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Let the flier beware, a Utah man says his sister is struggling to come back financially after someone canceled her trip home for Christmas.
Elmer Van Beek says his sister, Osta, was coming to Utah for a visit from Australia. Her flight plan had her stopping in Holland, then Memphis, before arriving in Salt Lake. Everything was fine until she arrived in Memphis, where she discovered her ticket to Utah had been canceled.
According to Elmer, someone canceled that ticket by paying the cancellation fee in cash at a U.S. Airways counter here. "They obviously had her information -- full name, knew that she was coming, was able to cancel the flight on her behalf," Elmer said.
Morris Murdock Travel in Salt Lake City says no one should be able to cancel a flight on behalf of someone else like that, regardless of whether they had that much information about them.
It seems to have been a fluke, which is what Elmer says he was told by U.S. Airways. "They did say that, you know, this is an anomaly. It's not something that normally happens. But for some reason everything was dropped, and all they're offering is a coupon," he said.
That's despite the fact that Osta had to pay for a much more expensive last-minute ticket in order to get to Utah once she found herself stranded in Memphis -- a ticket she had to borrow money to buy. "She expected a refund, not to mention the stress that it's caused her," Elmer said.
The coupon doesn't cover her added expense.
Elmer says the airline did apologize for the trouble, but because the cancellation fee was paid in cash, can't tell the family who canceled Osta's ticket, which means there's very little hope of getting that person to pay her back.
He says he just hopes no one else has to go through the same trouble, and he was astounded that anyone was able to cancel a ticket on behalf of someone else without that other party's knowledge.
U.S. Airways confirms it is investigating what happened but says standard procedure to cancel or change an itinerary is to require the person making the change to present ID.
A spokesperson for U.S. Airways says the original flight was booked through a travel agency, and that when the itinerary was changed, U.S. Airways notified the travel agency. If that's true, it's clear the agency either did not get the message or did not pass it along to Osta Van Beek.
E-mail: bbruce@ksl.com
