h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Hi Helen

JV's MB is a pain today - it keeps going down.

Last September we did a cheap as chips lastminute.com (LM) 5 day visit to NY. The flight was fine and the immigration was busy but we expected about an hour's wait so we weren't disappointed. We arrived at 4pm local time and the place was full of people from South America so customs and immigration was a problem.

The BIG problem was when we arrived at the hotel and they had never heard of us. We were totally gobsmacked as we had copies of all the reservation material from LM but they were fully booked. As it was a Friday and about 10pm London time we had no responses from urgent emails from us (they had a pay internet connection in the hotel lobby) and in the end the hotel phoned around for us and found a hotel just off Times Square.

I spent the weekend leaving emails with LM (they did not publish any phone contacts) and they finally got back to me on Monday afternoon - the day before we went home. They said that they would reimburse us for the additional hotel costs.

It wasn't a big deal really and we did not let it spoil the break but I was determined not to let them get away with it. When we got back I wrote to the owners of LM three times, the last saying that I was going to go to the newspapers about their service. This was the first holiday we had had in years and it was an anniversary break so I laid it on in trowels. It worked because they repaid the additional hotel and the full cost of the holiday - hotel and flights plus they offered to upgrade us if we booked another holiday with them.

I won't use LM or their competitors again as you can DIY your hotels and flights at a cheaper price and have proof of reservation. It appears that LM has a business partner in NY who handles the hotel reservations and partner was at fault. Sounded a bit like BS to me but who cares.

Thanks for the birthday wishes and I hope you got my round robin.

Speak to you soon.

Neil

PS What is FF on? I haven't a clue what the 'Alls of Phlopp was about.

Hi Neil

The MB's are a pain today. There must be a lot of modding going on as I had 2 emails about replies last but when I looked they had been removed! One was about the first lines thingy and the other about PC. I dread to think what was said. As for FF I couldn't make out that post at all!

Sounds like you had a nightmare situation in New York but glad you got something back from it. We once had a similar situation with a car hire in Florida, the one and only time we had booked and paid through an agent here. It was very late when we got in and there were no cars left. The other half got irate and from somewhere appeared a car.

Another tip if you book car hire. Always stick to the basic one unless you need loads of boot space. Often they upgrade at the other end because they don't have any smaller cars left. If you do want to upgrade pay any difference locally because the guy who is allocating you the car gets the commission and will often offer you an even better one! We only found this out from Hertz a couple of years ago.

I can't think who we book with off hand. We have used Airline Network and USAirtours (I think they are still called that) or the airlines own website can be cheaper. Hotels we usually do direct. Other half is off to Vancouver Saturday for 6 days for another convention.

I got your other message and came on to reply to that when I saw this one. glad you enjoyed your birthday, sounded great. Is your camera easy to use? We keep meaning get one but I don't take a lot of photos so just never get around to it. Peter takes a lot of aircraft (one of his hobbies) and still uses slides but the film is becoming a bit less easy to come by.

Has it stopped raining your way? It's just started here. You would think it never rained in London the way SW was going on earlier! (I don't always listen to him).

Well it's approaching meal time so I'll say cheerio for now.

Helen.

PS my fastest time through New York was 15 minites! I think we got in at around 12.30 local from Manchester on BA.