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Airline vouchers: How to rip off your company

Posted by: Stephen Baker on July 06

I spent way too much time on Continental.com and later, the phone, trying to put to use a voucher for a first-class upgrade. It would have made things a lot easier if Continental had leveled with me that the vouchers make sense mostly for travelers on expense accounts (who feel few scruples about socking it to their companies). The math: I can fly coach Newark-Portland for about $380 roundtrip. To take advantage of my “free” upgrade, the coach ticket would run about $950.

Reader Comments

Aaron B. Hockley

July 6, 2006 07:20 PM

Aw come on, that's not newsworthy... I've never met an airline that was in the business of making any sort of upgrades or using vouchers a painless process. Anyone else?

steve baker

July 7, 2006 12:00 AM

I'll admit that I was naive. I had that voucher in my drawer, and I was really counting on a nice cross country flight in luxury. I guess I knew that they wouldn't make it easy, and that I might not get the best rates. But to have me waste me time plugging in all those numbers when it was going to cost me more than twice as much seemed like an abuse.

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