Travel nightmares enroute to the Balkans

Aug 12, 2024 Kotor, Montenegro??

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“Unfortunately, Montenegro Airlines has ceased operations.”

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We had hoped we could take the train from Prague to Montenegro. We had heard of a very cool line of track that strong-man Tito, of former Yugoslavia had laid down, connecting Belgrade to the coast. Said to be one of the most spectacular train rides, with?254 tunnels and 435 bridges on the 296-mile journey from the Serbian capital to the Adriatic.

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Construction began in 1950 and with typical socialist elan, it was finally completed 26 years later.

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What intrigued us was the possibility of booking the overnight train and arriving on the coast at daybreak.?

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Alas – some obstacles.

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To get to Belgrade, the best route stops in Budapest first. Sounds great, another city from our bucket list. So far, the planning was taking shape.?

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Then problem number 1 emerged. The main track connecting Budapest to Belgrade was closed for construction. Had been so far, for 3 years.

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Hmmm.

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Well, one could travel via Zagreb, then Belgrade – or even fly directly there from Prague. The ultimate train ride was still on the agenda.

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But wait! Where was the online booking option? And Eurail didn’t even show the route on their planner app.

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Back good ole Google. Search after search. Finally, a link to a guy who specialized in putting together cool train trips. That’s his thing. But he’s not always available and then only via an email or a “contact me” page.

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I send him a message. “Can he assist with booking the night train to the coast from Belgrade”??

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“Sorry, no go”, came the reply. For your dates, the sleeper cars are fully booked. But, he continued, you could do the day trip. Tickets can only be purchased at the station, however, in person.

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Well, I can tell you, we were not too keen on getting ourselves to Belgrade and finding out that the train was sold out. Then what??

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By now, we were looking at our options and I came up with the brainwave of “why not fly directly from Prague to the coastal city Tivat.” ?From prior research I knew such an airport existed and that it was very close to Kotor – as medieval a place as you could imagine.?

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Back to our trusting travel booking app. And “yes!” a flight existed – one directly, 3 times a week. Bingo – let’s go.

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The evening before our departure, I received the message that we should check in. Normal operating procedure.

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Instead of giving me a direct link, the booking app says to go to the website of the airline they had booked with. That’s when things got interesting. The first site was a charter airline out of Denmark. They had a list of partners, one which showed it was flying the route we had booked. But when I got to their airline – there was no online check-in found. A lengthy search uncovered an email address.?

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I wrote, “Do you have online check-in for the route to Tivat from Prague?” And waited.

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The next item, of course, was to book a ride the next morning to the airport. Naturally, there are 2 terminals – which one was our flight departing from??

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Back to searching – this time to the Prague airport departures.?

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Then 30 minutes of panic. No such flight was listed to our destination. A quick search then gave this note – Montenegro Airlines had ceased operations in 2020!

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WTF!!

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But wait, an email came back from the airline – telling me there was no online check in. Had to be done at the airport physically. So, I replied – ok – what terminal is the departure? And waited…

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Back to the airport site. There had to be a listed departure. I had the flight number and time and everything.

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This time I entered the destination instead of the flight number and lo and behold. The departure was listed at the time I had booked. The difference from before? The number ‘0’ before the 3 numbers…..

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Then another epiphany.

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Our airline was “Air Montenegro” not “Montenegro Airlines”! A small but significant difference.

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Then I turned to my wife, with sheer relief on my face and explained the “nightmare” I had just spent the past hour on. Naturally, she laughed, then gave me a big hug.

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I expect by now, you are wondering; “where is the business lesson in this story, as cute as it may be?”?

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Good question.

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The answer is simple. Details matter. What seems logical and obvious to you will not be to your customer. You have run through your procedures, tens, hundreds if not thousands of times. It is now second nature to you what a customer must do, to get your product or service; either to purchase or understand and ?how best to use it.

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Worse yet, you may have employees now handling customer service and sorry to tell you they do not have your best interests at heart. They are working for themselves. Yes, they punch the clock for you, heed some of your instructions and receive pay from you. But they are there to put food on their table, save up for their vacations or prepare themselves for the next job.?

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You must practice what Reagan said when questioned about the deal he had signed to get the Soviets to reduce their nuclear arsenal.

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“We trust they will do it. But we will physical check too, to verify.”

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Make sure you do the same with your people.

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Until next week,

Stay healthy and focus on profit!?

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- Hugh? The “Profit Accelerator” Expert

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P.S. Did you know that even tiny improvements of 1-3%, in just 12 fundamental areas of your business could give you 50% and more improvement to your bottom-line? Test out my brand-new?Profit Acceleration SimulatorTM? and discover the true impact of a conservative estimate of Profit Acceleration initiatives on your business and see for yourself. (https://hughtafel.com/sim)

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