DominicB

As a BA gold in the USA who regularly flies AA for domestic flights, and sits at the front of the plane, enjoying all that goes with status and a nice travel budget, I was humbled by my travel experiences today. I was trying to get home from IAH to ORD, with heavy thunderstorms over most of Texas. And that's a pain for any and every airline, so I know that what I am going to relate is good luck as much as anything else.

AA changed a departure time by ten minutes (to make it earlier) with the result that - owing to a turbulent stomach that matched the weather and had me in a restroom - I arrived at the gate one minute to late to board, although the jetbridge was still connected. AA staff were 'jobsworth' (as Brits say), and professionally unhelpful and uninterested in getting me on the flight that would have got me home as I had hoped.

I was rerouted (and downgraded) via DFW, and the flight to DFW moved to the tarmac and waited and waited as weather closed down DFW for longer and longer, and eventually we were taken back to a gate and deplaned. AA had nothing to offer and would not even help me on the phone, for reasons I really did not understand. So I booked an airport hotel, and was heading away from the AA gates at IAH, when I heard a tannoy mention a closing flight to Chicago at gate 19. I ran down there, to find it was a Spirit flight, closing in 7 minutes. I asked if I could buy a ticket - "no, not possible when boarding has begun... we would love to... but the system is closed to sales... just not possible...."

I hung around looking desperate and pathetic, and one of the gate agents remarked to a colleague that she thought she knew how to bypass things. Two mins and $279 later, I was on the flight, which left on time and arrived early at ORD. Bumpy as hell - one of the most sustained bits of turbulence I can recall - but we did it. And the Spirit folk were sympathetic and up to bend the rules (and sell an empty seat) and help. Not the in-flight experience I crave, but I get to sleep in my own bed. And one in the eye for legacy carriers, really, notwithstanding the awful weather. But the attitude with Spirit was just out to be helpful in a way that I don't recall often with BA or AA these days.

madfish

LINDEGR

Nobody loves to bash AA more than me but I read this and wonder, so what?

enpremiere

eefor jfp

So did AA change the departure time at the last minute (close the door early) in order to take off before the airport shut down because of the approaching storm? If so, I can understand your being upset and would expect them to bend over backward to make things right (i.e. find you an alternate flight or refund your ticket along with some generous goodwill gesture).

On the other hand, if you were the only one not yet boarded at T-20 and they were afraid that the alternative was stranding everyone in Houston and not just one person, I can see why they i what they did.

It's good to hear a good report about Spirit. I have generally heard only horror stories about their inflexibility, nickel-and-diming and inability to interline, so they are on my do not fly list. But any carrier that bends over backwards to help someone in a tough situation deserves another look.

Often1

The story sounded fishy, so checking actual gate departures for AA on the IAH-ORD route for yesterday using FlightStats, no AA flight changed its scheduled departure and only one flight departed early (from the gate). That flight departed 2 minutes early, but the scheduled departure was never changed.

As OP presumably knows, AA requires that one be at the departure gate no later than T-15 for domestic services. For yesterday's three flights, that would hav e been 06:05 for 1221, 13:05 for 3978 (which ultimately departed the gate at 15:10) and 16:07 for 1315 (which ultimately departed the gate at 4:49).

The fact that the aircraft was still physically at the gate when OP arrived at the gate is irrelevant. While it may be possible to sometimes board a late passenger, it is more than likely that OP's seat had already been given to a standby and further that the flight was already closed. Closing does not mean the cabin door, but rather all of the associated paperwork as well.

The rest of all of this is simply about the luck of the draw. If OP wants to fly NK on a regular basis, he should do so.

DominicB

I'm astounded at how some people read some posts on here - truly astounded. As someone who often revels in status, premier cabins, gold cards, etc, and who joins in the constant moans about poor service from BA, which seems to fill about 90% of the posts on here, my point was how a low-cost, budget carrier had staff who went out of their way to make a difference, and how a combination of a lot of luck, and some really well-meaning staff, resolved a problem on a small, budget airline, when AA (as BA's partner), for all its size, both didn't care about or have the ability to solve. AA would have recognized my status, etc etc etc - but it was the budget carrier who came up trumps, apparently breaking rules to do so. If you like - a 'feel good' story on a board when almost all the posts are complaints, usually about first world problems, from folk like me who are often feeling very entitled. I guess nobody on here wants to feel good when .....ing is so much easier.

I think that is not without relevance to the BA board. Perhaps I'm wrong. What is astounding is that the background to the story - of no major relevance - is called into question, and Often1 calls me a liar. That's pretty rich for someone labelled an evangelist. So - just to clarify - both my text from AA and my online boarding pass gave a revised departure time of 5pm. That was subsequently pulled back by, I think, 11 minutes - and in my rather stricken case - that was a crucial difference. So, Often1, don't believe all you read on FlightStats, because in this instance, neither it or you know what you are talking about, whereas I was sweating it out in the restroom, racing to the gate, and let down by a changed departure time that was not shared with passengers, despite all the technology AA uses.

As I say, that's not actually germane, and I've not idea why Often1 has to be so offensive. And given that AA1315 is meant to depart at 4.22, I'm not even sure what it means to say that 'no AA flight changed its scheduled departure' yesterday. Frankly, IAH was heaving with flights that had changed their departure, and, bizarrely (but for me very wonderfully) the NK flight looked like about the only flight to leave IAH on schedule yesterday evening. Certainly, AA was updating display screens, online boarding passes and texting customers about AA1315, so time to wake up to the fact the FlightStats is not always correct.

