My horrible experience with American Airlines…
My wife and I went to London a few weeks ago. We had a good trip but our flight home was awful! American Airlines completely botched everything and I thought I would share my complaint letter with everyone. I warn you it's kind of long…
Here is my letter to American Airlines Customer Relations:
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Quick Overview:
My wife and I flew from London to New Orleans (connecting in Miami) on American Airlines. The flight from London to Miami left late from London and arrived late in Miami. Because of the way the situation was handled by American Airlines we missed our connection back to New Orleans and the next flight was 6 hours later which turned into 8 hours later. Along the way we were disregarded and treated with a complete lack of respect.
Full Story:
My wife and I recently visited London and booked round trip flights through American Airlines. Our first flight that took us from New Orleans to Miami and then from Miami to London went very well and we were both very happy with our decision to fly American. We stayed in London for 4 days and our return flight was on Tuesday, October 18th for 9:50 AM (4:50 AM EST). Because of logistics my wife and I had to leave to get to Heathrow at 5:00 AM (12:00 AM EST), but were able to get to the airport with more than enough time to check in and go through security with no problems. Our flight from Heathrow to Miami was late to leave at least 20 minutes late (boarding took longer than expected and we sat on the runway for a bit. When I booked our connecting flight from Miami to New Orleans, I choose one that departed for 4:05 PM EST. Our flight from London was supposed to arrive in Miami at 2:25 PM; however, we did not arrive until 2:50 PM and did not get off the plane until about 3:00 PM. There were no indicators that we would have problems making our connection. In fact for the last 30 minutes of the flight (right before landing) the screens on the plane kept showing all the connecting flights including the New Orleans connection were on time and there was no mention of any issues with any of the connecting flights.
Once we finally disembarked the plane a woman in an American Airlines orange vest (who we later found out was a Joint Business Runner) was handing out boarding passes with orange express tags on them. She had given us new boarding passes but with no express tags with them and made no mention of any issue with our flight. We had no idea why she was giving us “new” passes but took them and then ran to passport control, assuming she was ensuring we wouldn’t need to check in for our next flight.
Passport control was busy but didn’t take more than 5 minutes to get through, once we had gotten there (we spent almost 10 minutes speed walking just to get in line for passport control). After passport control we went to baggage claim so we could reclaim our bags, then recheck them after passing through customs. We waited for our bags for at least 20 minutes. After finally getting our bags we went to get in line to go through customs only to see each line had at least 40 people in them and none of them were moving. We told an airport official in another official bright colored vest (who I believe is an American Airlines employee) that our flight was going to leave in thirty minutes and he said, and I quote, “Oh you have plenty of time.” My wife tried to explain that we still had to check our bags and go through security, but he kept on reassuring us that we were in no danger of missing our flight. Other passengers overheard my wife’s conversation with the American Airlines employee and even volunteered their places in line because it was obvious the line was not moving. We stood in line for another 5 minutes when the official came over and said that he’d allow us to go to the front of the line. We were then able to get through Customs in about 5 minutes and began the process of rechecking our bags next. At this time we had less than thirty minutes before our flight was scheduled to leave, so once again my wife asked a woman wearing the same vest (another Joint Business Runner) what we should do as our flight was leaving in less than half an hour. She instructed us just to slide our bags under the TSA baggage claim perimeter rope and told us to “hurry.” As we are running toward security, TSA officials who are standing outside of the baggage area indicate that both my wife and I have been selected for a random security check, where our hands were swabbed. In this case, we once again told them that our flight was leaving in less than thirty minutes, and we were once again reassured that everything would be “fine.” After that 3-minute delay we hurried up the escalator to see security was backed up worse than Customs was and again we ask another official if they can help us through the line quickly. She asked for our boarding passes. It wasn’t until then that we realized the passes that we received from the American Airlines Joint Business Runner were for the next flight to New Orleans at 10:10 PM!! We pulled out our passes for the 4:05 PM flight that were given to us in London and she lets us go through the expedited screening line, which took another 8 minutes (approximately).
As soon as we get through security, both my wife and I SPRINT to the Skytrain then sprinted again once we got off all the way to D6!!! And by the way our London flight came in at terminal D12 about 100 yards away from D6. But that didn’t do us any good since had to go to the opposite side of the airport for passport, custom, etc… When we finally got to our gate, we could already see that the airplane’s door is closed and that the tunnel has pulled away from the plane (although the plane has not left the gate area). We went to the counter at our gate, drenched in sweat and exhausted from sprinting for a solid 10 minutes and from being up since 12:00 AM EST. After explaining our situation, I asked the woman on duty at the desk why we weren’t expedited through Customs, Baggage Claim, Passport Control, or Security, and what we were supposed to do now that we missed our flight? The American Airlines representative then launched into a discussion with me with a very condescending and superior manner, compounding my frustration when she scornfully offered me a $24 voucher for food, saying “you can have a nice relaxing evening at the airport (for the next 6 hours) and have dinner on us”. The levels of sarcasm and derision in her voice were unmistakable. Not only did matters outside of my control cause us to miss our flight (the handling of that missed flight can only be described as bumbled and inept), she expected a $24 voucher to compensate for it. To add insult to injury, she had to audacity to tell me that we should be grateful they were able to get us on the 10:10 PM flight as it was so full. We tried to explain to her that both of us had to be at work tomorrow for 7 AM (Central time), and after flying all the way from London we really needed to get home as soon as possible because we have commitments; once again our pleas were either ignored or treated with scorn. After speaking with her for a few minutes, it became obvious that she was unsympathetic, arrogant, and her entire demeanor unpalatable, so I asked to speak with her supervisor and she responds with condescension dripping from each of her words, “Oh he’s right here beside me.” So I attempted to speak with her supervisor who was again extremely unhelpful and unsympathetic, pretty much just regurgitating what the first employee told me. Neither acted in a considerate or concerned manner, instead both acted like this was OUR fault and said the 10:10 PM flight was very packed and kept on reiterating how incredibly lucky we were to even get seats on the flight. At this point my wife is exhausted and frustrated and began crying (she walked away from the desk to try and compose herself). But a few minutes later, she walked back up to stand on the side of me to listen to what the supervisor is saying. When my wife started to ask a question, the first American Airlines employee, who was listening to my conversation with her supervisor, sticks her hand in my wife’s face and shushed her, waving her off like a child. That was the moment that I absolutely lost it. I have never felt more disrespected by a “reputable” American company than this incident; I for the life of me do not understand how any employee can treat a customer in this manner and continue to work for your company. I am very disappointed with myself for not getting either of their names because frankly your employee’s behavior was reprehensible (Both the employee and her supervisor were at Miami International Airport’s, Terminal D at Gate D-6 at 4:00 PM on Tuesday Oct 18th). The employee who shushed my wife was a woman in her late 40s or early 50s with brown hair.
