As some people may know I’m a fan of Singapore Airlines. We all know that such businesses are run on the principles of ‘bums on seats’, but despite always travelling cattle-class I’ve never felt like just another ‘bum on a seat’ or cattle either.
Last year I had to make a trip to the UK in a hurry. I booked on-line (first time ever) and was in the UK within 36 hours of getting the ‘help phone call’. I needed to change my return date, and found to my horror that I’d booked a three month ticket – it cost a fair bit of money and aggravations to change my arrangemnets.
This year I booked on-line again (the last time ever) and was a little more wary. I read all the ‘terms and conditions’ and opted for the most expensive option: a year ticket, with air-miles and no penalties for changing the return dates…
Once again, I’ve needed to change the arrangements and, despite being told last year that I could do this on-line, found that I could not and had to phone Singapore Airlines. Imagine my dismay when I was told that I only had a three month ticket… I pulled out the confirmation – no mention of any limits, my air-miles had been credited – what was going on? I had the devil’s own job to get the ‘operative’ to at least change the flight from the 20th of July to the 20th of August.
The second phone call, when I realised we couldn’t make the 20th of August either, was even more fraught – with that particular ‘operative’ demanding huge sums of money for what I had already paid for…
At which point my fingers fairly burnt the keyboard with e-mails to just about every likely avenue of complaint. Wednesday, I got a phone call from SIA to say that they would extend our tickets to the 24th.
This morning, my belief that SIA do not treat their customers as just ‘bums on seats’ or cattle had been confirmed. SIA have just phoned to say that we must not worry, we can take our time and I have a direct number to phone should we need to change the flights again.
However, I’m still going to chase up what happened to my expensive ticket and I’m unlikely ever to chance booking on-line again…
Boadicea's Chariot 
Sorry to hear about the bad experience. We tend to book rail tickets on-line here, in France, and my son shops around on-line for cheap ferry crossings when visiting France. He gets some excellent deals that way.
bo, just buy an open ticket or a return and don’t bother to use the other half, believe you me it works out cheaper in the long run on the pocket book and the soul. I have been round this mulberry tree so often it isn’t true with the boy in the past.
People unfortunately do not become ill or die according to ticket bookings, most untidy and discommoding of them!
Why you cannot buy a single ticket at a reasonable price is beyond me!
I once had BA ring me up to confirm a flight and I told them I had no intention of using it, they told me I must. What are you going to do about it says I? Never heard another word.
What a performance, Boadicea!
I must say that I don’t blame you for not wanting to go down the internet booking route again.
Although, I suspect that soon, there will not be an option. High street travel agents seem to have disappeared and talking to a human being, as opposed to an “operative” seems to be an increasingly rare occurrence.
I don’t blame you for following this up though; at least you managed to change the tickets and that is a minor miracle in itself.