VSLover

that is frustrating and you already note that due to storms, things were likely a bit frazzled on the ground trying to ensure timeliness and such.

not surprising, as the volume of my flying got me explat for 10 years before i moved to london. my experiences, and i think of of your points made was that as a BA gold, i have generally been treated very well by AA domestically as a OWE--a situation you unfortunately did not experience on ground or over phone.

whats most shocking is you chose spirit for a night home rather than a night in hotel

sdsearch

No source that I can think of for delayed flights is 100% correct.

Being 100% correct would require that every change in schedule is immediately communicated "to the whole world" instantly, and for various reasons that doesn't always happen.

I've seen AA.com vs other sites (not just FlightStats, but also ExpertFlyer) have different estimated departure times on a delayed AA flight for hours. Apparently AA put one time into their system online and a different time into the system that goes to third-party reservation agents (which is what ExpertFlyer uses and what FlightStats may use).

OTOH, I just saw a case the other week at BOS where a flight that had been cancelled (according to all online sources) kept showing on the airport display screens as "now boarding". I asked an agent at the lounge if it was going out, and at first they said yes, and I asked if there was space left and if I could switch to that flight, and at the point they suggested I stay on my current flight because it the flight I was asking about was cancelled. By the way, it showed a particular gate the flight was "now boarding" at, and when I left the lounge and walked by that gate, it was totally empty (of both agents and passengers).

I've also seen casee where the gate board is showing a particular delay and aa.com is not yet showing that delay.

Meanwhile, it is common enough (even if a small minority of delayed situations) for delays to be either partially or completely reversed, after customers have been notified of a delay. (Yours is not the first case by any means, though it might be the first case that you were aware of.)

Speaking of LCCs, I've seen more than one Southwest flights go from seriously delayed to perfectly on-time, and even from being cancelled back to only slightly delayed!

I don't know if AA ever goes from cancelled back to slightly delayed, but they can certainly go from delayed to not-delayed or from more delayed to less delayed. You should never count on a delay, because sometimes they are reversed. (For example, a delay caused a mechanical issue which takes way less time to resolve than predicted, or delay because crew is not available and then suddenly find alternate crew ready to go, or a delay based on weather forecast which is then redone to one which no longer requires a delay.)

Finally, it seems to me the low-cast carrier just happened to be the solution here. Someone else might have a story where AA was the solution to their problem with an LCC/ULCC flight!

I realize you had reasons to not be at the gate the whole time, but would you have done something differently if you had realized that being away from the gate had a chance of having you miss the flight?

Science Goy

deleted

JDiver

Anyone who uses the various flight tools online surely knows they may show reported, unadjusted or just plain incorrect times for various reasons. And whether the scheduled TOD changed or not becomes irrelevant if the flight departs the gate early or late.

For example, my BOS-CLT flight, scheduled to depart at 11:05 was first delayed from departing the gate (B4) when the ramp shut down due to lightning, then parked at a remote stand when Florence’s tail generated further thunderstorm, winds and rain activity.

Several tools show the flight departing BOS at 11:33, but in fact we departed ~12:35. That latter time and subsequent delayed arrival in CLT is what was important to many with air connections.

Implying another member is misrepresenting the facts in such circumstances usually reflects much more on the accuser than on the original poster.

In any case, it’s also true the AA emphasis on D0 often means numbers of passengers with tight connections affected by IROPS or other factors are given short shrift by D0 driven gate agents more willing to use their powers to inconvenience passengers (regardless of elite status or even numbers) in favor of bending a rule to accommodate paying customers.

In this instance, Spirit ground staff displayed greater flexibility and compassion than AA ground staff.

PHL

I've never experienced AA moving up the scheduled departure time on the day of departure, let alone within an hour or two of it. Is this a common occurrence?? If this is how I'm reading/understanding the OP, and if OP arrived at gate at least T-15 to the originally scheduled departure time, I believe this to be a valid claim for refund and perhaps additional compensation on the grounds of denied boarding.

Write a straightforward, factual email to customer service without any hyperbole or emotion. Explain that you were able to grab a flight on a competitor at the last minute for $279 and wish for refund of the flight for which you were denied.

C17PSGR

There are reports on here of AA shifting delayed flights left or right. There are certainly tons of reports with AA agents having a fully boarded plane at T-15 which makes it obvious who isn't there.

I'm glad OP was able to get help from Spirit's gate agents. It's always great to see service oriented gate agents but AA has them as well. For example, last month, I was happily seated on a flight out of FCA in 4D having a PDB when the flight started to having a series of maintenance delays. It became obvious as we waited that I would probably miss my connection at DFW and end up overnighting there unless the flight made up some time. Then the pilot decided to off load us.

I quickly looked around and saw a DCA flight to JFK in final boarding and walked over to the GA who told me there were seats but he just couldn't change my ticket in time because of other paperwork and wanted to know if I could call the EXP line. I called the EXP line, who changed my ticket to connect through JFK and put me on the flight. The GA kept the door open and waited to print the manifest. I boarded the flight and heard the manifest start printing. A couple of minutes later the GA came on board, told me there was an empty seat in F, and gave me a new boarding pass.

So ... great service isn't limited to LCC's.

Science Goy

I appreciate low-cost carriers for putting price pressure on the majors and helping keep my fares low. As for service, I've generally found LCCs about as hit-or-miss as AA and kin.

ijgordon