dmin

after reading already several other posts in this forum, I have decided to finally also write a post... forgive me if it might be the wrong forum, but I just need to tell you what I recently have experienced...

Being a platinum member at Aeroflot (Skyteam elite + ) and a FQT at Star Alliance, I dare to believe that I am qualified to judge one airlines way of how to deal with certain issues and how much delaycan be tolerable or not.

I am writing this post to seek for advice. Please tell me how to deal with that kind of situation and what my rights are in that case. Even if you cant help, this experience might warn you and in this case I have reached at least something good,

My complaint concerns a code shared flight between AA/BA (booked through Expedia). Flight route (1) Berlin-London- San Diego (2) San Diego-Dallas-London-Berlin
(I know two stop overs are always critical, but it was the only available connection that time with still reasonable prices- well, EUR 1500/ person per roundtrip).

Fair to say, the first trip from Berlin-San Diego was without bigger issues. The horror started on the way back...

We have arrived at our final destination (Berlin) with more than 48h of delay...none of the delays were caused by force majeure but a concatenation of various causes.

(1) San Diego-Dallas: 6. Jan carrier: AAIt was already night (around 10pm) and the guy at the AA counter gave us new tickets for the next day and redirected our flight (new route: Dallas-Houston-London-Berlin). No hotel/meal voucher... we had to find a hotel on our own costs... yes we complaint, we argued, i was upset, my mother desperate... but we werent agressive... however that AA guy called the police on us and we were suddenly surrounded by 4 officers. They didnt do much but advised us to accept the facts and after they have left again... the attitude of that AA guy was really really bad... not only because he has called the police on us but the way he dealt with the whole case. I hope he finds himself one day in my positition- with his mother in a wheelchair... wonder, what he would have done.. I asked that guy three times "is there really no other flight connection?" and his answer was always "no"... but actually there was, but with Lufthansa (not a member of Oneworld). I know that changing to a flight with another alliance comes with additional costs for AA... but they cant do, even for a person in a wheelchair?
(2-1) 7. Janfrom all our flights, this one was the only one with any delay or issues...Hallelujah!

I am in my 30s, fit and a frequent traveller. But even for me that trip was just horrible and exhausting...imagine, what a 70+yo women in a wheelchair must have gone through... having bad luck is one thing... but the attitute of those AA employees was just undescribable. it is one thing how they treat me, but how could they treat an old lady like that? We had a fantastic trip to the US and met so many nice ppl... but the attitude of those ones working for AA was just insane. In all my flight years I have never experienced such behaviour. Are these people so underpaid or whats the reason for all that? Are they treating their own mothers also that way? No blame to BA, their employees were a total different world...

What have I learned from that trip`?

(1) never ever AA
(2) never ever AA
(3)<avoid> code sharing flights
(4) one hour stop over at Dallas airport? Forget it!
(5) I acutally also blame Expedia. They may have just overtaken the flight route from the airlines. However, they advertised it on their website and the money went through Expedia
(6) I am sorry for China Eastern, sorry to Aeroflot whenever I thought you were rude to me... compared to AA you have always treated me like a god.
(7) calling hotlines from expedia/AA/BA does only cost you money -they wont be able to help (in my case it did cost me more than 400 USD due to the roaming fee and waiting time)

can anyone advice how to deal with such experiences?

JDiver

Welcome to FlyerTalk.

I’m sorry for your many problems.

I think they began with purchasing a one hour connection in DFW; though it’s within minimum connection times, I believe, a fifteen minute late arrival (by the time you arrived, your connecting flight was already boarding, as they begin boarding Europe flights 50 minutes prior to departure), the fact that wheelchair passengers are first to board (preboarding) and often the last to disembark, the unfamiliarity with DFW (rather than argue with a gate agent, there are reaccommodation centers in most terminals that are better prepared to assist) and AA policy (For departure gate arrival, AA states:

"Recommended before your flight:

30 minutes: Be at the gate, ready to board.")

