MOXJO7282

NY direct to Aruba Sunday 2/8/09 was originally
8am - 1pm then
9am - 2pm then
12:30 - 6 pm

now
NY to Miami to Aruba
11:45am - 3pm Mia to arriving Aruba 11:45pm

What a joke!! And the rep I spoke to was so unsympathetic saying "We can give your miles back if you don't like it"

Anything I can do?

Regards.
Joe

mvoight

As usual, the choices are

1. Live with it
2. Request a schedule you can live with. These do not have to be flights that have awards availability.
3. Refund

Why do you feel the rep was unsympathetic? Theren't aren't that many options and a refund is a viable one for many people.
That way you can look for a better method of getting there.

AA isn't going to give you anything more than this.
What would you expect them to give you? There are no more nonstops from JFK. It's not like AA is picking on you.
Look up the flights. Pick ones with seats in your class. Call AA and ask for them.
There are plenty of seats on the Boston nonstop and other connections from JFK, EWR, and LGA

777-DCA

What could the rep had said/done to make you feel better? Scheduling changes happen, it's part of the business. Does it say in the contract of carriage that the scheduling are guaranteed and not subject to change? Sure it's frustrating, but AA offered some form or recourse.

MOXJO7282

So they should have the right to just screw me and my family? I'm missing one day of my timeshare stay because I decided to fly Sunday direct instead of Saturday indirect. Then they reschedule 3 times, ultimately cancelling Sunday direct about 90 days from flight and make us spend 12 hours in transit, and get us in at midnight causing us to miss another day of vacation. They actually split my family and sent my wife and son through Boston until I brought it to their attention.

You would be OK with that? And when I explain the agent is like "oh well, too bad".

That to me is very bad customer service and AA should in some way make it right. I suggested they open up some award seats on Saturday, which she said they do in certain situations, but they wouldn't do it for me.

You make it sound like I'm whining about a minor change. This classifies as a major inconvenience to any reasonable person. I doubt you would be so blasse if it were you.

Regards.
Joe

tom911

Looks like your only real options are a 0545 departure on the same routing, or a 0815 departure via BOS (assuming NY in this case means JFK). Anything else does get you in after 11pm. If you can live with those, and there are seats available, see if they'll move you. You need to be proactive with alternate flights that will work. You also have some early morning options out of LGA.

Find something that works for you and call them back. There's no guarantee that the flights won't change again in the next 3 months.

I missed that these were award seats. Not sure they're going to be as flexible with those as revenue seats.

Pedro M

What were you asking AA to do for you? I'm sure you were not expecting them to start flying again from JFK directly to Aruba for you.

I have had good luck changing my flights to the day before without fees of any kind when a flight ticketed months in advance had changed by more than a few hours.

TooMuchTravel73

Being based at MCI... I don't have a lot of direct options when traveling on AA...

One thing I frequently do is travel MCI/MIA on a friday late night, then get a Sat MIA to AUA/CUR/BGI etc in the AM. There are many pretty cheap hotels near the airport (and the courtyard and marriott MIA frequently run Friday night discounted room rates).

Not as good as a NYC to AUA direct by any means, but overnighting in MIA can give you your day back.

If your on the last NYC to MIA and the first MIA to XXX you can generally check your bags though and have them held at the airport overnight.

brp

You are certainly whining here. I don't know if you were whining with the agent or not since I wasn't there. The one useful suggestion you've had as to what they could do is the Saturday change. I would try calling again, being reasonable and not accusative (again, not sure you were, but your tone here leads me to believe that) and mention that you were supposed to get in considerable earlier, will be losing out on a reservation you made, they made a major change, and you'd like to try for flights X, Y & Z. Being reasonable and having alternative suggestions helps.

Cheers.

tom911

I did that with my brothers family award flights to St Thomas this summer. They arrived at MIA at 11pm and were out to St. Thomas on a morning flight. That's certainly an option to look at.

hillrider

Unlike the EU, there are no laws in the US protecting customers in cases like this, so you're at the mercy of the airline's unilateral 'conditions of carriage' you agreed to by default when you forked over your hard-earned money. In AA's case, they state:Translated into English, it means that AA doesn't have to do anything about taking you to your destination when it said it would, and when it doesn't do so you're contractually on your own and you must pay for all expenses etc.

If you don't like this state of affairs in the U.S. (and you shouldn't!), please take your time to write your Congressperson: there's been a push to try to get US citizens some protection under the law (see www.flyersrights.org), and this effort would benefit GREATLY from additional direct citizen pressure.

WRCSolberg

Your problem seems to reside with your victim mentality, you're taking this way too personally. It's a schedule change, it happens, it's not a personal attack on you. What exactly do you expect AA to do since they've canceled the original flight? Refunding your miles seems plenty generous to me.

Honestly, yes. And if this trip is as important as you make it out to be, I'd have devised a contingency plan - a backup.

I'd also love to hear the other side of this story. Judging by the tone of your post on here, I'm guessing you were probably a bright ray of sunshine on the phone with the ticketing agent.

brp

Right. In the EU, they would clearly reinstate the flight just for the one inconvenienced passenger, something that AA appear unwilling to do. We can only hope for the day when we have such protections here. AA are only offering a refund and, in others' experiences, working within existing flights to find a solution. Far short of that EU-mandated flight reinstatement thing.

Cheers.

joshuaw2

For schedule changes they usually give you a free change afterwards without a fee. I don't know if you have any status with AA or not. So.. I wouldn't go making numerous changes to you and your family's reservations - they each could cost you more money later. I'd take the refund (money and miles) and rethink situation and airline choice maybe. Others may get you there when you want to be there (for that extra day of timeshare vacation - YAY).

Same thing happen to me last year at Christmas. Three schedule changes within a 2 week period! Messed my work schedule up, but I lived. Just today booked flights for this Christmas actually. I expect a schedule change later.

dcameron

Actually, yes I would. Up until this week, AA only offered one flight a day to the country I live in. If I missed a connection, or if the flight was canceled for any reason then I have a full 24 hour delay. It sucks, but that is the way it is.

You basically have two decisions to make each with two options: Do something or don't, and get bent out of shape or don't.

As far as the first decision, the other people in this thread have given good options as to things you can do about it, which is a good start. (I particularly like the one about flying into Miami the previous night and getting out on a morning flight and is what I would choose to do.)

The second decision is completely up to you. Getting all bent out of shape doesn't make things any better or easier, it just makes you feel miserable/more stressed in the meantime. Try to remember, this is your vacation and stressing out defeats the whole purpose.

MOXJO7282

I have gold status.

Well my follow up with another more friendly rep gave me a somewhat better outcome, but I've still lost considerable value because of the changes made.

This other rep told me that because of the schedule change they could override the system and create award seats, if a seat is available for sale. If the previous rep knew her stuff I would have saved alot of time and stress.

They agreed to put me on a flight Saturday, direct, getting in at 4pm, except that I'm now in coach. They also were able to change my return from Monday to Saturday, keeping me in first class on the way back.

So I decided to get in a day earlier, fly direct, but in coach as opposed to a day later, indirect, in first. I'll keep calling to see if business opens up, but that's probably unlikely given the season.

Regards.
Joe