I had to fly to San Francisco this Friday for some last minute business, so I bought the ticket and went. I decided to take an afternoon flight home Saturday afternoon so I had some time to do some shopping.

As it turns out there was a family problem at home on Friday night, so I woke up at 4am and headed to SFO airport to try and catch the first flight out on Standby. I arrived at the airport an hour and a half early, returned my rental car, and proceeded to the terminal.

There was a 20 minute line at the check-in counter, so I used the kiosk and printed my boarding pass (no checked luggage), and went to the gate. I walked up to the gate at 5:22, the flight was at 6:00am. I waited in line, and then asked the gate agent if she could put me on the standby list.

She very rudely told me that unless I was Executive Platinum there was no way I would make the flight anyway, so sorry I can't help. I tried to hand her my boarding pass (I am Executive Platinum) and she refused to even look at it. Finally I said "I am Executive Platinum and would like you to put me on the Standby list, if for nothing else for the next flight." She again refused, and told me that it isn't fair to her other customers that I insert myself into the Standby list above them.

I hung around and waited for things to die down a bit. After they had boarded 99% of the passengers they had two seats left over, so I tried again this time with the supervisor who had since walked up. I had previously seen them talking to each other, and looking at me so I knew that they had discussed me being there. She informed me there had been no Standby seats available, and that even if they did put me on the list when I asked they wouldn't have been able to accommodate me. I told her that wasn't true, that there were 8 people on the standby list when I arrived at the gate and now there were 3. After that there was nothing but silence, finally I realized that she had ended the conversation by refusing to speak with me. I gave her a somewhat sarcastic thank you and walked off in disgust. I would have liked to get their names but as I walked up the second time I noticed they both had their nametags covered up. I know the managers name started with a "Jav" and they were working the 6am DFW -> SFO on 12/17. I went and got a cup of coffee and sat down at the next gate over (where the next flight to DFW was). Then I saw the woman who had refused to put me on the list originally give a customer a hug, hand her and her friend two boarding passes and put them on the plane.

So basically what happened was they knew I was going to bump one of her friends/cousins/sister or whomever those passengers were with my status. In order to protect them they wouldn't put me on the standby list. I'm aware that had I stopped at the ticketing counter outside security I would have made the flight. Hindsight being 20/20, I was trying to get to the gate as quickly as possible - there is no reason that a gate agent shouldn't be able to put you on the standby list. I've done it many times before.

I find the entire situation very frustrating and I'm wondering why I have flown ~500k miles in the last 4 years with American. I'm posting this for two reasons - I'm curious what you guys think, and secondly I'm wondering what I should do, if anything about it. I'm tempted to call/write/email AAdvantage customer service and complain. The entire episode was very amateurish, and you would think with the ongoing bankruptcy and otherwise unpleasantness going on at American Airlines that they should be treating their best customers better than this.

Thanks for reading,
Dan