Birmingham family's dream holiday to Disney World 'ruined' after being blocked from KLM plane
A family from Birmingham were left with a bill of £2,600 to salvage their holiday to Disney World in Florida after an airport blunder left them unable to board their flight to Orlando.
The Miller family arrived in Birmingham Airport on May 30 for their flight - only for KLM airline to prevent them from boarding the plane.
The airline told them they were booked on a return flight from Orlando, but not the outward journey.
It appeared a change in the booking had not properly been recorded on KLM's systems - despite dad Sheldon Miller getting an email confirmation of the alteration.
He then had to then spend more than £2,500 on an alternative flight for himself, his partner and two kids with Aer Lingus.
They were also denied boarding on the return flight with Sheldon and his family instead having to fly with Virgin Atlantic from Florida to Heathrow, to Amsterdam and then to Birmingham.
The dad who is calling on KLM to refund the extra £2,600 said the whole thing had been an "utterly ridiculous saga" and that "it was the worst customer experience with any company ever by a country mile".
Mr Miller changed the family's outbound flights, initially planned for April 3 - after his dad was diagnosed with cancer.
After getting confirmation of the change, and a link to check-in through airline Delta, a partner of KLM, the family were told at the gate at BHX they were not registered to fly on May 30.
Mr Miller said: "After queueing for an hour we got to the check in desk and they told us we weren’t booked in to fly out but we were booked in to fly back and there was no way we would be able to board."
He adds: "At that point, our seven-year-old daughter burst into tears and our 13-year-old son wasn’t best pleased either, neither were we.
"We then spent three hours trying to speak to someone at KLM only to be told finally by a call centre rep we had to sort it out through social media as they couldn't do it.
"I've never heard anything so ridiculous in all my life when it comes to business."
Mr Miller tweeted KLM on May 30 saying: "KLM we have turned up to Birmingham Airport only to be told we can’t board our flights to Orlando, because your booking system has failed to allocate our flight date change request, after dozens of requests from us on the phone & in writing. No one is helping."
After eventually making it to Disney via the Aer Lingus flight, his family then faced the gruelling return journey via Heathrow and Amsterdam before returning back to Birmingham on June 10.
Mr Miller said: "No one has stepped up in any way. The whole experience felt like one massive pass the parcel, with no one at KLM remotely interested in our customer issue, let alone willing to take responsibility for it.
"We still not have had any communication from KLM about the refund of our Aer Lingus flight and airport hotel stay."
Mr Miller: "You cannot charge people return full fare and only deliver one half of a journey and continually keep customers in the dark, passing them from pillar to post and expect them to put up and shut up."
ITV News Central has contacted KLM for a comment.