Christopher Elliott writes the Travel Troubleshooter column for The Miami Herald; he also writes about the travel industry for MSNBC.com and for National Geographic Traveler.
If you don't find the information you need here in his past columns, you can reach Elliott via his website at www.elliott.org.
Q: A few months ago, just before my wedding, my fiance and his best man went to Las Vegas for his bachelor party. He had purchased a package deal through Yahoo Travel that included a stay at the MGM Grand hotel and round-trip airfare on Spirit Airlines for both of them.
If 2008 was the year of the staycation, then `09 is bound to be the year of the naycation. As in, nay -- we're not vacationing. The conventional wisdom about travel is that it will slip by just a few percentage points next year. But the unconventional wisdom -- supported by several troubling surveys -- points to a much bigger drop.
Q: I have an issue I'm hoping you can help me with. I made a reservation at Snowbird Resort in Utah last year for a five-night stay over Christmas break. Unfortunately, we missed our flight, so I rescheduled for the first week in March.
Q: I'm at the end of my rope. I recently I booked a trip to Mexico online through Apple Vacations for my wife, daughter, son-in-law and myself. As always, I also bought an insurance package.
Q: I'm having a problem with a long-overdue refund for an online booking. I don't know what to do. I recently bought three airline tickets from Miami to Johannesburg through Travelocity. The trouble started soon after I made my purchase. A Travelocity representative phoned me to say that the price of my ticket had gone up overnight, and that he needed my permission to charge more on my credit card.
Q: I recently booked a car through Hertz to drive my family to San Diego for the holiday weekend. Two weeks after I returned the rental, I discovered an additional $66 charge from the company.
You can't talk about the worst holiday travel experiences without mentioning the movie Planes, Trains and Automobiles. The 1987 comedy, starring Steve Martin and John Candy, is about one frazzled business traveler's struggle to get home in time for Thanksgiving. It's a textbook holiday travel nightmare, featuring snowstorms, flight diversions and almost every imaginable delay.
Q: Can you help me with an airline reservation? I recently bought a ticket on South African Airways through Virgin Atlantic Airways to fly from Los Angeles to Johannesburg. My credit card was charged and the airline promised to send me a paper ticket.
It took a couple of airline bankruptcies, a summer of staycations, a serious recession and the near-collapse of the world economy, but by golly, travelers are feeling loved right now.
Q: I need your help with a cruise booking that's gone terribly wrong. More than two years ago, I tried to buy a Caribbean cruise for my parents though Travelocity. At the end of the process, the site crashed and I lost my reservation.
Q: Last year I earned enough Marriott loyalty points to score a cruise with Carnival for my 25th anniversary. I followed all of the rules carefully. We booked a cabin and a certificate was issued for the cruise.
What's so fair about flying? If you said ''nothing,'' you're right. Air travel has become so Balkanized in the last few months that flying is -- and I want to be careful not to overstate this -- almost un-American.
Q: I have an issue I'm hoping you can help me with. I made a reservation at Snowbird Resort in Utah last year for a five-night stay over Christmas break. Unfortunately, we missed our flight, so I rescheduled for the first week in March.
Q: I'm trying to get a partial refund for my airline ticket, and am getting nowhere. I recently booked a nonrefundable ticket on Lufthansa from San Francisco to Istanbul through Priceline.com. I had to call off my travel plans because of an illness, so I decided to recoup my rather sizable surcharges and fees, which amounted to about $350.
Q: My daughter and son-in-law will be traveling to South Africa to attend a cousin's wedding. They've been carefully watching ticket prices online and recently found a fare on South African Airways. They phoned the airline to book the tickets.
Q: Is there a difference between the price you pay for an airline ticket online, compared with offline? I recently tried to buy a ticket for my mother on Expedia. She wanted to visit my brother in North Carolina, who was on life-support.
Q: I booked a one-week vacation in Ocho Rios, Jamaica, through Apple Vacations recently. It included accommodations and transfers to and from the airport.
Q: I'm stuck with a mystery hotel bill, and could use a little help with solving it. Last summer I booked a room at the Sheraton in downtown Duluth, Minn., through Hotwire.com. When we checked out, we paid for our incidentals but not for the room, since we had pre-paid for it online. But a few months later, my credit card was charged for the hotel, too.
Q: What is a car rental company's responsibility to have a vehicle available for you when it sends you a confirmation? I ask because we recently rented a car from National Car Rental in Mexico, and they ran out of cars. When we arrived at the rental counter in Guadalajara, a representative told us that other renters did not return their cars on time. He said there would be no cars for several days and would not help us find another car.
Q: I recently booked a hotel room in Singapore through Orbitz. I never received a confirmation online, and when I inquired about my reservation, I was told Orbitz had nothing listed under my e-mail address. So I booked a hotel room through another travel agency. Imagine my surprise when I discovered a $74 charge for the hotel on my next credit card statement. Orbitz has refused to refund the money for the last 10 months.
Q: I'm trying to get a refund for airline tickets that I didn't mean to buy. I tried to book three flights to Florida through Expedia. But during the confirmation process, my computer froze and the screen blacked out. I called Expedia to verify if the flight had been confirmed. It had no record of my purchase, so it offered to help me make the reservations by phone.
Q: I recently stayed at the Grand Floridian Resort & Spa at Walt Disney World, and something happened to my SUV that I parked through the hotel's valet service.
Q: I recently found a surprise fee on my hotel bill, and I'm having absolutely no success in getting it removed. Maybe you can help me.
Q: We booked a flight to Europe in business class using 180,000 award miles, and we've just learned that some of our flights will be in economy class. We need your help.
Q: I'm disappointed with Days Inn's ''no cancellation'' policy reply and frustrated by its indifference to my predicament. I hope you can help me.
Q: My airline has gone under, taking my award miles with it. I need your help getting them back. My husband and I planned a trip to Maui to join our daughter and grandchildren for a summer vacation together. We contacted our credit card company, Capital One, and used 71,000 ''no hassle'' reward miles to book a roundtrip airfare from Los Angeles to Maui.
Q: My husband and I recently booked a flight to Europe through Alaska Airlines using our frequent flier miles. We're going to Zurich via London on British Airways, one of Alaska's partner airlines.
Q: I have a trivial travel issue that is turning into something that's anything but trivial. Frontier Airlines mishandled my bags on a recent flight to Salt Lake City. I had missed a connection, and the airline promised to send the bags to my hotel. It also gave me a sheet explaining that I would be reimbursed for up to $25 in incidental expenses.
Q: I'm having a problem with a hotel voucher that has turned out to be useless. Last summer, I took my daughter and 4-year-old granddaughter to San Antonio to visit SeaWorld. We stayed at the Motel 6 on Market Square, where I had been a guest more than a dozen times in the past.
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