Originally Posted by
SFO777
Contact your credit card company and dispute the entire AA ticket charge and the subsequent NZ ticket charge.
If it's Amex, they will give you a immediate temporary credit for the full amount paid on both tickets and then punt it back to AA and NZ.
That will get their attention pretty quickly and you can then argue from a position of strength.
So, lets try a slightly different scenario. The OP hired a car to drive him from SAN to LAX. The car gets into an accident on the way and the OP misses his flight. Should he still dispute the credit card charge? Same situation if it was two different tickets/PNRs.