WWYD flight situation

huntjul

I'm a prof at a vet school and am moving in Dec back to the US. 180 of my students on the island leave for good each semester and take their pets, which is a perpetual issue as most airlines will take max 5 cargo pets and 2 first class pets per flight. Each semester one student manages a "pet flight list" which ensures that those leaving the island permanently have first go at booking their flights with their pets. The airlines will not keep track of it and overbook pets then say oh well when you're stranded at the airport cuz Fluffy can't fly, so it's a legit cause.

Being the awesome person I am, instead of just circumventing it and screwing over someone else, I contacted pet flight student when I booked our flights back in June. I was planning to book first class tickets because they were $30 more and you get 3 free bags. However, pet flight student told me, sorry, no spots for pets in first class, only 1 left in coach for that flight. Fuck it, but we do what we have to. I booked DH in coach with the cat and myself in first class with the baby (don't judge, it had to be done).

Today I find out that actually first class has NO pets booked. So I spent more money (when baggage fees are added in) to make DH fly coach when we could have been all together in first class. So I'm pissed. To change the ticket now is ~$1000 so not going to happen.

I'm want to contact the student to express my dismay at receiving misinformation, but I am a faculty member and think she'll probably freak out that she screwed over a prof. Besides, what can she say/do to fix it now? Nothing.

So do I contact her or not? I kind of want to throw the hammer down.

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sooner1981

Is it possible that when you booked, other people had made refundable flight reservations with pets, and that between then and now, those people changed their schedules and are now leaving earlier / later?

If the flight schedule usually works well, it doesn't seem like this student would have pulled something out of thin air in an attempt to screw over a professor, so I would think there must be another explanation.

That said, since there is nothing this person can do to fix the situation and this is not their permanent job (so you can't view it as a "training moment"), I think i would let it go.

huntjul

I know it wouldn't help the situation, but it might help my feels!!! Each semester there are issues with this process and people get screwed over. I'm dismayed it ended up being me this time.

@sooner1981 It would have had to be 2 people leaving the island permanently with 2 pets who did a refundable in first class and booked >6 months in advance--quite unlikely but vaguely possible. But I think it was a legit mistake not malicious. If I thought it was malicious, I would be going to administration to pursue disciplinary action, not doing a WWO13D

Lee81

It sounds to me like this student is taking on a (not insignificant sounding) task as a courtesy/favor to everyone at no benefit to herself. I imagine it's not her top priority. She make a mistake or was given bad information by other people booking flights. Sure it sucks and it's inconvenient but sometimes you get what you pay for. If she's doing that bad of a job, maybe someone else can be persuaded to take over in the future. But if the person doing it now is getting a lot of shit from people, who's going to want to take over? The only thing worse than a thankless job is a thankless volunteer job.

It doesn't hurt to say something as an fyi if it would make you feel better, but only if you can say it without making her feel bad.