David Politis

My travels took me to the San Francisco Bay Area today (12/29/06), where my wife and I flew into Oakland International Airport (OAK) on Delta (Flt. #3957) via its partner relationship with SkyWest.

The flight from Salt Lake to Oakland was fine, but the baggage situation once we got on the ground was not.

After 20 minutes of waiting while passengers from two other flights received their luggage and seeing no sign whatsoever of our bags, I began to look for a solution.

The Delta representative at the lost luggage counter used her walkie-talkie to call an unknown associate to ascertain the whereabouts of the missing baggage.

His response was that they “didn’t have enough rampers” to take care of our bags since they were loading an outbound flight first, so our bags would have to wait.

So I asked the “lost luggage” woman if there was a “red coat” around, a long-used term at Delta meant to refer to an on-the-ground Delta supervisor. Surely, I thought there had to be a supervisor on-site.

We don’t have red coats any more, came the rather huffy reply. Okay, how ’bout a supervisor? Can I speak to a supervisor?

No, there is no supervisor here, she said. You’ll just have to wait.

By now it had been 25 minutes, so I thought I’d go over to the Delta ticket counter. Once there I found a solitary, harried ticket agent trying to solve problems for outbound passengers. Hmmmm, I thought, maybe I’ll try something else.

I walked back over to where my wife was sitting to give her an update, then proceeded to try calling Delta on the SkyMiles 1-800 number. All lines were busy.

Next I got directory assistance on the line to get the main number for SkyWest, thinking surely they’d want to know about this bungled baggage operation in Oakland. By now, however, it was after 5:30 p.m. back in St. George, Utah (headquarters for SkyWest), and naturally (you guessed it), everyone had gone home from SkyWest already. I left a pointed message on the voice mail system.

With the baggage claim monster sitting idle and 50 Delta/SkyWest passengers/customers growing more upset by the minute, I decided to walk back to the Delta ticket counter once again. This time there were no customers in sight.

Great, maybe now I’ll get this issue taken care of; but no, it was not meant to be. Turns out the agent was the only Delta person working the counter that day as the supervisor had been called out of town for a family emergency. (Like what, a trip to Mazatlan, I wondered sarcastically to myself?)

The ticket agent was very sympathetic and offered to let me yell at her, but I declined, saying that it wasn’t her fault there weren’t enough rampers. I just wanted my stupid luggage.

I finally decided to make one last effort to reach someone who might be able to help me, so I picked up one of the Delta Direct phones adjacent to the ticket counter. Maybe this way, I thought, I can talk to a real person who might have the ability to get some extra bodies out onto the ramp to get our luggage inside the terminal.

Unfortunately, that was not to be the case. (Turns out Delta Direct is only for making flight arrangements.)

I did speak to a “live” person via Delta Direct, however, and she helpfully gave me a 1-800 number to call regarding baggage issues. Turns out, though, all I got was a series of recordings to help me find my lost bags. AAAAAARRRRRGGGGHHHH.

They’re not lost, doggone it, my mind screamed as I walked back toward the baggage claim! My bags are somewhere between the belly of Delta Flight #3957 and Baggage Claim #2 inside of Terminal Two at Oakland International Airport!

I felt like I was trapped in an old Star Trek episode and my luggage was trapped somewhere between the transporter on the planet’s surface and the transporter platform on the Starship Enterprise.

As I walked away from the ticket counter and the the baggage claim came into view, I realized something had changed. The conveyor belt was moving, and, and, yes, there were bags on it.

Two minutes later, with two bags in tow, I walked over to my wife.

Total time from arrival at our gate to bags landing on the baggage claim conveyor belt? Forty-five minutes. UGH!

Now . . . I get the fact that it was a Friday afternoon, the Friday of New Year’s Eve weekend. And I accept at face value the statement by the Delta representative at the ticket counter that her supervisor been called out of town on a family emergency.

I even understand that Oakland is not a big destination for Delta/SkyWest. (Soutwest Airlines has a dominant position at OAK, however.)

Nevertheless, 45 minutes to get luggage delivered from a plane to Baggage Claim on day when the airport was mostly deserted is unacceptable.

Not enough “rampers!” Are you kidding me?

Delta and SkyWest get a BIG, BIG “Thumbs down” from me for this luggage fiasco.

This entry was posted on Friday, December 29th, 2006 at 9:05 pm and is filed under Politis Perspective, THUMBS DOWN!. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.