flight nightmare

i got an email this morning: your flight departure time has been changed, please contact us immediately. i looked at the new time - not good.

over a month ago now, i booked a flight to Toulouse in September, to attend my father's 70th birthday. it was the cheapest deal around and i thought it was perfect. the times were a bit longer than i'd wanted, but that was a small price to pay for quite a cheaper ticket. but with the ETD being moved forward by 3 hours, i was suddenly going to have trouble making that flight, as the idea is that a bus will take everyone (about 50 people) back to the airport for 2pm. that's not going to change just for me. my father's place being a good 2 hours away, with no bus possibilities, the only other way is taking a taxi, and that's really expensive.

i called the airline and there was nothing to do but to cancel the flight, really. i'd been holding for about 15 mns, and i wasn't too keen on going through that again, so, not remembering how much more expensive the other flights were, i cancelled. then i checked what else i could book, and i found completely exhorbitant prices. 400 euros for a domestic return! you could practically fly to NY for that. another airline didn't have the right days, and mixing and matching airlines didn't work, as one of the flights was a non-low-cost company and the single was basically the same price as the return...

by then, i was pretty upset. i called my father and we discussed the options and we decided the best thing to do was to cancel the cancellation - if possible. we could always find a solution for the bus problem. so i called them back and, after explaining the situation and the woman talking to her supervisor, they were able to cancel the refund and book me back on as if nothing had happened. thank god. still, i wouldn't want to go through that everyday.