American lied to me once at EWR. It was 1997 and my wife was flying home from MIA with our then 8 mo old baby. She was spending time with her mother and sister after her father's death. I had flown home a week earlier to get back to work. I asked for a gate pass to meet her since carrying the baby and car seat can get heavy. I never had a problem getting a gate pass before and she had flown down every month with the baby since her father was ill. We had chosen American since we wanted to be loyal to one airline and it seemed to be a good choice at the time based on the many flights to MIA which was our main travel destination.

I was told by the ticket agent that she could not give a gate pass unless it had been preauthorized by a supervisor at least 24 hours in advance and pre entered into the computer and that this has been the policy for over 1 year.. I asked to speak to a supervisor and was told they were all unavailable until after my wife's flight got in. All the other agents had long lines. I met my wife out side of security and she was livid that I could not help her. We did speak to a supervisor while waiting for the luggage. The supervisor spoke to the agent and apologized and admitted that she lied to us. Since then we have flown mostly CO and sometimes UA but not AA. Misinformation is understandable, outright lying is unacceptable.