After this incident, my wife and I left the gate and walked down the terminal hoping to find a customer service desk, looking for an American Airlines employee we could speak with, who could explain to us why this happened. We finally found the customer service desk, which just happened to be at D-12 where we first disembarked from the London flight. We spoke to a customer service employee and told her we would like to file a formal complaint. The difference in how we were treated is like night and day. The employee we spoke to was sympathetic and helpful; she really seemed to want to get to the bottom of what happened and why. After hearing our story, she realized that the Joint Business Runner (she supplied the technical name) did not tell us that our flight had been changed and then realized the passes we were given on the later flight didn’t even have us seated together anymore. She was able to move us to an exit row so that we could sit together and offered her sincerest apologizes for the confusion. Originally when we were offered a $24 voucher for dinner from the American Airlines employee at gate D-6, we didn’t take it. Her manner so mean-spirited, frankly we didn’t want anything to do with what she offered in a plainly halfhearted gesture. But after speaking with the employee at the customer service desk, we did accept the food voucher. After talking to her for a bit and explaining that we wanted to file a formal complaint, she told us where to go online to file an official complaint. Although she did not get us home any earlier she was very helpful and conciliatory.
After speaking with her, we decided to calm down over dinner in the terminal, which was a good deal more than $24, then went to our gate for the remaining 5 hours of our layover. Adding to our additional six-hour layover, our 10:10 PM flight gets delayed, then delayed again and again. The first delays were caused by weather, with the final delay being caused by waiting for our flight crew coming in from a delayed Tampa flight. Our plane finally left at 11:55 PM – almost 8 hours after our original connecting flight took off (at this point my wife and I have been up for over twenty-four hours, and have spent nine of those hours in the Miami airport). Both my wife and I missed work on the following morning, something that would not have happened had our flight gotten into New Orleans at a reasonable time, rather than when we did at 1:30 AM.
What I don’t understand is how American Airlines could even let this happen in the first place. I booked these flights in July. It is your responsibility to get me to my connections in time, especially if the next available flight is 6h 5m later (which turned into 7h 50m later). I can think of multiple solutions to have prevented this from happening.
1.) Why did the London flight not use more fuel to get the plane there faster? I have been a passenger on multiple flights where the captain will even come on the intercom and say he is going to burn alittle more fuel so people will not miss their connections.
2.) Why wasn’t the New Orleans flight delayed for 10 minutes and then again make up the time during the flight? Once again I’ve been on multiple flights where the plane was delayed for just a few minutes to allow passengers time to get to their connecting flight.
3.) Why weren’t we and our bags expedited through security and then an airport cart could have been used to get us to our gate as quickly as possible?
Any of these were options that your employees could have chose, but that’s not even the worst part of this entire situation. The worst part is that even once we missed our flight there was so much more that could have done.
1.) If they really wanted us to have a “relaxing” evening of waiting after being up since the night before, they could have given us access to the Admirals Club.
2.) Given us more then a $24 food voucher; that’s hardly enough for one person to have a decent dinner, let alone two.
3.) Upgraded us to first class on the way home.
4.) If there were no more available flights for over 6 hours, why weren’t we able to take a flight offered by another airline – this is also a regular practice that would have prevented us from being stuck in Miami’s airport for a total of 9 hours (to put that in perspective our flight from London took about that long).
These are pretty easy solutions and I am not a multi-billion dollar fortunate 500 company like you, that deals with these issue on an everyday basis. But the absolute worst part of this entire ordeal is that one of your employees treated us, paying customers, with a complete lack of respect. Our interaction with her was incredible degrading and has to rate as one of the worst experiences I’ve ever had.
So this all being said, I am absolutely disgusted with how American Airlines treated the situation and more importantly treated my wife and I. At this point I will NEVER fly American Airlines again (regardless of whether we have to take non-direct flights and your prices are cheaper), will tell EVERYONE about my experience and will post this experience on my blog, Twitter page, Facebook page, Google+ page, etc… Any chance I get, I will let family and friends know how helpless we both felt, how American Airlines treated us, and how they showed a complete lack of competency and care for their passengers.
I may be one person, but after this experience, I guarantee I won’t be the last person to decide that I don’t want anything further to do with American Airlines if this is the way they treat their customers.
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