Just a few weeks ago I was supposed to leave for four days at the Coeur d'Alene Resort on the Idaho Golf Trail. The idea was to play that course and Circling Raven. The reservations had been made eight weeks before departure, through Cheaptickets.com. On Sunday morning, 24 hours before departure, I logged onto AA.com to check in. Imagine my surprise when I found that three of the six flights had not been booked. AA maintained that Cheaptickets had not ticked the three flights and so they cancelled them. Cheaptickets had no answers at all, other than that they had now cancelled the entire trip and would be pleased to rebook it... at a vastly increased rate, of course. Needless to say, my much anticipated trip went out the window.
Cheaptickets did offer a $100 travel certificate as compensation, then changed their minds and reduced the offer to a $50 travel certificate. I'll leave you to draw your own conclusions. The object of my message is to suggest that if you're going to use a discount travel provider, make sure you check with the airlines concerned that your reservations have indeed been made and that you are good to go. Don't leave it till the last minute.
Quick Tip: Always check your flight reservations as soon as you have a confirmation and number and airline record locator. Simply go to the airline's website, enter the record locator and check it out. It will take no longer than a couple of minutes and will possibly save a whole lot of heartache and trouble later on.
