fridaysoff.ca

We're home!

Now, I don't often use my blog as a platform to speak negatively of brands, but when a company leaves me with no choice but to put my kid's life at risk I think I have every right to produce a public complaint. So here goes.

Late yesterday afternoon (4:45 p.m. to be exact) we arrived at Pearson from a fun holiday in Bonita Springs, Florida. Before we left for the airport - yesterday morning - I called Aeroport Taxi and Limousine Services to book a van with a child seat to pick us up at Pearson. The spokesperson on the phone told me to call when I landed and that a car would be there to pick us up with a baby seat within five minutes. Great, I thought and hung up the phone.

Note: We booked them to drive us to the airport when we left a week prior and despite the poorly installed baby seat it had been a satisfactory alternative to park n' fly.

So fast forward about five hours and we've landed and retrieved our luggage.  It's about 5:30 p.m. and L'il E is getting cranky (understandably so after a long afternoon and no nap) I've come down with the cold that I'd been fighting off all week and the Hubs is getting testy. I call Aeroport Taxi and Limousine Services and they tell me to go to door 19 and that a car will be there in five minutes. We go to 19 and wait, and wait, and wait. I call back and another representative tells me a car is on it's way, but that there are no cars in cue with a baby seat. What? (Insert blood boiling here).

At this point I lose it.

I ask why the car I had ordered five hours ago is nowhere to be found and the woman calmly on the other end tells me that I need to wait until there is a car with a baby seat in cue, but she can't tell me how long that might take - it could be one or two hours (you're kidding right?). She then tells me that she can't request for a car to come pick us up because that's not how things work with arrivals (oh really?). Finally she tells me that her drivers will take me without a car seat (oh you mean put my kids life in danger? OK no problem). I hate this company.

She hangs up offering me no alternatives and doesn't even sympathize and I'm left utterly frustrated and irate. Did I mention helpless?

With no other option available the Hubs and I take the chance and hop in another airport taxi with L'il E strapped to us - literally holding him for dear life. Now I know there are haters out there who will judge us for this, but we honestly had no other choice.

Fortunately we made it home safely and E sat calmly looking at photos on my iPhone while I sat there having a full-on Britney Spears moment.

I will never be calling for Aeroport Taxi and Limousine Services again. They've been around since 1968 but clearly they haven't learned anything about customer service in the last 44 years.

Do you have any airport horror stories to share? I'm feeling catty.