After being named one of the best airlines in the world only last week Cayman Airways receives a bumpy landing. Note the comment about their Customer Service.

From Scubaboad

Thread: Cayman Airways Scheduling Difficulties

Posts October 16 2014

AggieDiver: For those of you flying Cayman Airways or Cayman Airways Express in the next few weeks, make sure you are keeping a close eye on your tickets and reservations. Starting yesterday morning, Cayman Airways has been monkeying around with my reservation for October the 31st. Apparently they are changing around some of the aircraft serving the Sister Islands, and their system is trying to automatically shift passengers to different flights to accommodate the changes. We were originally scheduled to fly from LC to GC on the 9:05am flight that is non-stop. Yesterday morning, I received an email from Cayman Airways that they were changing our flight to one that leaves LC at 8:30 and connects through Cayman Brac, getting us to GC at 9:45, which is still plenty of time to catch our 11:40am flight to Tampa on Cayman Airways. So I just accepted it and didn’t ask why they had to change our flights. I knew they were making a change to some of their aircraft, and just assumed that the non-stop flight we originally booked was no longer on the schedule.

About 6 hours later, I got another email stating they were changing our flights. This time they left the flight from LC to CYB alone, but changed the CYB to GC and GC to TPA flights from the 31st to Nov. 2nd. I immediately called the airline and told them we could not fly back on the 2nd and still catch a flight from TPA to Houston on the 31st. They apologized and re-booked us on the flights on the 31st.

About two hours ago, I got another set of emails saying they were changing our flights again. This time they wanted to change our flights from LC to CYB and CYB to GC to the evening of the 30th, but leave the GC to TPA flight on the 31st. I called again and told them that was not acceptable and asked what we could do to lockout the system from continuing to try to change the reservations. In the course of that discussion, I came to find out that the LC to GC direct flight does still exist on the 31st, but it is sold out now. I am pretty sure that somebody deemed more important by Cayman Airways (probably a Cayman citizen) wanted to fly from LC to GC that morning and didn’t want to take the connection through CYB, so my wife and I got bumped to the non-direct flight instead. In the course of doing that, I suspect the flights were already full through CYB, so they overbooked us, and their system keeps trying to rebook us to fix the problem. I didn’t get any reassuring answer from their phone staff about how they were going to keep this from happening again. So I suspect that rather than relaxing during the time leading up to my vacation, now I am going to have to keep watching them like a hawk for the next two weeks and check my email multiple times per day while on vacation to make sure they don’t keep trying to change our reservations while we are underwater.

Sad to think that they just got named one of the top eight airlines in the world, but can’t seem to manage what is a fairly simple issue like this. I guess not having any competition on the flights to the Sister Islands makes them not worry too much about things like this. What am I going to do about…change airlines?

 

Doctorfish: Had a similar problem earlier in the year. We were originally booked for early afternoon and when we checked in, were told all flights were full until next day.

I stayed in the agent’s face until we were finally put on a flight at 17.00 same day. Most unsettling situation.

There were other travelers at the counter who seemed to be in the same boat.

I guess that’s what happens when you hold a monopoly.

 

AggieDiver: I can’t prove it, but I still think they are giving priority to Cayman residents and bumping non-residents off the flights when necessary. If they try to rebook me one more time before we head down there, I am going to escalate the issue beyond their customer service phone reps and see if we can get to the bottom

 

Posts October 17 2014

Jdcpa: I have another story to tell on this issue, and will do that later in the day.

I am still trying to get a flight home as I have been completely bumped off my flights to Tampa.

Right now I get to Miami at 8:00 Pm and am being told to drive to Tampa to get home.

I wish I knew who to call to get some answers. The reservations people are absolutely no help.

More later.

Aggie is correct.

This is my story as it sits right now. Sorry for the long post.

Original booking was flying out of TPA to LC on 10/19 and returning from LC to TPA on 10/27. Business class paid for. Normal flight times

I got the same email as Aggie routing me through CYB, leaving LYB earlier, but getting in GCM about the same time, no issue.

I then got an email that went like this. LYB to CYB at 8:30; CYB to LYB at 3:30 (Yes LC to CB and then back seven hours later) LYB to GCM at 3:40; GCM to MIA at 5:30 arriving in MIA at 8:00 PM. AND THAT WAS IT. No return flight to Tampa.

I was told that the best answer was to drive to Tampa from Miami.

I was told that the reason for this is the GCM to TPA flight was cancelled on the 27th.

There was no early morning fight from LYB to CYB on the 27th either, that had been cancelled as well.

So we tried to go to CYB on the 26th, but found out the jet from CYB to GCM was full. No other flight from CYB to GCM would get me there in time for any connection to TPA.

So we figured out a way for me to get to LYB to GCM on the 26th, and asked for approval for business class on AA from MIA to TPA. Arriving in GCM at about 6:00 PM and leaving at 7:30 AM the next morning.

The next call I get is that the GCM to TPA flight had been restored, but there were no business class seats open. Of course I still can’t get to GCM except by going the day before.

The next call I get says they are adding a flight (or at least they think they are) from LYB to CYB and from CYB to GCM that will get me there in time for the flight to TPA.

I am waiting for them to confirm the flights.

So as it sits, two days before departure, I might have a flight home, and will hopefully will hear this morning. On the same flights as I was originally supposed to be on!!!

I paid for a business class ticket and now don’t have a seat in business class.

And the best part, I don’t get any payment because the cost of a coach ticket today on the flight is more than I paid for my Business class ticket bought months ago.

I have had issues with Cayman Airways before, but this is ridiculous.

The addition of the 30 seat plane out of CYB has made a mess of their schedules out of Little Cayman.

And their customer service is nonexistent.

