Kansas Crimson

Sharing doobies. Good idea brah.

oh whatever bros. From now on, you guys gotta bring your own drugs.

It’s surreal: on one hand I get shit here (rightfully so) about sharing a 5 minute car ride.

But on the other hand, I get shit from yall every single day about how I need to stop being so nervous, the important thing is to keep living our lives however we want, now are yall gonna let us reserve this McMansion so our extended family of 22 guests from 5 different states can come ski, or ain’t yall?

And for the record, the doobie part was a joke.

I just stick to edibles, duh.

Right on cue!

“Hi, we’s scheduled to arrive tomorrow, but can we cancel and just get a refund instead?”

I’m sorry, but for a last minute cancellation refunds are not available.

“Oh, darn. Well I just tested positive for COVID, but if I can’t get a refund then I’ll just come anyway.”

I'm flying to Kansas tomorrow.
( yes, I understand the risks, and also postponed my 'holiday' so that there would be fewer people travelling )

So far, looks like no one is sitting next to me on both flights.

Anyone got any flight tips during COVID?
Do I just find an empty corner in the terminal and hide during my layover?

pdub wrote: ↑Sun Jan 03, 2021 3:38 pm
Anyone got any flight tips during COVID?

Don’t

sorry, but if I’m getting shit for a 5 minute car ride with a local, then I only think it’s appropriate to give the best advice possible regarding cross-country leisure travel during a pandemic.


But if you do go, it sounds like you got the right idea

Professionalism time!

I let my manager know (one of the ones who isn’t already out sick with covid - I have 8 bosses, Bob) that a covid positive guest plans to come anyway.

The other 7 managers all deliberate and run it all the way up to the top brass, who basically replies: “no refund. If they have covid and still want to come, just tell them thanks for letting us know.”

1 of the other 7 managers tell me to tell the guest. All the other staff freak out, so I politely stand up. I let the managers know this makes us nervous, we already have one manager out sick for over a week with covid, and we don’t want to risk the health and lives of the staff and other guests and potentially the entire company over a $400 reservation.

I ask the managers to ask the brass (who “works” at home even though it’s more so just a half-retired capitalist cowboy at this point) that if and when the guest calls cuz the fireplace don’t work or whatever, if the brass would be comfortable going in there to help the guest.

Considering how much corporate executives like it when the staff stands up for themselves, this prob ends with me bumping the official ousdahl is funemployed thread, but whatever.

Oh, good! Sort of.

Got in touch of the guest again, and he clarified that it wasn’t actually anyone in the traveling party who is covid positive like he initially said. It’s actually “just” his fiancée’s grandma, who wasn’t traveling, and who no one in the party has been in recent contact with.

(Either he made up the positive test just to try and get a refund, or there are positive tests but they wanna come anyway)

ousdahl wrote: ↑Sun Jan 03, 2021 2:47 pm Right on cue!

“Hi, we’s scheduled to arrive tomorrow, but can we cancel and just get a refund instead?”

I’m sorry, but for a last minute cancellation refunds are not available.

“Oh, darn. Well I just tested positive for COVID, but if I can’t get a refund then I’ll just come anyway.”

My response would have been “can we please have this conversation again so that I can record it, you know, just in case there’s a chance that I happen to get deposed in some litigation? Maybe something to do with reckless endangerment......

Let’s begin- please say your name slowly, and spell your last name”

Seems to be opening them up to quite a lawsuit

Forgive my ignorance. Obviously I am not a lawyer.
If anything, I would think it would be ousdhal's company that might get screwed by doing that.
The guest stated he was Covid positive and they did NOT tell him that he couldn't come.
So what liability if any would the guest have?

On a related side note....
I know of two major hotels in Chicago that shut down unexpectedly before New Year's Eve.
The Ritz and the Four Seasons. They had guests who had booked reservations. My guess is the majority of those guests didn't put down deposits or "pre-pay" but if any of them did, I would have to assume they were refunded.
Now on the flip side, if a guest had put down a deposit or "pre-paid" and the guest canceled the day before because they said they had tested positive for the virus and the hotels had a 48 hour cancelation policy - do you think the hotels would refund the money?

