Its been a rough two days for AMR, but even more so for myself as a customer of AMR. I was supposed to fly out Sunday morning at 7:30am from DCA to MIA to SJU to STX (what an itinerary). I never made it out of DCA because of the EDS system failure. I went back to my friends place in DC and got up very early on Monday to make the 8:30am flight. It was cancelled. They then put me on a 2pm flight out of Dulles (about 30 min away from DCA) that was actually a 9am flight that had been delayed for maintenance. I should've known better. I got to IAD and the ticket counter (which was only staffed by one person) said everything looked good. They were waiting for a part for the airplane that morning which was the reason for the delay but the part came and everything looked good. I proceed through security to the gate and there are 100 angry people standing at the counter. I know right away this isn't good...and I was right. The flight was cancelled. The gate agent was not helpful at all and wouldn't even look at alternate itineraries on other airlines to get me to SJU at least by tonight so I could make it to STX for my morning meeting that I couldn't miss. I ended up plugging into the internet from the terminal and doing my own research on flights, then calling the 800 number to try to get booked on them. By then the alternate flights were full. I didn't need a hotel voucher since I could stay with my friend in the city, but I did ask for car fare which the grudgingly provided. But they looked at me like I was CRAZY when I asked if I could placed on an upgrade list for the next mornings flight since I wasn't on the same flight as everyone else who had just got bumped.

I fly about 100,000 miles a year spending about $20,000. Unfortunately (or maybe I should say Fortunately) I've only flown about 15,000 this year with American and I'm not "Gold." The employess of AA were awful...they didn't even stop to think about what this experience might do to their future business with an above average (in terms of revenue) customer. I was actually using this flight to see if I should switch from using USAir since AA has better routes to the Carribbean where I live. No way...I'd rather spend an extra 2 hours on a crazy route for USAir then 3 days waiting. I've flown over 30 USAir segments and have maybe had 2 delays in that time. This is probably my 10th AA segment and I've had a problem with almost every one (this one is quite extraordinary I hope). USAir may have just reemerged from bankruptcy, but they are a much better airline from a frequent traveler's perspective than AA. Its rare that I meet any AA frequent fliers and now I know why...if you fly this airline once you'll never want to fly them again.

I finally made it to STX this morning. Ironically most of yesterdays San Juan passengers who has spent from 7:30am to 4pm at Dulles to be sent to a hotel were booked on flight 9255 today that was supposed to leave at 7:30am. Fortunately for me I was on the 7am flight as I had the connection in San Juan. I just checked flight 9255 and it FINALLY took off about 5 minutes ago at 2:56pm. Those poor people spent all day yesterday at IAD and then all day today (from 6am until now).

Anyone have any ideas for what I should write to American? They really don't seem to care, but have probably lost $10,000-20,000 of my business a year because of their attitude. They have the best routes to the Caribbean, but that doesn't mean anything if they are this unreliable.

Sean