Originally Posted by
MCI777
I hate to keep comparing AA to Delta but this one area where Delta is wayyyyyy ahead of AA. Case and point: two weeks ago I flew DL outbound MCI-ATL-ORF and returned on American ORF-CLT-MCI. Both airlines had delays on their respective segments but DL agents seemed empowered to make decisions in order to help the customer. With AA, all I got was "I can't, they won't allow me, it's not possible". The willingness and ability to help a customer on the AA side, just seems very limited these days.
Last week AA went from on time for an ORD-YYZ 90 minutes before the flight, to 3.5 hours late 70 minutes before the flight (the best excuse I could get from AA was WX/crew issues) - weather was fine in ORD with no other delays on the whole AA board - and fine in YYZ as well. My guess, just more of the same we came to expect - they needed the aircraft somewhere else and made up a flimsy excuse in the system.
In any case, as a 'mere' LTP (3.5M) they did nothing for me proactively, had no answers on how to get me to YYZ, and the most they would offer was a refund on the ticket (which I gladly took considering my 0% expectations with AA as of now). I had to rebook my connecting flight to PVG (MU - different ticket) at some cost - but again, no care from AA on that failure either. Of course, I sent a note to AA on all this reminding them why my most/all of my 50-60K in annual air spend will be staying away from their company for the foreseeable future because of this failure - amongst others - on their part for the last 2-3 years.
...and, the response from AA to a note on all this. Nothing.
DL, UA and WN all do a far better job of looking our for their elites - of all levels - than AA does IMHO. Again, it seems things have fallen to 'unless you are CK, you might as well just be a first time flyer' at AA. Interestingly, this is the same tactic 'Jeffy' pushed at UA with GS until he got pushed out the door himself for some of his other bad choices.
Under Oscar, things seem to be getting better on this count as I am a bit surprised as to how UA treats me lately as a mere *G - albeit a MM one.