From the "Our Difference" section of www.virginamerica.com

SEE UPDATES BELOW. VIRGIN AMERICA MAKES GOOD ON “OUR DIFFERENCE” PROMISE.

I’ve been a huge fan of flying Virgin America since I flew with them earlier this year. The whole experience – the style, lighting, wifi, etc. – won me over immediately.

I first booked a flight with them around this time last year to visit my 77-year-old father who lives outside of Seattle, WA. Our trip was unfortunately postponed by my mother being admitted to the hospital for late-stage cancer symptoms. It took a few phone calls and a bit of persuasion for the airline to give us credits toward later flights, but I got them.

I’ve been able to redeem some of them since, but because the original trip was scheduled over the Labor Day weekend, we still had a large balance left over for future flights.

A few weeks ago, nearly a year later, we noticed that the credits were going to expire on August 27, and we were planning another trip to visit my father. Unfortunately, this also coincided with the passing of my mother on August 13. Needless to say, we had other things to deal with right after and we missed the August 27 date. But not by much. We realized our mistake only two days later and called to see if we could still redeem them for our trip to Seattle.

My wife spent over an hour on the phone after initially being told “no, but try this person/number and maybe you can.” She was bounced around from Guest Care rep to Guest Care rep, on hold, disconnected, on hold, disconnected… She even faxed them my mother’s death certificate.

Finally, this morning she was simply told “No. It is not our policy to extend credits past their expiration date.”

Okay. We screwed up. We had a good excuse, but we – I – screwed up. After all, an expiration date is an expiration date and we’re talking about an airline, right? Airlines are notorious for not caring about their customers.

And that would be fine if it weren’t for that damn message above from their website. Words like “bring great service back” and  ”challenge the status quo and always stand up for our guests.” make me expect more. Words like that make me expect service that keeps notes on me as a valued customer. Notes that might suggest: This guy has had a rough year. He wouldn’t have the credits if he didn’t have to cancel a trip due to his ailing mother, and now he’s only 2 days past expiration due to her death. Maybe it’s worth $303.99 to keep an otherwise very loyal customer, loyal.

It’s easy for companies like Virgin America to talk the talk. It’s harder for companies like Zappos to walk the walk. Guess which company has earned my ardent loyalty?

So I’m calling bullshit on Virgin America. You can keep your mood-lighting, your 3000 MP3’s and your wifi. I think I’d rather do without and wait for Zappos to launch an airline.

UPDATE: Perhaps I was premature in my judgement of Virgin America. They have contacted me via Facebook and we’re working toward a solution. I will update this post as soon as I get confirmation.

UPDATE: Well it might’ve taken a little nudging over the webernets, but Virgin America came through in a big way and lived up to the “Our Difference” claims above. I’m back to being a huge fan of the airline, and truth be told, I was dreading the idea of a personal boycott. I’ll be blogging about this experience and the power of social media on the Trustworthy Blog in the next few days.