People who miss their flights.

[redlight]

How about turning up a month early.
I will keep it short as possible.
Was working in Greece a few years ago and I booked a flight home at an Athens travel agent(bucket shop).
Short version is the git sold me a ticket for a month later by accident(he says).
Find this out when I turn up at check in a month early.
Lucky for me it was BA and they saw the funny side and gave the jump seat home.
I had not been home for over a year so I was not exactly a model passenger at check in.

[badass]

Some people who make sure they plan things properly may then find out they have fcuking stupidly unreliable mates that are supposed to give them a lift.
I had that - planned to give myself a 1.5 hour leeway in case of congestion/puncture/breakdown etc. Its a 1.5 Hour journey.
Call mate before leaving. He's not up. Takes 45 mins to get up. Arrive at mates house (10 mins away) mate faffs around for another 15 mins, much to my and another couple of mates' annoyance. What he hadn't told us is that he planned to pick up another mate in Croydon on the way to Gatwick
Thank **** I had left so much leeway and lied about the departure time (said it was earlier than it actually was) Arrived just in time.

Why is it people that have done poor planning always decide "it'll be allright" with nothing whatsoever to base that on apart from the fact it'll be very inconvenient if it isn't all right.
The only thing more annoying that that is people stressing when everything's going fine and to plan.

[Saracen]

Originally Posted by Spud1

.........

Do these people not understand that there is a cutoff point for a reason? That it takes time to put bags on/off, to do the required security checks, to board passengers, to sort our the documentation etc etc etc..and that there is a damn good reason why they open the checkin desks TWO HOURS before the flight, and close it 30mins before.........

I agree .... but an amusing thing happened to me a few years ago.

I was coming back from Florida to London via New York. The route was from a small donestic airport to Miami via a little 'puddlejumper', then an AA flight to New York from Miami and a connection to the main AA NY to London flight. A local weather system (i.e. nasty storm) held up the puddlejumper, so I got to the airport late, but only about one minute (literally, ONE minute) late. The airline, however, had "closed" the flight. It was explained to me that if they didn't close on time, they risked getting charged for being "late". The irritating thing was that the plane then sat on the apron for three hours, with me sitting in the departure lounge looking at it, but unable to board. The same storm that made me late in made the flight I was supposed to be late leaving. I ended tranferring to a United Flight about an hour after my AA flight actually left ... and about four hours after it should have.

So, anyway, it turns out that that nasty storm hadn't quite finished screwing around with the airlines that day, because the AA flight I SHOULD have been on ran foul of the same weather system, further north, and ended up diverting. Chicago, IIRC. The passengers then had to get another connecting flight from Chicago to NY. My UA flight, the one I had to get because AA wouldn't let me on the flight that sat at the gate for three hours, actually got to New York BEFORE the AA flight I should have been on.

So ..... being a bit miffed by now, mainly about having sat staring at my flight for three hours and being prevented from boarding because of airline rules, I moaned a bit at the AA staff in New York, and ended up being upgraded to First class as a result.

The final irony? While I didn't make my transatlantic leg and ended up on a later flight, the transfer flight from Chicago didn't even make the flight I did, and I would have been on an even later flight from NY to London if I hadn't sat watching my plane sit at the gate for three hours.

Fate is a funny thing sometimes. That storm appeared to be messing me about, but in fact, I ended up getting home some hours earlier than I would have had my initial flight not made me late, and I went first class into the bargain. By being late, I ended up getting home sooner.

Not everything that seems irritating or bad actually is. After all, missing the sailing of the Titanic wouldn't have been too bad a thing.

[IBM]

Saracen ... isn't that the storyline to 'Forces of Nature'? Cool story.....should be a movie