Has this ever happened to you? You were planning to do something, but your plan didn’t happen.
That’s exactly what happened to me today.
I woke up at 2AM to catch a 4:30AM flight going to Cebu via Cebu Pacific Terminal 3. We arrived around 2:30AM at the airport. We reached the ticketing, presented our identification and plane tickets, but we were informed that our ticket was for PAL and is on Terminal 2. To avoid being late, we took the cab and weight straight to Terminal 2. When we arrived there, we were informed that we only have tickets for Cebu to Manila, but we don’t have Manila to Cebu. When we called our organiser, only then did we realize that they sent two different emails — one email had the Cebu Pacific ticket, and the other e-mail had the PAL ticket. What I was able to print was the PAL ticket, and not the Cebu Pacific ticket. The situation cost me an extra P8,500 to buy another ticket.
What are the lessons that I learned?
LESSON 1. NEVER ASSUME
I travel a lot. Because of this, I didn’t even bother to check well which airline I was going to ride.
So that was why when we were trying to do a web-check in, the Cebu Pac system wasn’t accepting my reference number because the reference number was for PAL.
LESSON 2. PREPARE! PREPARE! PREPARE!
If you do not prepare, you are bound to fail. Indeed, that’s exactly what happened to me. If I had printed and prepared the ticket, I would have seen that I was missing a ticket.
It’s the same in life. You have to prepare of your future. People always have their regret at the end. There’s a saying that goes: Better be prepared rather than being sorry!
LESSON 3. DETAILS! DETAILS! DETAILS!
You need to learn how to read the fine print. Excellence is often found in the details. We cannot ignore the little things because it’s the little things that create the bigger things. Likewise, we need to be observant. We should never have the “pwede na ‘yan attitude”.
One minor mistake can cost you money and time. Never neglect the details.
These are the lessons that I learned, and sure enough, they are costly lessons. I hope you learned from this blog, and won’t commit the same mistakes that I did.
THINK. REFLECT. APPLY.
Are you the type of person who always assumes and ends up assuming wrong?
Are you the type of person who is never prepared?
Are you the type of person who’s not into details, and ends up repeating the work?
What change do you want to happen in your life?
(Chinkee Tan is a top Filipino motivational speaker, wealth and life coach whose goal is to inform, educate, motivate, and disturb. His vision is to help people become financially-literate and debt-free. For more info about Chinkee Tan, please visit his fan page at FB, Twitter and Instagram. Also follow VIBER PUBLIC CHAT GROUP search chinkee tan, and VISIONCHINKEE on You Tube for more news and encouragements.)
