Date: May 30 & June 3
AAdvantage Status: Platinum
Fare class: Y & V
What happened: May 30 was DEN-DFW, cancelled due to mechanical. As the wait neared 2 hours, I deplaned and hopped the next flight departing immediately - but that left me in a last row middle seat with my carry-on forcibly gate-checked.
June 3 was DFW-SAN and also cancelled, due to the runway incident at SAT leaving crew stranded, but I was rebooked onto a flight the next day. Still wound up in a middle seat the next day.
Compensation: 15,000 RDM
Comments: Seems like a nice compensation amount to me. ^ This had been an expensive open-jaw ticket, so to pay a bunch and end up with Basic Economy levels of service/seating, and losing a day, had me pretty peeved. I wrote a polite, but disappointed, email to AA CS and (somewhat credibly) threatened to decamp to AS. For me, 15,000 represents 1.5 international trips' worth of RDM, so that seemed like a nice gesture. As a side benefit, my hometown is DFW, so being stranded there meant one more evening with friends and family. AA responded in less than a week and the miles had already posted.