bumped from TATL J award seat, new flights (to merge)
 

I have two J award tickets for tomorrow, Oct. 22 from MCI-DFW-MAD on AA ,MAD-BCN in IB. With less than 24 hours before the flight AA calls me and says they have to bump one of us from our J seat because they need it for an extra pilot. Huh, what's with that? I asked them to bump someone else but they said I'm the only one, likely because my seat is an award seat and I have not status other than Gold. Our only option was to take an involuntary downgrade or completely different flights at much much earlier times.

I was not willing to fly econ so I took the new flights MCI-CLT-JFK-BCN in J on AA the whole way. I had to scramble to contact my airport drop off service and pick up in Barcelona as all flights are 6 hours earlier than the original plans. AA has also sent me 2 $500 vouchers for future travel which I don't think is enough.

I used all of my remaining AAdvantage miles for this trip and was hoping to be done with flying AA forever but now I'm stuck with them orI lose $1000.

Is this a "vent" thread, or is there a legitimate complaint buried in here?

You have (almost) no status and you're on award travel. Who do you expect them to bump when must-fly personnel need a seat?

The compensation they provided is astoundingly generous by the way.

Agreed, $1000 in credit is fantastic compensation for what amounts to a minor inconvenience.

Guess you'll have to weigh the benefit of the vouchers against your odd determination to "be done with flying AA forever," but you'll never get a better deal than this.

You've now been essentially paid $1000 to take your "free" award trip. Don't look a gift horse in the mouth.

I'm not an AA apologist by any means, but I think they handled this well given the circumstances. I'm impressed that AA actually had the decency to call and work out things ahead of time. This could have been a nasty little surprise at the airport, and you likely would have had significantly fewer options available to you. This sucks and feels wrong on so many levels, I know, but I think AA at least handled it well. The two $500 eVouchers were an incredibly nice gesture, as well, IMHO.

What I'm confused about is why the "extra pilot" couldn't fly in a Y seat. Did the crew member have an immediate turn, or did AA accidentally sell a crew rest seat in the J cabin? I've flown next to deadheading pilots in MCE on the DFW-HKG flight who were piloting the aircraft to DFW the next day. I'd guess this would be more of a FAM/"security" issue than an "extra pilot" issue, but that's just my theory.

Unfortunately, sometimes this is the way it goes on an award ticket. It happened to me at the gate before as an EXP on an AAnytime award. I was flying MSY-MIA-MAD, and the MSY-MIA flight was oversold by two. My companion and I were essentially told to cooperate and accept new arrangements if we wanted to fly to MAD in J that day. Of course, our bags didn't get the memo. :rolleyes:

+1. I've been told to basically pound sand before as an EXP.

it is kind of a vent thread. I just don't believe their excuse because they already lied to me once. They claimed to have called me last night at 9:30pm to advise of all this but they did not call or send an email or text alert. I was home ll night and the phone never rang. I have been planning this trip and working out the details for 11 months and a last minute mess up throws me off balance.

So $1000 in vouchers is generous? I would have rather had cash as I likely won't be able to use them. All my vacation travel for the next 12 months is already planned and booked.

It is generous and AA did you a favor.

Enjoy!

$500 voucher to travel a few hours earlier seems quite a reasonable compensation

That it called you in advance and gave an option to reroute is better than just downgrading

You do not have to use the vouchers and can just cease flying AA , as you intended - or maybe you can use the voucher for someone else who wants to travel

Having to make a call to change a taxi booking to an earlier time and another to let someone know of earlier arrival time, does not seem to be a major issue - and hardly "scrambling"

OP, I empathize with you. Although it seems like AA did handle this relatively well, it still sucks that they can do this with virtually no penalty. If you, on the other hand, wanted to make a last-minute change, I'm sure they would want hard cash from you! But they get to give you vouchers which you can't use, and you're supposed to like it?

I take exception to the poster who says that this is only a "minor" inconvenience. You have no idea how this affects the OP's plans. What is a minor inconvenience to you might be a major inconvenience to someone else.

Unfortunately, without greater consumer protection for consumers like those the EU has, there's not much we can do when this happens.

There was also a call to make, making new arrangements for the house/dogsitter, and the inconvenience of arriving in Barcelona way to early to check into our B&B and finding something to do all day with luggage and possible work stoppages and strikes in Barcelona with the current political mess there.

