Never Fly Iberia Airlines
After a wonderful week in Valencia our long planned Spanish vacation turned tragic. Our 10 year old daughter developed appendicitis. We took her to San Joan de Deu hospital where they performed immediate surgery. We had been scheduled to fly to Granada the next day, which obviously we couldn’t. Vueling Airline said that with proper documentation they would reimburse us for the ticket in keeping with Spanish Law.
Because our daughter’s condition was serious, she needed to stay in the hospital for 5 days. That meant that we would be unable to get to Granada to make our return flight to the US. We notified Iberia of the situation. They said nothing could be done until the 24 hours prior to our scheduled departure at which time we should send them the medical documentation to arrange rebooking.
On Saturday afternoon, July 28, we received discharge papers and called Iberia. This time we were told to email the paperwork to their medical department, which would make a determination on the validity of our case within 5 days or we could pay $1,700 in “voluntary change” fees. Obviously we were distressed to hear this. Officials at the hospital helped us write a letter explaining the situation and asking for a quick resolution of our situation so that we could return to New York and receive follow up care for our daughter.
After not hearing anything from Iberia, we called them Saturday night and were informed that they had the documentation but that determinations typically take 48 hours and that they were working on it. This, however, was the beginning of a pattern of useless and misleading information from Iberia. The next morning an agent said we might hear in 24 hours. Later we were told to just wait. All the while hotel fees are adding up.
Finally, on Monday morning we were able, with great effort, to get a booking supervisor on the phone. He informed us that in fact the medical depart takes up to 21 DAYS to make such determinations and that they don’t even work on the weekends. So the 2 days we spent calling, waiting on hold, anxiously checking our email for news was totally pointless. We were stuck.
The real point of this non-policy became clear, however, when the supervisor said that the solution to our problem was simply to rebook with change fees and price differences. He said that for the low low price of $3,500 we could fly from Barcelona to NY in 4 days. This despite the fact that their own web site showed multiple flights available the next day with the necessary 4 seats.
The policy of charging you the price differential is infuriating because, of course, the price difference is huge because we are going from a long-term advance purchase to a same week one. This despite the fact that they undoubtedly sold our seats back to NY at an inflated same day price. So they win both ways. They basically get 3-5 times the money because our daughter had to have emergency surgery while on vacation.
The supervisor, of course, says, “well that’s the policy” like the airline is some other entity that he has nothing to do with. Iberia airlines could have waived the fees and price differentials and put us on a flight the next day if they had wanted to do so. But instead, they use these medical emergencies to make more money from families in crisis. This is beyond despicable and possibly illegal.
Please share this post on social media and tag them on Twitter: @Iberia_en, post on their Facebook page: http://www.facebook.com/IberiaEN, and email them at [email protected] and let them know that these policies are outrageous and that families in our situation should not have to pay anything to rebook a flight.
Thanks,
Alex S. Vitale
Elizabeth S. Palley
Because our daughter’s condition was serious, she needed to stay in the hospital for 5 days. That meant that we would be unable to get to Granada to make our return flight to the US. We notified Iberia of the situation. They said nothing could be done until the 24 hours prior to our scheduled departure at which time we should send them the medical documentation to arrange rebooking.
On Saturday afternoon, July 28, we received discharge papers and called Iberia. This time we were told to email the paperwork to their medical department, which would make a determination on the validity of our case within 5 days or we could pay $1,700 in “voluntary change” fees. Obviously we were distressed to hear this. Officials at the hospital helped us write a letter explaining the situation and asking for a quick resolution of our situation so that we could return to New York and receive follow up care for our daughter.
After not hearing anything from Iberia, we called them Saturday night and were informed that they had the documentation but that determinations typically take 48 hours and that they were working on it. This, however, was the beginning of a pattern of useless and misleading information from Iberia. The next morning an agent said we might hear in 24 hours. Later we were told to just wait. All the while hotel fees are adding up.
Finally, on Monday morning we were able, with great effort, to get a booking supervisor on the phone. He informed us that in fact the medical depart takes up to 21 DAYS to make such determinations and that they don’t even work on the weekends. So the 2 days we spent calling, waiting on hold, anxiously checking our email for news was totally pointless. We were stuck.
The real point of this non-policy became clear, however, when the supervisor said that the solution to our problem was simply to rebook with change fees and price differences. He said that for the low low price of $3,500 we could fly from Barcelona to NY in 4 days. This despite the fact that their own web site showed multiple flights available the next day with the necessary 4 seats.
The policy of charging you the price differential is infuriating because, of course, the price difference is huge because we are going from a long-term advance purchase to a same week one. This despite the fact that they undoubtedly sold our seats back to NY at an inflated same day price. So they win both ways. They basically get 3-5 times the money because our daughter had to have emergency surgery while on vacation.
The supervisor, of course, says, “well that’s the policy” like the airline is some other entity that he has nothing to do with. Iberia airlines could have waived the fees and price differentials and put us on a flight the next day if they had wanted to do so. But instead, they use these medical emergencies to make more money from families in crisis. This is beyond despicable and possibly illegal.
Please share this post on social media and tag them on Twitter: @Iberia_en, post on their Facebook page: http://www.facebook.com/IberiaEN, and email them at [email protected] and let them know that these policies are outrageous and that families in our situation should not have to pay anything to rebook a flight.
Thanks,
Alex S. Vitale
Elizabeth S. Palley
