Carol, Wonderful Carol

I found out that whenever someone tells you something is going to take ten minutes, they actually have a problem with math.

I was trying to use our American Express Rewards points to buy airline tickets to Hawaii. Yep, it is official, we are ALL going to Hawaii. We have saved our points for nearly 20 years and only have to pay for one ticket, out of six! I cannot get too excited yet since we are not leaving until the end of the summer. However, the tickets are purchased and it only took three hours.

The first attempt ended with a computer glitch and the phone call marathon began, at 1:30, with one child asleep, and one quietly playing with his Legos. The second call ended with an unplanned disconnection. The third call ended with a misunderstanding in payment and the tickets increasing by $100.00 each. That is when Carol arrived on the scene. At this point all four kids were awake, active, and interrupting my phone call constantly. This was phone call number four of five total phone calls.

I won't go into entire details of the story, but I will tell you that she called me when she said she would, stayed with me on the phone so that we would not get disconnected, memorized the names and ages of my entire family, and at one point got so frustrated with her people that she wanted to pull out her own credit card and pay for my airfare.

It took a long time to finally make reservations, transfer points, and be done with the phone call. My whole family was at the restaurant waiting for me to arrive and celebrate with Valentine's Day dinner. I was 45 minutes late, and our phone conversation was finally complete at 7:18, but the reservations are done because of Carol. She is wonderful. I told her supervisor. Maybe she'll get a raise. Maybe she can meet us in Hawaii so that I can thank her personally.

It was worth the three hours. My husband owes me a box of See's Candy for all of my efforts. Come to think of it, he owes Carol a box of See's Candy too.

Comments

Sarah Markley said…
I am really happy for you guys! Kudos to you for staying on the phone that long. I'd have given up and put the whole thing on the credit card! =)
Sarah Markley said…
Hey, check me out...I'm in the spotlight too! =) I've been praying for you today.
THAT IS SO COOL! Way to make it happen! Sorry it took so long but you will be laying on a beach in Hawaii and all you can say is "ahhhh, this is worth it!" Well deserved!
ayates said…
fun, fun, fun!!! What island???? We went last summer to maui and had a blast with the kids!!!