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I’m guest-posting at Consumerist.com again this week, and early into next. (If you came here from Consumerist, howdy. Hope you’ll stick around here, too.) Thanks to Ben and Meg for having me back.

Yesterday’s travel-related highlight: passengers forced to relieve themselves in the barf bag because the airline prohibited use of the bathroom — because a lightbulb was out.

Today’s first offering: American Airlines skycaps in Miami, upset with the tip they received, fill a woman’s suitcase with trash. Delightful.

The fine folks at the Consumerist got a tell-all e-mail from a former (and presumably disgruntled) employee of Enterprise Rent-a-Car. Included: some info on how to negotiate better rates.

Some are unethical, such as claiming to be an insurance adjustor for State Farm. Don’t do that.

But other tips are helpful, such as:

1. Enterprise doesn’t have any set prices. […] the agent manually types out how much you pay per day and he has authority to make it pretty much whatever he thinks you should pay.
[…]
6. For the best weekend deal call up on Friday sometime before 2pm and say, “I have all my info, drivers license and credit card, can I get a rental all setup so I don’t have to do anything but sign the ticket when I come in?”

The extent to which Enterprise’s rates are negotiable is particularly striking, and potentially useful, if you’re in the market for a rental car and aren’t afraid to haggle.

The whole post is here.

I was guest blogging earlier today over at the Consumerist. Nice to be invited back ! (I had the pleasure of blogging there once before, back in September last year.) Thanks to Ben and Meg for letting me sit in.

Here’s are some of the posts that went up today. Many are related to travel. Shocking!

- Can’t Drive 55? Find Out Where to Slow Down
- Recharge Your Batteries For Free At Airports
- Will More Fuel Efficient Cars Lead To Cheaper Beer?
- Howto: Get Your Name Off The No-Fly List
- Point/Counterpoint: JetBlue’s Apology Isn’t Enough

I don’t know why I’ve neglected to mention this — I just keep forgetting to post about it — but I’ve enjoyed sitting in with the team over at The Consumerist as a guest blogger this past week. If you’re not familiar with it, it’s a Gawker Media site that acts as an irreverent consumer advocate.

Here is a small sampler of posts on travel related issues that I put up over at their site in the last week:
- Laptoppa Non Gratta: Virgin Atlantic Restricts Dell and Apple Notebooks
- This Post is a Threat to Security
- J.K. Rowling’s Voodoo That She’ll Do Do
- Harass Your Way to (Eventual) Refunds

And here are a few posts unrelated to travel, but what the heck:
- Watching Stupid People on TV Really Does Make You Stupid
- Waiters Lobby for Mandatory 20% Tips
- The Geography of Usury
- Anger God by Eating Foie Gras

My thanks to John and the vacationing Ben for letting me join in the snarky fun.

tags: travel | Consumerist

The snarksters at Consumerist.com have been running an experiment for the last few days, calling various U.S. airlines’ phone numbers, to see how long it takes them to get through to a real human being. (Day 1, Day 2, and Day 3.)

The loser, by a mile? Midwest Airlines, every day.

When they do get through to a customer representative, they might try asking them where they’re located. Soon, phone reps may be REQUIRED to state where they’re located. If U.S. Senate bill S.2553 makes it out the Commerce Committee and to a floor vote, overseas call center workers would need to identify their location to their U.S.-based customers.

While a number of flyers have grumbled about foreign-based phone representatives not understanding U.S. geography, among other complaints, it’s not clear that identifying one’s location would help matters any. It’s not like you have a choice in the phone tree between a domestic or an international call center. This seems like a jingoistic attempt to get people angrier about jobs moving overseas.

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