Originally Posted by Often1

OP - If this upsets you as much as you say it does, send in a webform complaint to AA. Keep it to 3-4 short declarative sentences at most. The agents reviewing this stuff have 30-40 seconds per to review these and they are not particularly concerned that others were told that their bags were not loaded when they were.

All that matters is that you gate-checked a bag and items worth $X were taken from it. You are annoyed and want to be made whole.

I would not say that you will never fly AA again. First, you won't be taken seriously. Second, why even attempt some customer service gesture for someone who has already told you they are done with you.

It is up to you whether you ever fly AA again. On this route, you could fly UA to IAH, but you won't find that any better in the world of minor inconveniences.

Locking your bag is plain silly. Anybody who wants to can cut off a lock (and TSA will if it wants to) and it simply flags your bag as containing valuables (although apparently there weren't).