How An Air New Zealand Passenger Spent 7 Hours To Rebook A $15,000 Flight

An Air New Zealand passenger booked on a flight from Chicago to Auckland had a harrowing time rebooking his seats after the carrier canceled its Chicago service. While the process of rescheduling or rebooking an airline ticket or seat is never fun, the passenger’s patience with Air New Zealand was really tested after the airline’s phone call with him lasted several hours.

Service canceled

US-based New Zealand national Rupert had booked six tickets from Chicago to Auckland for Christmas, but because Air New Zealand canceled this service due to aircraft-related issues, he had to rebook the tickets on a different service.

Photo: Jordan Tan I Shutterstock

While ordinarily such calls usually don’t take much time, with customer service agents accommodating the passengers’ needs, it was a different story with Rupert’s bookings. He had booked three skycouches with the airline and wanted like-for-like seats. RNZ’s Checkpoint quotes him as saying,

“What I expected is that we would be rebooked Chicago to Auckland with a layover somewhere else, with the sky couch on the US to Auckland leg, or the same number of sky couches that we booked originally. I thought that would be a simple like-for-like swap.”

Tedious rebooking process

The rebooking process wasn’t as simple as Rupert had anticipated. The carrier said that the aircraft Rupert and his family were rebooked on was a leased plane and did not have Skycouch. These are a row of Economy seats that can change into a couch after take-off. There is a special footrest on each seat, which can be lifted all the way up to create a large couch space.

Photo: Jordan Tan | Shutterstock

Air New Zealand told him that they couldn’t book him on the Skycouches but could refund the amount he had paid for these special seats. Rupert added,

“It has been surprisingly difficult. I’ve had several nights up well past midnight over here in the US trying to figure this out … I was on the phone for seven hours last weekend. It’s frustrating because the systems don’t seem to be designed for anyone’s convenience, so you [could] be talking to one person and they say they’ll get back to me. But then if they’re out of the office, no one else can take over that until that person comes back.”

Eventually, the Skycouches were booked, but Rupert says that it was done only when RNZ’s Checkpoint intervened, a claim that Air New Zealand denies.

Suspending Chicago flights

Air New Zealand had to suspend Chicago-Auckland services due to Rolls-Royce engine maintenance issues on Boeing 787s. The Rolls-Royce Trent 1000 engines powering its Dreamliners require heavy maintenance at an earlier stage of usage than anticipated. As such, the airline had to suspend its Chicago service.

Photo: Carlos Yudica | Shutterstock

Related

Air New Zealand Reduces Full-Year Profit Expectations As Demand Softens And Competition Grows

The airline decreased its earnings forecast by about $6 million.

Air New Zealand’s chief customer and sales officer, Leanne Geraghty, acknowledged that it would be disappointing for customers traveling to and from Chicago, especially for those traveling over the April holiday break, but it was something that couldn’t be avoided.

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