svickersart wrote:And I get people all the time that will tell me they have been waiting an hour, Hmmmm, my computer says you called 15 minutes ago, I love to call them on that lie.
That reminds me of when I used to drive a hotel shuttle back in Portland. One of the crews I had to deal with the most was for an airline that I will not name except to tell you their name is diametrically opposite of "Southeast". This is the story of my dealing with one of their flight crews.
When flight crews would land that were staying at our hotel, we would leave so that we could be at the pickup area 20 minutes after they landed. That should give them the time they needed to get the plane cleared and get out to us, and we might wind up waiting a couple minutes for them. However, we have a ten-minute window to be in the pickup area, or else they start charging $1.50 a minute for every minute you're in the pickup area. Just for the record, at the Portland International Airport, there is only one terminal, and only one pickup area.
So we had this crew due to land at, say 23:20, so I was there at 23:41 (a minute late). No sign of the crew, but after about eleven minutes of waiting and a full bus, I decided it was time to leave. I raced to the hotel and back as quickly as I could safely, and made what is usually a 20 minute trip during the day in fifteen minutes. When I arrived, the crew still wasn't out there, so I waited another ten minutes and then left with another full bus, rinse and repeat, making that trip four times in an hour. The crew never came out, so we no-showed them in the system and I kept making my runs. About half an hour later, right after I left the airport, they called saying they had been waiting almost two hours and were about to take a cab. The person at the front desk, who had been scratching their head with me abot how a whole crew could disappear, told them that it was fine if they took a taxi, but the hotel would not be paying for it, as I had just left the airport. They opted to wait for me and chew me out the entire way to the hotel. When we arrived at the hotel, I got out of my seat, turned around and faced them, pulled out my notebook of my times and read off the times I had been at the hotel and the airport, with a line at the time that they would have to have been out there to wait for me two hours. I also noted the time that they had been given clearance to land (I listened to the channel at the airport) and made note that they had somehow arrived before their plane to have waited as long as they had.
Needless to say, they were not happy. The crews are supposed to tip a dollar each (the airline gives them the money to tip) but they didn't. In fact, they lodged a complaint against me with the hotel and the airline. What they didn't realize was that I had lodged a complaint about them with the airline, complete with facts and times, and it's my understanding they had reprimands all over the place. Then, to add insult to (their) injury, our hotel kicked them out a month later, telling them (in more professional wording) that we didn't need the drama that their airline brought. Same with an airline whom I won't name except to say they almost had to change their name from what it is to the opposite, "Disbanded".
There was one Northwest crew that I had a lot of fun with, though. They tipped me in candy one night, so I took a bigger candy bar to all their doors that night. The next time they came in, they had a giant cookie for me (along with a tip), which I then topped. This kept going until the night I lost, because they had brought a big gift basket full of all sorts of tasty nastiness for me. Never before had losing been so sweet.