At the point you weren’t at the gate, they began processing standby passengers and gave your seats to them.

I know you’ll never fly AA again, but the reaccommodation centers are useful in helping arrange alternate transport, issuing hotel vouchers, etc. That is those agents’ job. The gate agents are quite pressured (directives from management) to get flights out on time, and are both unlikely to reverse their actions nor interested in assisting anyone once their flight is gone - and they’re looking to their next gate assignment. And there some unacceptably gruff gate agents.

Threads you might be interested in include

https://www.flyertalk.com/forum/amer...aster-thd.html (and linked prior threads), and

IDB / Involuntarily Denied Boarding on AA & Compensation (master thread)

ijgordon

I think booking the 1-hour connection at DFW with a wheelchair passenger was probably the biggest mistake (in addition to the double-connection; how much in hindsight would you have paid for SAN-LHR-TXL?). Your travel insurance should cover the cost of the overnight hotels. If you didn't have travel insurance, well, that seems somewhat foolish too given your situation.
AA was probably wrong to close the gate early (though Delta does this often as well), and certainly it sounds like you got a bad agent, although the fact that the police were called probably suggests his version of events would be somewhat different from yours. (Trying to be impartial here...).
After that it sounds mostly like a spate of bad luck; sorry to hear about it.

Fraser

It's a frustrating experience no doubt but as a ST E+ you are probably an experienced traveller, but, IMO,. made a few rookies mistakes which didn't help your case.

Personally I have had little problems with sub 1hr connections at DFW, never missed a flight, although have come close. That said if I was in need of a wheelchair assistance you can bet I'd be looking at alternative connection opportunities. The less number of connections and longer layovers where possible.

I don't think you can blame Expedia, they don't set the minimum connection times and their systems do pick up on the published LMCTs.

thunderlounge

I would have to agree with this line of thinking. They aren't calling the police (security, or whomever it was that showed up) unless something really goes wrong.



Agreed. For a domestic to domestic connection, and hour is fine at DFW under normal circumstances. With a wheelchair PAX in tow, no way as I've seen wheelchair PAX on flights enough times to know they're coming off last usually.

I'm not convinced the OP has as much travel experience as they let on. Either that or their common sense went out the window when booking their trip.

- Never been through <insert whatever major hub here> before, and a short connection?

- Also traveling with a PAX who needs special assistance (wheelchair) and a short connection?


Don't get me wrong, I understand things can be frustrating as all get out when situations arise. However, as with most drive-by rants against whatever carrier, how much of this (or any) situation could have been prevented by some common sense when booking the trip?


OP looks at connection time, knowing mom needs a wheelchair, they've never been through DFW, and could have easily picked a different itinerary with a better connection time. Had that happened, this situation would not have occurred. They would have been a few minutes late into DFW, but would have had plenty of time to make the connection.


Now I will place a fair amount of blame on the OTA's like the one OP used, as well as the others. They are notorious for showing the shortest connection times possible at the top of their results. I very rarely use any of them any more for that reason (among others as well.) I'll look at them when checking for a flight as you never know when you may find that one really great fare, but most of the time you can also book that directly though the airline as well. Not to mention you can get a much better selection of connection times by going direct as well. The problem with this situation is the OTA says that 1hr is sufficient to connect through DFW, when the reality that a few scant minutes after the first flight lands, the second one will start boarding.

If the agent was a jerk, that's another issue. However it sounds like things may have escalated well beyond just that.


I'm starting to realize more and more that common sense is not so common any longer.

Ragnarok

I wouldn't have even ran after that first flight landed late at Dallas (DFW). The delay caused the misconnecton.

I would have walk normally / casually to the gate / re-accommodation center, request a Military Excuse (proof of delay) along with the reroute/rebooking, then book myself in a nice hotel, have a decent dinner at the hotel restaurant. Then file a claim with Citi when I get home and may be write AA to ask for some customer service recovery gesture mileage :-)

The rebooking might have even been at a higher fare class since it's close in. Sweet extra Avios!

