SAS - Warning
Ah, that makes it all the sadder. I'd say "next time", but this trip has shown that I'd need to save for 10 years to come back to Norway, and I'm way past "retirement age" already! A stunning country though, you are privileged indeed to live here (as I am, living on the Sunny Coast in Aus).
Thread Starter
The strike is officially over.
@Recidivist, I moved from Tromsų at 15, now living in the south of Norway, had the pleasure of visiting Australia a number of times between '73 (Newcastle NSW) and 2014 (Perth WA). Will agree on the Sunny Coast.
Per
@Recidivist, I moved from Tromsų at 15, now living in the south of Norway, had the pleasure of visiting Australia a number of times between '73 (Newcastle NSW) and 2014 (Perth WA). Will agree on the Sunny Coast.
Per
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So a final synopsis of the SAS strike experience.
The intended flight was 17.30 Thursday, LHR - Oslo
Wednesday lunchtime - I spot ono the SAS website that my flight is not amongst those slated to operate irrespective of the strike
Cue 45 minutes on hold to SAS customer services to be assured that it WOULD operate
22.00 Wednesday - text received from SAS, after their customer service line was closed for the night, advising that they were working on a re-booking as my flgith was now cancelled after all -so their website had been right all along
10.00 Thursday morning - text received to say I was rebooked on the 19.30 flight
12.40 Thursday morning, on the train to London - a further text received to say that it wasn't possible to rebook me after all, and I should book with another carrier and seek reimbursement. The dilemma now was that other carriers were in "gouge" mode and charging upward of £400 for a single ticket
Cue another 45 minutes on hold, after which I was told to ignore most recent text and I was indeed rebooked on the 19.30. Question is, what if I had followed instructions from previous text and blown nearly £1000 on two tickets for my old mum and me, ignorant of the fact that I was actually booked on an operating SAS flight
So overall, a hugely frustrating, sometimes panic inducing experience that leaves me finished with SAS. When it all blows up you can't email them, you can't talk to them in a realistic timescale, they certainly don't want to talk to you, and all the messages I got from them contradicted each other leaving my brain scramlbed. If you wanted a case study as to how NOT to do customer communications, look no further- these guys are experts !
The intended flight was 17.30 Thursday, LHR - Oslo
Wednesday lunchtime - I spot ono the SAS website that my flight is not amongst those slated to operate irrespective of the strike
Cue 45 minutes on hold to SAS customer services to be assured that it WOULD operate
22.00 Wednesday - text received from SAS, after their customer service line was closed for the night, advising that they were working on a re-booking as my flgith was now cancelled after all -so their website had been right all along
10.00 Thursday morning - text received to say I was rebooked on the 19.30 flight
12.40 Thursday morning, on the train to London - a further text received to say that it wasn't possible to rebook me after all, and I should book with another carrier and seek reimbursement. The dilemma now was that other carriers were in "gouge" mode and charging upward of £400 for a single ticket
Cue another 45 minutes on hold, after which I was told to ignore most recent text and I was indeed rebooked on the 19.30. Question is, what if I had followed instructions from previous text and blown nearly £1000 on two tickets for my old mum and me, ignorant of the fact that I was actually booked on an operating SAS flight
So overall, a hugely frustrating, sometimes panic inducing experience that leaves me finished with SAS. When it all blows up you can't email them, you can't talk to them in a realistic timescale, they certainly don't want to talk to you, and all the messages I got from them contradicted each other leaving my brain scramlbed. If you wanted a case study as to how NOT to do customer communications, look no further- these guys are experts !
A final comment about the effect of the SAS strike on this (would have been) passenger. Deciding that we couldn't take the chance of staying with the Tromso booking, our travel agent booked us instead onto the northbound Hurtigruten ship from Trondheim to Stamsund, then switching to the southbound ship on which we were already booked. It so happened that, on the day we were northbound, it was "Cleanup Norway Day" and our ship had been allocated a small Island (Stott Island) to contribute to the effort. We volunteered to participate, and found ourselves as 2 of about 60 passengers engaging in the exercise. To carry this many volunteers,a comfortable power boat of about 45' was accompanied by 2 RIBs. We went in the longer RIB - about 40' with twin 300hp motors on the back (the smaller RIB was maybe 30' with an inboard jet motor, and almost as quick as us). Clad in full immersion suits, we went about half an hour to the island, and spread out collecting quite a lot of plastic rubbish for 2 hours. Then it was about an hour and a half directly upwind to rejoin our ship at Bodo. At first, the relatively open water constrained our speed to about 33 knots, but later as we came into more shelter that increased to 37 knots! This all being north of the Arctic circle, windchill was ferocious, and we arrived in Bodo very cold, but absolutely exhilarated from what would be a once in a lifetime experience. Many thanks to the SAS pilots who brought this happy sequence of events to pass!
