventful, and the return went smoothly. After the return home was when the nightmare continued. Between the delay in leaving and the flat tire, three vacation days were lost. Susan and Robert felt they were owed more than reimbursement for two meals. Susan wrote her first letter to Ryan International on June 14th, outlining the problems and asking the company to make recompense for the mess. When there was no response after one month, she telephoned SunTrips directly and spoke to a Customer Service Representative named Valerie.
Valerie told Susan she had at least 300 complaints to take care of, and had no idea when she would be able to get to Susan's. She did some checking, and told Susan a refund of $534.90 had been sent to their travel agency.
Susan contacted her travel agent, who had never received the refund. She telephoned Valerie again and was told there had been an error made; that sum was for the agency commission on the trip. The Colombo letter had been assigned to an investigator, and Susan should hear something in approximately three weeks. When Susan asked to speak to a supervisor, Valerie told her that wasn't possible, and refused to even give her the name of a supervisor. When Susan persisted, Valerie finally transferred her to Mary Evanson's voice mail -- Mary was on vacation.
Susan decided to wait the three weeks, and received a letter from Mary Evanson on July 25th. Basically, it was an apology for the 'inconvenience' suffered, but there was no offer of recompense. Susan persisted, and finally received a refund of $394.42 for two night's stay at the Aston. No other recompense was ever offered, not for inconvenience, not for suffering, not for the dilapidated state of the Aston at Poi Pu Kai.
Now that the ordeal has finally ended, Susan says, "I don't know when, if ever, we will be taking a trip like this again. We have a family of 5 and a trip like this is a major expense. I feel strongly that a company should stand behind the companies it represents, and if there is a problem they should take care of it. Whatever happened to customer service?"
It probably still exists out there somewhere, but not at SunTrips, Ryan International or the Aston at Poi Pu Kai.
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