I have a new found sympathy for anyone who has to use a wheelchair. Not that I wasn't already sympathetic, or at least I would like to think at the very least understanding, but, as the saying goes, if you really want to understand somebody, walk a mile in their shoes, well, try wheeling a few miles in their wheels around Heathrow! and understanding shall be yours.
For a recent holiday trip to Portugal, we took the decision to travel in the comfort of a full-service airline for a change–British Airways consumed my Air Miles and got my business. Unfortunately, a few weeks before the trip my wife injured her back, necessitating what can only be called “wheelchair assistance".
At our first (of many check-in’s) at Manchester, a wheelchair was offered, all we had to do was walk a few paces to the “assistance" area and one would be immediately provided–however, when we took those few paces to the “assistance area" the nice lady there knew knew absolutely nothing about our request and the wait for a ‘pusher’ would be at least an hour. When I pointed out that I could actually push the wheelchair myself, I didn't need anybody to pushing for me a wheelchair was provided immediately! What a strange world we live in.
So far so good, a pleasant lounge experience of Manchester, prompt boarding then. Oh dear–British Airways seems to have gone all “Ryanair" with cramped plastic seating with faux leather effect. I'm exaggerating, the seat was definitely a seat, and there was definitely some legroom, they haven't quite gone all budget airline yet but, the new aircraft with new fit out definitely showed a trend–we are all being squeezed in–even now by so called full service Airlines.
Prompt arrival at Heathrow–first problem, I thought all of BA now lived at terminal 5 – unfortunately, not their flight to Lisbon which departs from terminal 3. The dreaded transfer route–terminal 5 to 3–not normally a big problem but, if one of you is having trouble walking anything more than a few paces then you really need that wheelchair! One wasn't forthcoming, furthermore, when we asked one of the Heathrow staff members "is it far to walk?" we received the quite remarkable answer, “Oh no it's just round the corner", round the corner was a corridor, so long it may have crossed time zones! Thankfully, about halfway down the corridor a helpful BA staff member was able to provide a wheelchair which then stayed with us all the way to boarding, unfortunately, no one seemed to consider that we might need another wheelchair at the other end, as on arrival at Lisbon. it seemed that walking huge distances was some sort of Portuguese national obsession (and not a wheelchair in sight). Still staggering, wearily to luggage reclaim area we were each able to obtain a trolley and load it with our disproportionately large quantity of baggage. Unsteadily we began to navigate our way outside the terminal building to our airport hotel, which was, we were assured, a mere 400m away, unfortunately across that marvellous Calcada paving, which is not ideal if you're pushing the trolley with a couple of unstable bags on it, and you've got a bad back! Our evening and journey ended with a rather remarkable stroll down the main road (rather than on the Calacada pavement) with a Portuguese traffic policeman walking very helpfully in front of us and diverted traffic away from our trolleys and bags. Very helpful the Portuguese, if a little obsessed with Calcada.
The next morning , our holiday began in earnest with a short stroll back to the airport to pick up our car from Avis. There's nothing worse than standing in a queue when the people at the desk don't seem to be doing anything, or are chatting amongst themselves, or straightening the dividers that keep the people in the queue in a straight line! I assume I'm not alone in thinking, that I'd really like to grip such people warmly by the throat and tell them to stop messing about with the queue straitening devices and get behind the desk and distribute some bloody cars! What makes such a queueing experience worse is that when you finally get to the front of the queue, when it's your turn and you think that all your pain and anguish and anxiety is over, things get worse!
As I said, as a rule, the Portuguese are very helpful, unfortunately, the lady behind the desk at Avis was very much the exception. I won't describe the laborious processes of name, booking reference, credit card, passport that led to the point where I was ultimately offered a car, for, I truly didn't think that they could get worse–but it did. Here’s how the conversation went:
“Would I like to use the device to pay the motorway tolls",
“How much is that?”,
“€1.8 a day to a maximum of €18 per 10 days" came the answer
“But I'm only hiring the car for 7 days …you have my agreement in front of you"
“Yes?"
At this point I'm beginning to give up–and try to move on
"OK So, it's a maximum of €18 and that's it?"
"Yes.... plus the tolls"
" PLUS the tolls?”
“Yes"
“And how much will they be?"
“I have no idea"
At this point I do give up, and so simply–“okay, go ahead"
BUT she wasn't going to let me get away that easily.
A few more clicks and words and printing noises and my documents is handed across to me with a typical continental flourish along the lines of "hereaaaaa issaaayouraa docuuumennnt", youuua willlaaa zeeee ... okay sorry I'm going to stop doing the accent.
" You will see that there is an insurance excess of €20,000"
" How much?"
" €20,000"
“But I have insurance, I've paid for it, it says on my car hire voucher here” says I, pointing aggressively!
" You might have insurance with whoever you booked it with, but you donnnn’taa haveaaa insurance with usszzz–if you havea anyyyy damage to the car we will charge your credit card €20,000"
At this point I thought,(but did not say) " it's a Vauxhall Astra for Christ sake, it isn't even worth €20,000", but then, I thought better of it.
I've recently adopted a policy of using a rather marvellous credit called Santander Zero for all my holiday expenditure. I found that it gives quite a remarkable exchange rate, (almost exactly the commercial rate on any particular day) and not the rather poor rate that is severely loaded or penalised by Travel exchange companies, normal credit card companies or banks. Consequently the entire cost of this holiday to date, flights, accommodation and of course car hire had already been charged to the card which, being fairly new to me did not have any excessive credit limit. So, in the event of an accident they were going to attempt to charge €20,000 to this already heavily loaded card?
Good luck with that I thought, inwardly smirking if not outwardly.
I must say, we enjoyed our holiday and I can at least look back on the experience and smile.
This morning I received a bill for €43.10 for tolls, some 9 months after the trip and charged it automatically to my credit card. Apparently the Portuguese authorities and Avis had some technical difficulties.
You've got to laugh.
:-)