I suppose I can check out the Admirals Club at JFK. Wasn't it just remodeled? I've never been there nor to one in CLT if there is one.

I did have plans for this evening which will need to be cancelled so that the packing I was going to do in the morning will have to be done tonight.

You'll have access to the Flagship Lounge at JFK as a J passenger. Head to the club near the security checkpoint to access it. It was recently beautifully remodeled. It's a great place to wait for a flight, although it can get busy in the evenings. There's a buffet, a champagne bar, nice showers, among other things.

Safe travels and enjoy your trip!

I cannot see that plans for the evening would be impacted by the small time needed to pack

If Barcelona has the issue of strikes, then getting there earlier is surely a benefit to give extra time to deal with them

$1000 for having to make 3 phone calls seems pretty decent

Sorry for your stressful experience. I'm worried now about flying my award ticket because I won't have the ability to reschedule (going on a cruise), nor can I handle a 14 hour flight in economy even for $500.

While understanding the fact that award passengers are bottom of the barrel, its still upsetting because it takes so much effort to earn the miles and find saver awards.

You will have access to the new Flagship Lounge at JFK, near gate B12. You will also have access to the AC at CLT--there are two (forget the exact locations).

Note: I *believe* that terms of the vouchers are that you have to use them - by purchasing a ticket - within the 12mos, but the date of the flight you purchase can be after the 12 months.

Someone will correct me if I am wrong there...

I also got 2x$500 vouchers for a similar situation. 2 J TATL and platinum. I was told they go by fare paid and award is considered $0 I guess.

It's a very minor inconvenience.

It's minor change in the scheme of air travel. How much of an inconvenience it is, only the person(s) affected can define - that's entirely subjective.

EU protection would not have made any difference here

Where covered :

If the passenger actually travelled in the lower cabin, then indeed EC261 would have provided for a 75% refund of that sector. The downgraded leg was 86% of the journey and the mileage cost is 57500 , so would have been entitled to 37,000 miles refund - which at current purchase cost is a value of $886.24

Changing to another flight to avoid the downgrade would have provided for compensation of zero however

Getting $500 voucher for changing flights and staying in business class versus $886 worth of miles for a downgrade, I don't see that EC protection would be that amazing here

You may have been displaced by a pilot, but imo it's not as likely (they block a seat for the PNF / Pilot Not Flying) in Business class (often front right) for safety (the PNF must both have speedy cockpit access and really be able to rest), but I suspect you were displaced by a Federal Air Marshal. However, they are prohibited from telling you that so they have to come up with some other moderately credible excuse. And if a FAM or two want seats, they're going to get them.

But look at it this way. You're both going on award miles, and in Business. You have to change some plans, but that could have also occurred due to other issues as well. $1,000 in future flight credit for your trouble is not only more than sufficient, it's considerably more than we often see around here. Life happens while we plan (we've taken two eight plus hour mechanical delays and an airport stoppage of several hours just this year, ironically none of them on AA), and you've been well served. Enjoy the Flagship Lounge, and though there will undoubtedly be some challenges in Barna ("Barça" is the Football Club, Barna is the city's nickname) due to the current political issues, you'll enjoy. (Most accommodations will happily store your baggage the day of arrival or departure.)

We will merge this into the business bump thread soon.

/Moderator

Rearranging your travel arrangements is a pain and I feel for you.

In a way, AA might have done you a big favor here: connecting passengers in MAD have been experiencing epic-length waits at passport control for onward flights. I saw reports in August of 2-3 hour waits at MAD. And IB is not exactly known for its stellar services on the ground.

So, you'll have that going for you on the "glass half full" side of the equation. Enjoy your trip regardless, check out the Flagship Lounge in JFK (it's nice!) and raise a toast that this was worked out ahead of travel day +$1000.

It might have been otherwise.

I'd be more upset about the shorter TATL flight with less time in international J, especially going east, and possibly different type of a/c. Not sure which one flies which route so not sure if it's the same type of seat. If the JFK has a better hard product then I would be fine with the change and $1k to spend on future flights just to go a little earlier and 90 minutes less in J.

If you want to play semantic games, then the level of "inconvenience" it poses relative to the magnitude of the "change" is entirely on the traveler, not the airline.

$1000 for having to contact an airport pickup to adjust the time. Sounds horrific.