Right now it is a nightmare to get to and from Little Cayman and connect to anything. I checked on days before and after my departure and there is nothing available. Nothing!!

Don’t try looking at your tickets if you have a later departure date because their system is not updated with the new (non) flying schedule.

All I can tell you is if you are planning a trip to LC you need to be on the phone with Cayman Airways every day to make sure you have a return flight.

This is a mess beyond belief.

It will get straightened out, but when is the issue.

diver 85: Thanks for headsup AD———we checked our GC to CB tickets last nite, for Saturday, & they had—-without emailing us–up’ed our flight by ~ an hour and a half to 5:10 PM(from 6:25 PM)ie different times & different flight numbers………….. .hmmmmmm

AggieDiver: Sounds to me like they had somebody more important than you that wanted to fly to Tampa in business class. So they take you off the flight completely and make a mess of your reservation for a few days…then restore you back to what you had without business class. They are banking on you being so happy to have a flight that you won’t bitch about being bumped from business class with no compensation.

KathyV: Thanks for the heads up; I’ve just checked out upcoming flights to/from CB and so far we still have flights and seats, but I will keep my eye on the schedule!

 

Posts October 21 2014

Carriemak: carriemak is offline

What a mess! Too bad they didn’t offer to pay for an extra night in Paradise.

 

[Quotes jdcpa post in full from October 17 2014]

 

caymaniac: I actually had them pay for a night, of course this is over 10 years ago but they over booked and put us up at the Ambassador for the night, lucky for us we could let that happen.

 

Posts Nov 2 2014

 

Jdcpa: They did it to me again!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I have a December trip planned and just got a call that my return trip has been changed to get me back as far as Miami, not Tampa, and not business class that I paid for.

Exact same issue!!!!!!!!

I can’t believe the incompetence of these folks.

Of course no one who can possibly fix it is there until tomorrow.

Good grief!!!!

carriemak: What is up with Cayman Airways changing flights like that? I have had the flight from Grand to LC changed many times by them but never what you are experiencing. Good luck!

AggieDiver: I know part of it is they are changing the flights going between LC and GC to route more folks through Brac. They want to mainly use the Twin Otters to

carry folks to LC and between LC and Brac. It seems they want to use their leased Embraer 120 and eventually a new Saab 340 to carry most of the non-jet traffic. In the course of changing out flights in their system to account for the schedule changes, it seems their system is canceling the old flight first, then adding the new flight. Which results in the system rebooking folks on new flights sometimes on different days. Not sure why they are booking jdcpa to a completely different end destination though. My flights ended up fine…but I stayed on top of it every day to make sure they were not monkeying with things.

And fwiw, the embraer is a nice ride…cruising speed is twice as fast as the twin otter and it is a fair bit quieter.

KathyV: We came back yesterday and we didn’t have problems with Cayman Air but I spoke with some people that did have problems.

It took 3 days to get one woman’s luggage from GC to CB. They kept calling Cayman Air and were told “yeah it’s here, we will get it to you right away!” but planes kept arriving without her bag. The dive shop kindly loaned her some gear so she could dive but she couldn’t find a mask that didn’t leak and her contact lenses were in her missing bag so she was rather miserable.

Another couple were scheduled to leave CB yesterday on a flight that left around 11:30 am. They had confirmed the flight and printed out boarding passes on Friday, but at 7 am on Saturday they got a call saying that their flight was canceled and that they had been scheduled to leave on the 9:05 am flight! Good thing they had already done most of their packing but it was quite a scramble. When the taxi showed up to pick us up at the hotel the driver was not prepared for another pair of passengers and luggage – but we all squeezed in and made it work.

My husband and I had no problems with Cayman Air. We flew to CB a week ago Saturday on the new Embraer 120 aircraft and I liked it a lot. All of our bags came with us and it was a quick, comfortable, and pleasant flight.

We had originally been booked to leave CB for GC on the jet at 6:20 am yesterday but I wanted a later flight because our Delta flight wasn’t scheduled to leave until 1:30 pm and the Delta check-in counter doesn’t open until 10:30 am – so we would be hanging out in the airport for many hours and dragging our luggage around until the Delta agents showed up – and then hanging out in the departure lounge for more hours until our flight arrived.

Before we left home I tried rescheduling with Reef Fanta Seas, Delta, and Cayman Air and I was told that we would have to pay hundreds of dollars to reschedule. But last Thursday we rented a car to tour around CB and stopped at the airport. I went in and talked to the Cayman Air ticket agent and she was great. She offered to rebook us onto the 9:05 am Embraer 120 flight and it only cost us an extra $25 US per person. it was the best $50 bucks that I spent on vacation.

It is a good thing we were able to take the later flight to GC because yesterday’s return trip to Chicago was a nightmare thanks to Delta. There were a lot of Delta employees at the GC airport but they were all trainees and only one guy knew what he was doing but he was rarely available. It was a long and painful process just to check in even though we were early and there were not many people in line.

We were supposed to board at 1 pm and leave at 1:30 pm but then they announced that the flight was delayed. The Delta staff were vague, non-communicative, and casual. I was afraid that the flight would be cancelled entirely but a plane eventually showed up and we left around 3:30 pm.

We arrived in Atlanta around 7 pm and of course I knew we would never make our 7:25 connection, but it was worse than expected. It took more than 2 hours to get through immigration, customs, rebooking, and security. In fact we almost missed the last flight out because they had almost finished boarding our 9:53 pm flight when we finally got to the gate.

We eventually got home safe and sound but it was a long, hard day. I will never willingly fly Delta again if I can avoid it, I’d rather fly with Klingons!

Anyway, Cayman Air was great for us but I do know that others were having problems with them.

For more on this story go to: http://www.scubaboard.com/forums/cayman-islands/493941-cayman-airways-scheduling-issues-2.html

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