And then the delay at Houston IAH? I would again go have a nice meal at a restaurant and file a claim later on AND since it's British Airways, a EU carrier, file a claim EU261 for cash compensation on top!

jordyn

While it may be true that one hours is not a sensible connection with a wheelchair, all of the following are definitely true as well:

• AA's conditions of carriage do not give them the right to deny boarding if you arrive at the gate 17 minutes ahead of your scheduled flight time (the 30 minute suggestion quoted by JDiver above is helpful advice, but not a requirement in the contract)
• A four hour mechanical delay forcing another overnight stay is AA's fault
• A 90 minute delay caused by AA maintenance is their fault, but doesn't really matter since it didn't affect the connection in IAH
• A further delay caused by IT systems is BA's fault
• All of these circumstances together add up to a totally miserable passenger experience

I think AA owes OP reimbursement for the first night's hotel, and also ought to provide a reasonably huge amount of goodwill compensation for the overall delay and misery caused by their repeated failures to be able to operate a reliable airline. None of that is required by contract or by law, but it's really what should happen regardless of any lectures to the OP about the original connection.

Depending on when OP ended up arriving in Berlin, BA may also owe compensation under EC 261/2004, but only if the actual arrival was more than 3 hours late than the original January 8 LHR->TXL flight was scheduled to arrive.

As to whether the agent or the OP was at fault for the police being called, we obviously don't have enough information. I've seen plenty of people behaving badly at airlines, and also seen agents threaten to call the police on people who were just justifiably upset by their treatment. We certainly know there's been instances in which the police have been called on people doing nothing more controversial than sitting in seats that they had a boarding pass for, but I do agree it's unusual to see the police being called and it's possible OP did something to cause that. The fact that the police just talked to OP and went on their way does seem to indicate that the OP's behavior did not cross any legal lines, and I don't think it really forgives AA for anything else that happened in this tale. More to the point, if the original GA had just waited until T-15 to process standbys and close the door, there would have been no need for the police to arrive in the first place.

jordyn

It's possible you have more time to lounge around Texas than OP did, you know?

3Cforme

I'm surprised AA didn't make more of an effort for a wheelchair passenger at DFW.

QueenOfCoach

You booked a 1-hour connection domestic-international with a wheelchair passenger in an unfamiliar airport? I'd say the fault is yours.

wrp96

I'm not, considering that last week when we had to change gates after going mechanical (after we were all the way out to the runway before maintenance decided we couldn't fly after all) and I asked for a cart as I couldn't walk fast, I was told that "it will be a long time for the cart and the plane won't wait for you so you should start walking." Thankfully an agent at the next gate heard that and called for a cart for me.

nrr

Recently I've had several connecting flights, one in ORD, the other in CLT, both with about 15 minutes extra time than the minimums. AA specifically noted the close connection times.
I wonder if the OP had similar notes when he looked at his itns on aa.com.

JBauer

hmm. I also agree 60 mins was a close call, but traveling with kids or the elderly is very trying and stressful and it is awful when AA employees show no sympathy. Rarely do they empathize.

What at is the Military thing you speak of? Never heard of that.

Ber2dca

Legal MCT is calculated with able-bodied adults in mind. A frequent flyer should know that a 1 hour connection in any airport represents a certain risk of missing your connection. How acceptable that risk is depends on many factors..but one would think that being accompanied by your 70+ year old mother kinda shifts priorities a bit. On that front, the responsibility rests on OP's shoulders. Of course that doesn't mean AA service isn't often decidedly sub-par.

3Cforme

If so, and the experience of wrp96 is common, it would make for an interesting class-action suit under the Air Carrier Access Act. 'We can't get wheelchairs here fast enough' , or 'Wheelchairs can't get between gates fast enough' is not going to be a successful defense.

Airlines are required to provide assistance with boarding, deplaning and making connections.

https://www.transportation.gov/airco...s-disabilities