Kudos to AA for handling this perfectly.

Thanks for restating my point....:confused:

We were on newly refurbished 787 out of Dallas. AA 66 is on a 777, status of hard product unknown. I hope it's not the crappy old style flat seats. I'll really be pissed if we don't get the new lie flat seats.

Assume you mean the old 2-3-2 NGBC 777, which are no longer flying (the seats, I mean; the 777 have all be reconfigured). Your flight currently shows the Zodiac-equipped 777 which is the forward/rear alternating seats, lie-flat (same as the 787 you were scheduled on). Always a chance your plane could be swapped for the other lie-flat option, the B/E Super Diamond, which are all forward-facing.

Some people love the rear-facing seats. It'll be a nice flight regardless and you might have dodged a bullet in Madrid with the transfer!

:confused: There are no "refurbished 787s" (either -8 or -9), as they're new to the fleet.

No 772 is flying with the old "NGBC" seats; every one on service has the fore-and-aft Zodiac "Concept D" Business Suite or the reverse herringbone B/E Aerospace Super Diamond Solos (in the 787-8 and -9 respectively, as it turns out).

All of this is extremely well documented in this forum.

And you can use the voucher to buy a ticket just shy of their expiration to get another year out of them - but please verify this. If you don't know what you want, just by a refundable ticket ticket somewhere so you don't pay a change fee when you exchange them for where and when you really want to go.

OP if you don't want to use it, I will take your 2x$500 anytime.
Another option could be, get the AA miles difference, request to fly in Premium Economy (DFW-MAD) and still get the $500 voucher...

good to know. last time I flew AA in business was in 2011 with the NGBC seats that were shamefully bad for a biz product. good to know all AA aircraft have been retrofitted since then. most of my long haul flying has been on AA partners like JL, CX. I had always avoided AA for the TATL or TPAC flights. The homebound flights for this vacation are on IB metal. No AA seats in J available from VCE to the US for the day I needed. In fact, I was shocked that I didn't have to go IB on the way to Europe, that I actually scored J seats on AA DFW-MAD flight.

BTW, packing is not an easy fast thing. There is a cruise involved with this trip so a lot more complicated packing to be done.

I don't believe i mentioned packing, but I can relate. We're on DFW-MAD next week, flying onward to TFN to cruise as well. I'm looking forward to flying on the new 787-9.

Where do I sign up for this $1000 & six hour deal? :)

I am almost positive it is a FAM that took that seat. AA did you right. A pilot could have taken the jump seat. Safe and happy travels.

No, that's unlikely that a relief pilot would take the cockpit jump seat. On flights requiring three pilots / a relief pilot, a seat is generally blocked for the PNF if a seat is required. That seat is not available for seat selection by passengers at any time. It might be possible an instructor pilot might be added for rating purposes, but my guess, as yours, is FAM.

I'm sorry OP. That sounds like an inconvenience for you, while the compensation isn't worth much to you. While many on FT are able to rearrange their travel or plan additional trips to take advantage of airline credit, others have limited time off or otherwise inflexible travel patterns. It doesn't make your situation any less terrible that you fall into the latter group.

That being said, AA's proposed compensation in this particular case seems generous on average. If you think you'll be unable to use the proposed travel credit before it expires, I highly suggest contacting the airline until you get an agent who can offer you something else.

I find it hard to believe that someone who flies over 25,000 miles per year will struggle to find a use for $1,000 in credit (on the largest airline in their home country) sometime over the coming year.

This is bad advice.

Agreed, you're probably replying to the worst advice in this whole thread.

As to the OP, you did get a deal. More your various things ("inconveniences"), move on with $1000 more than you had before, and thank your lucky stars this didn't happen at the gate where no rerouting what possible. I wouldn't have cared to read *that* thread.

What's a PNF?

When the flight requires more flight crew than can sit up front, the extra pilot is assigned a specific seat based on the aircraft type. That seat has been negotiated and is part of the collective bargaining agreement with the pilots' union.

Almost certainly a FAM because this flight would already have a Relief First Officer (3rd pilot) assigned since it's always going to be greater than 8hrs of flying time. Even if there was an additional forth pilot (deadheading, positive-space for whatever reason) they would be contractually required to be assigned a business class seat (jumpseat or Y seat would not suffice).

-FlyerBeek