When Chris Cuomo was bounced from CNN for journalistic improprieties he wanted ‘Megyn Kelly money’ on the way out. Reportedly he demanded $60 million as a separation payment. Megyn Kelly, of course walked away with $69 million when NBC bought out her contract. Now she has a podcast.
Kelly left Fox News, where she built her brand, after no longer really being at home there in the Donald Trump era with Trump going after her during the Republican primaries over her questions about his misogyny. In her words “she became the story.”
She’s wealthy. She’s famous. But the great equalizer in life – the place where there’s no inequality – is dealing with a European airline. Over lost luggage. At New York JFK.
The prominent host told her Air France baggage nightmare in full in a hilariously detailed 18 minute segment of her online show. Just beware that around 13 minutes and 45 seconds in she drops the F-bomb – something the airlines drive all of us to do from time to time.
After her family’s Air France trip to Venice with her family she waited for checked bags at JFK airport but none of them arrived. She put in a missing bag claim and was advised all of the bags were on the next Air France flight 3 hours later, and they’d all be delivered that day. No bags followed, so she followed up.
The baggage office was outsourced. Nobody answered the phone. She left messages. Apparently after somewhere between 83 and 100 calls someone picked up and told her that they had no information on the bags and to deal with Air France directly – but she couldn’t find a path to do so other than the website. She took to twitter.
Hey @airfrance @AirFranceUS – you managed to lose ALL of our bags en route home from CDG to JFK. Of course it is impossible to get a human being to help us. I realize you’re busy disappointing well, everyone, but how about some assistance?
— Megyn Kelly (@megynkelly) June 28, 2022
Air France responded, as many companies do, asking her to DM her issues for them to help. The truth is that most companies aren’t actually going to be helpful via direct message, they just want to take the complaints out of public view. That seemed to be the case here. She detailed her travails with Air France bots and useless customer service.
The airline even stated that they could not respond in in acceptable period of time (not even that they ‘might not’).
Little by little the bags dragged in and were delivered. But they were still missing a bag and Air France showed all the bags had been sent. She then got caught in the infinite regress of the virtual assistant – she’d provide the requested information on the missing bag, they’d start over introducing themselves. At the end of 3 weeks she’d never managed to speak to a live Air France agent who could advise on baggage issues.
I’m not sure her aspersions over Air France KLM CEO Ben Smith’s salary hit their mark (she was paid far more than he was to not work) nor her complaints about checked bag fees (she almost certainly did not fly economy).
However a celebrity journalist with 2.6 million followers on twitter, nearly half a million YouTube subscribers, and the reach of SiriusXM couldn’t get her airline’s attention through social media. What chance do the rest of us have?