On yet another related side note.....
My mother had booked a trip to Canada in early January of 2020. They trip was not until late August.
She had bought theatre (play) tickets and when she called the theaters in late June or early July to cancel and get a refund - they said that "pandemics" are not refundable - DESPITE their having canceled the performances.
She then asked if the performances were canceled NOT due to the pandemic would she have gotten refunded - then they said yes. WTF?
Apparently one of the theaters decided to tell their patrons AFTER they officially canceled the performances that they have lost a lot of money due to the pandemic and that they would appreciate if people did NOT ask for refunds.
My mother was torn. She asked for a partial refund based on the principal that they were not going to refund her money originally. They gave her a hard time. She then agreed to let them keep the money but then put a portion of it towards next year - god willing.

My final related side note.
Moron me decided to "pre-pay" for a trip to California with points/miles AND $ through American Airlines Vacations. When the shit hit the fan with the pandemic I tried to cancel and get refunded my points/miles AND $. Well, NOPE. They would only give me a credit and that credit was only good FOR TRAVEL before December 31, 2020. Well, we know how that worked out.
I fought with them for a while and somehow supposedly got them to extend it to December 31 of 2021.
Me being me, I called yesterday to confirm it. Of course at first they told me my MONEY "credit" had expired. I then proceeded to read word for word an email that I had received from American Airlines Vacations stating that the credit had been extended to December 31, 2021. About 10 minutes later the woman on the phone said that it was a mistake and that the credit should have only been extended to ONE YEAR from the time I had paid for the trip - which was in January of 2020.
I of course argued with her, told her I can not and will not travel before the end of this month, and that I had "documentation" stating I had until December 31, 2021 to use the credit.
Finally she came back telling me that I do in fact have until December 31, 2021, she would send me a confirmation email (that I requested she do), and then she spoke to me in a tone that implied I should be grateful to her and to American Airlines for being so kind and accommodating to me.
My response was - well if you refunded my money back in February of 2020 like I had originally requested - then this would have been over and done with.

so this whole vaccine rollout...

pdub wrote: ↑Sun Jan 03, 2021 3:38 pm I'm flying to Kansas tomorrow.
( yes, I understand the risks, and also postponed my 'holiday' so that there would be fewer people travelling )

So far, looks like no one is sitting next to me on both flights.

Anyone got any flight tips during COVID?
Do I just find an empty corner in the terminal and hide during my layover?

I haven't found air travel any more harrowing than grocery shopping. My advice (which may be too late in coming) is to bring a couple different kinds of masks. You're going to have one on, continuously, and may not know in advance what will be most comfortable in the pressurized environment.

IMO, lounge passes are worth double during COVID. Terminals can be quite full at the major hubs and the lounges are less populated because of the lack of business travel. Food is limited in some, but drinks are not.

Grandma- I was implying that ousie would have told them not to come if they tested positive. So it’s still on the guest to use good judgment and it would have been documented why they would not allow them to check in.

As for the refund, that’s a whole other discussion. As you said, maybe give them credit for a later stay, or have them forfeit the first night or two but give them back the rest?

The real point is that you have a regional/local resort owner that can't afford to eat last minute cancellations no matter the stated reason. You have a tourist that can't afford to eat a nonrefundable deposit even though he's been exposed and knows the safest option is to cancel. I'm sympathetic to both of those positions. It sucks.

The entire situation should and could have been avoided if better measures were taken (checks calendar) nearly a year ago.

All that said, I think all the stories you hear about employers putting their own employees at risk, often times through forcing them to lie and take risks, is troubling. But again, I can't imagine being in a situation where there's a real risk that you just have to watch your business die.

The tourist has traveler’s insurance, and could get a refund if he made a claim. He doesn’t wanna go that route. Yall’s vacation is more important than this pandemic, remember?

But I think there’s also a good chance they just decided, “dang, bad snow season, maybe if yall play the covid card you can get refunded for the ski trip and go to the beach instead.

And it’s not that the business can’t afford to eat last minute cancellations. This season, just like last summer, is on pace for more record occupancy. Record last minute bookings too, so in all likelihood the property would have rebooked. Just like yall’s vacation, the quarterly numbers are more important than the pandemic too. Isn’t it blatantly obvious how public health concerns have taken a back seat to...just about everything?

In management’s defense, their default response is to call bluff on a last minute cancellation even with the covid card, just cuz they’re so conditioned to yall feeding us line after line of bullshit.