Airline Headache

So it was that time of the year to book my ticket home to Vancouver for Christmas. That was almost 2 months ago...anyways, it seemed to be all fine. There are 3 airlines that fly direct from JFK to YVR. I normally fly Air Canada because they allow pets in the cabin but they just recently discontinued this as of September 2006. So they were out of the question. Cathay Pacific never allowed dogs in the cabin, so that left me with the only airline left...Harmony Air. I've heard mixed things about them...they are a fairly new airline based out of Vancouver and only have limited flights. They also do not have frequent flyer miles. Anyways, I find a flight with them on Cheaptickets for the dates I want and book it. That would have been all good and everything but recently, I was talking to one of my friends and she mentioned that one of her friends were trying to book a ticket on Harmony but could not find flights from YVR to JFK. This was very confusing for me cause I had just bought mine about 2 months ago.

Anyways, I decide to go to the website to find out more information about this and find out that they had flight schedule changes and they no longer fly from JFK to YVR and vice versa until May 1, 2007. What the hell? I got no notification of this! So I call Harmony and they tell me that I've been re-booked onto Cathay Pacific...that would have been all fine but what about Dim Sum...there is no way I'm putting her under the plane. So they go on to say that they can only refund me my ticket or I take the flight. I then call Cheaptickets to see what they will do and they first say that their system does not show that the flight has been cancelled and that I've been re-booked...it does not come up at all. Then they go on to say the same thing...that it would either be a full refund or take the flight. What? I bought my ticket for $500 and right now flights are much more than that...the Cathay flight is over $2k that they re-booked me on. Anyways, I research United and American to see what the connector flights look like...I'm already not happy cause I don't want to connect but I don't want to leave Dim Sum in NYC either for the holidays...she should be with family! So I price out a ticket that connects in Chicago on United for $868 and write a long email to Harmony Airlines to see what they will do about it and that they should book me on this flight and pay the differences of any costs that I have to pay (it costs more for Dim Sum to fly with me on United). They've been really nice about the whole thing but they just can't do anything cause it's policy so I felt bad yelling at the reservations representative and she suggested I write that email.

So I got a response from Harmony...not too bad. Took 2 days for a response...they said they were working down the list of people to contact and they were still on November travels. Anyways, they booked me on the United connector flight that i requested and gave me $200 Harmony dollars to help with my pet fees on United. It's not the best and it'll force me to use them again in the future (within one year) but at least they did something about it. I must say that I am impressed with the level of customer service that they have offered me as most other airlines would not have been so nice and plesant to me on the phone. I'll have to fly them and then decide what I think of them as a airline but as far as customer service, I think they are good.