tomj888

Flying ORD-LAX today. FL 1375. Early this morning we got a text update that our flight was delayed. As a good boy, I went o flight aware to see that the flight came in from CUN last night. Having flown over 3 million miles in my life, it reeks of mechanical delay. But I’m hopeful its not. I look online and it looks like I have NO choices to get home. All flights are full (guess Covid is behind us) so we are flying standby on the 5 pm, which of course is late. Welcome back AA flyers. My wonder is why couldn’t AA update the flight status with the “WHY” that would of given me more time to seek other ways to get home. I’m an EXEC Plat and I’m wondering if it is worth it to ask the Admirals Club to put us on another carrier. I’m a surgeon and have a full OR schedule in the morning, so getting home is kind of important. Any other suggestions??

VFR

The policy is that EXPs should be rebooked on other airlines to get them to their destination as fast as possible (though even that may have changed due to COVID). Looks like UA 1044 has availability in almost all economy fare classes, which departs Chicago at 6 pm.

tomj888

Thank you for looking for me. I looked as well. I went to the Admirals club support desk and they clarified the situation. The plane went mechanical in Cancun and is actually on it way to ORD. I checked again on FlightAware and found it to be true. So b/c its an intl flight they have to go to Intl terminal then deplane then ferry the plane to H16. Based on that info, we are going to hang in there and wait for our flight. I even see availability on the UA flight at 735 pm, so we should be good.

That said, I would love to see airlines tell you why a plane runs late. I wonder if they do that for CK members?

wrp96

United does provide this information on either it's website or it's app, or at least it used to.

javabytes

United is also moving away from delay codes because they assign blame and cause finger pointing rather than collaboration to get flights out. I am curious how this will ultimately impact public-facing delay info.

While it is a paid service, AA delay details can be obtained through ExpertFlyer (or any GDS if you have a travel agent friend).

MiamiAirport Formerly NY George

I think you will find that most TAs (even on the EXP Desk) won't re-route you on another carrier until a flight actually cancels, which could be hours and hours before that happens. The fact that the OP has a demanding job with a busy schedule won't pull much influence.

hotelboy

OP should have also considered the small risk of a major delay with planning his travels and the potential impact. We all have places to be. No one person is more important than the other.

Stripe

When a flight is delayed one of my first stops is ExpertFlyer, where you can often get the cause of the delay in the flight status notes. If it's mechanical I always take a screenshot in case the original mechanical delay somehow morphs into a weather or ATC delay.

EF is also a quick way to see alternate flight availability.

TomMM

Which could legitimately happen.

Antarius

Sure it can, but the underlying cause is still MX for your delay. Had the aircraft not had a mechanical delay and left on schedule you'd miss the weather.

BRITINJAPAN4

Agreed, Very DYKWIA, if its essential ( for whateveer reason) to be somewhere, they YOU have to go out of your way to make sure you can be there, expecting airlines to do it for you is simly unrealistic..IRROPs happen.

Antarius

An EXP is more important than a Gold, for example. That's why there are multiple status levels.

ATLflyer2017

Regardless of the cause of the delay, the flight is still delayed. Knowing if it's mechanical or weather doesn't change that.

One other thing to consider, if I had 3 million miles under my belt, and had high priority obligations the next day I would probably give myself a day cushion to allow plenty of time to get home if I missed my flight or it was canceled.

Antarius

It does matter though. My SFO-DFW flight had part of the inboard flap fall off. While the flight showed delayed by an hour, I deboarded and asked the EXP desk to put me on the UA SFO-IAH nonstop, which they happily did. The AA flight ended up leaving 13 hours late with a different aircraft but I was long gone by then.

Had this been weather, I would have been stuck.

tomj888

What an odd reply, In no way did I even infer I was more important than anyone. I mentioned my job, b/c had I known earlier in the day, I could of pursued other options. my post was about transparency so that as fliers we have the most tools to make informed decisions. At the end of the day i was prepared to pay UA $350x2 so we could get home. Its never about the money. Its about being informed. do you like living in the dark as it relates to travel?