to try and make an already long story short, me and my family had a flight from Birmingham Alabama to Baltimore and then Baltimore to buffalo new York where our family lives. We ended up stuck in Baltimore for 6 1/2 - 7 hours with a 1 year old little girl and a 2 year old little boy. As we all know, flying with and traveling with kids can be very trying and stressful. we Understand delays and things happen this is part of flying and a hidden risk, but the airlines lack of empathy, answers, time, just to name a few was wild and no cares were given that night with this airline, ON TOP of the full blown lies they fed us were we literally did a quick google search and or made a phone call just to go back to them and say " hey listen we know you just lied we understand delays but you do not have to lie to customers''. All that aside we made the best of a very long airport layover stay and dealt with it. The BIG ISSUE! The reason I am here is to throw caution to all your winds. While trying to entertain 2 cranky and tired kids in Baltimore airport they were having what was one of the heaviest rains I had seen in a good while. these jokers FOR WHATEVER REASON! ( still wondering and waiting to hear this explanation) left everyone's luggage out by the loading area where planes park and our luggage goes underneath. The problem was 1. there was no plane to load and 2. the lack of care of this airline and their staff to have brought the luggage out but to then leave it there IN A MONSOON! needless to say we were supposed to originally be in buffalo around 6:30-7:00 P.M. Instead we all finally got to our destination around 3:30 in the morning. We proceeded to say "let's just get these kids to bed and we will sort everything in the morning". TO MY SURPRISE as we went in the luggage for the kids sound machines, medicines, P.J. 's and the blankets, This is when we got the biggest shock to see it was not just the outside of the luggage that got extremely saturated BUT EVERYTHING inside as well. Our luggage if you did not know and was not part of the rain in Baltimore would have thought someone threw them in a pool and waited for it to completely sink before retrieving it. Praise God! We were staying with family because we would have been up the very famous creek without a paddle. we hand washed one set each of P.J.' for the kids and throw them in the dryer while one of us had to go to Walmart to find cheap sound machines for the kids and over-the-counter medicines. all said and done we all finally got to get some sleep around 4:50 in the morning in which none of us made it out of bed that same day anything less than 1:30-2:00 pm. When me and my wife finally had enough energy to get up and deal with the luggage, that is when we saw how bad of a mistake southwest made. All the clothing had to be washed, dried and folded, which again we can eat that one as The clothes were just very wet and as we went through each article of clothing we found that there really was no loss and no damage there. Now that could not be said about the electronics, medications ( some prescription) very expensive textbooks which i needed to study for a masters exam, and the suitcase themselves are now discarded because as expected they start to smell despite our best cleaning efforts and also with 2 young children we got worried that somewhere in all our luggage mold would start growing were we could not maybe see or clean. To really give the visual of how waterlogged everything was some of my prescription medication came out in one solid block, as some of them were kind of like powder pills in which when I opened it up to take one a very white cloudy liquid poured out as rain water got in the bottles and dissolved them. We even had a lot of things packed specifically in zip lock seal bags for a little added security. A lot of it was the kids' medications and toiletries, and everything inside, outside and around was in some form of a pool of water in and or around it. Around 2-3 hours we finally got some pics and had an inventory of what was damaged,destroyed,ruined and salvageable and all said and done we were out just shy of $4,000.00. a lot of things we could not locate any proof of purchase or receipts , so all said and done we were just going to have to take a hit and put in a claim totaling $2,500. Now granted, it says give them up to 30 days to go over and respond. It ended up being closer to 2 months before I had to reach out again to see where we all stand and next steps, to find out they responded a while ago and needed additional info to do " final phases". we got no emails, no text , no calls, no smoke signals, nothing, as if we would just forget about it and they would carry on. finally we get the response saying they got everything they need and the claim is in the final stage but as a" For your troubles' ' prize we sent you a $50.00 voucher. Finally I got the response email saying the claim is ready and to my utter surprise they offered us a $200.00 voucher to bring my grand total to $250.00 in THERE vouchers. I messaged them saying that is unacceptable and we are not some rich family and they are the reason we are in this mess and we are fairly young parents who have just got running in our careers. We received a follow up email saying pretty much we are sorry you are unhappy with our decision you are valued customers to us and we hope your next flight with us will be a more positive experience ( side note my $200.00 voucher was bumped down to $100.00 in the next email ) making my new grand total $150.00. THE BIG REASON! they are going by guidelines and policies which state i had to make a claim within 4 hours. Now we are out of some of our kids' things, luggage, electronics, medication, study material, just to name a few from the laundry list of the loss we now have to eat. My question is, Who is in their right mind after having a very long day that we had and dealing with a very poor experience and 2 very antsy and tired children, is going to have the time let alone the energy or will power to make a claim that late under very unique circumstances? and i won't even get started on how I had to beg my pharmacy and doctor to send me more medications because for health reasons i Needed it, the red tape and amount of proof i needed to provide so they did not think i was some drug user trying to abuse my medications. i flew this airline because a while ago a handful of people told me they were pretty good and may be easier to fly with when you have kids, Now I'm sitting here wondering if A. were these people under the influence when suggesting this airline, and B.mistaken what airline they actually Flew , because as it stands this airline is not only wrong and unethically and unreliable But also dishonest and thief's and unprofessional who lack humility and a VERY basic respect for being human and difficult circumstances. they are not willing to take responsibility for their wrongs and poor actions and decisions. I May not get my money back or items But the least what i can do is warn others to take caution to the wind when flying this airline and if you can afford it to buy the flight insurance because unfortunately we could not at the time and that was a gamble and now we are paying for that mistake. This airline is unreliable and shady and doing some research i now see why their ratings are nose diving among all the other stuff they got going on. i will be adding a few pictures although no justice can be done unless you could see and touch in person, you all for listening to my rant i guess we live and learn. have a blessed day all.
