The opportunity to reschedule our departure to Cape Town to get a better fare was going to expire today, so I screwed my courage to the sticking place, put on headphones, and called British Airways. Their voice menu was mercifully short (only two questions, each of which only had three options), but then they hit me with the dreaded statement that “wait times may be longer than usual” and began playing BA’s theme music, the Flower Duet from Lakmé by Léo Delibes.
After about 30 seconds, a voice interrupted the music to remind me that wait times may be long, and then the music resumed for another 30 seconds. After a few cycles, I took off my headphones and put the call on speaker so I could work on editing the minutes from last night’s Shir Hadash Ritual Committee meeting.
I was still working on the minutes when, a mere 75 minutes after calling BA, I was connected to an agent. I explained what I wanted to do (fly a day earlier and get a refund for the difference in price). She set off to work on my request, putting me on hold while she worked. I got to hear a lot more of the Flower Duet, occasionally broken up by her reporting on progress or asking me questions. I did more editing while I waited.
It took another hour, but she delivered most of what I wanted. Our flights have been rebooked but not yet re-ticketed (that will have to be done by the Reissue Department), and we’ll get a voucher for the difference in price – almost $1500. The voucher is good until the end of September 2023, so there’s a decent chance we’ll get to use it before it expires. And if not, we’ll be no worse off than if we’d stayed with our original flight schedule, so I’m fairly happy with the result.
After the call ended, I finished up the minutes and sent them out; it sure was a lot easier to concentrate on them then.