Stripe

It sounds like the OP's first call was to AA, who was then limited to space QR was showing as available, or AA metal. I think the lesson here is to first try to work things out with the operating carrier, then fall back to the ticket issuer if you can't get anywhere.

slocouple

Having just arrived home on our second round trip SEA-DOH-ATH in QSuites, we would say that we're glad we tried it, but the seat itself is waaaay too hard for both of us. My tall, big-footed husband really dislikes the toe box, too. Soft product is great.

dls25

The QR phone reps most likely wouldn't even look at, advance schedule changes are the ticketing carriers responsibility. You will be referred right back to AA.

cmtlatitudes

The nuance here is AA's new JFK-DOH flight. I hazard the guess it's not happening in a vacuum, i.e. there has certainly been discussion between QR and AA with respect to AA's introduction of a direct flight in this market. Particularly with pretty much the exact flight times.

I'm not saying QR won't sometimes reaccommodate on their own flights & it's always worth trying. But I don't think the OP is going to get very far, particularly with a JFK flight. And AA likely wanting people those flights full.

If potentially being switched to AA's flight is a hard stop for anyone, going forward they should have a backup plan in place in case of this, or unfortunately be prepared to cancel their flights. (But keep in mind there was no guarantee with QR that it won't happen again or that you wouldn't end up on a non-QSuite 359 flight at the last minute anyway.)

I completely get the OP's disappointment. Sometimes the trip excitement is as much about the flight as it is about the destination. Am glad though at least for now, he still has his flight back in QSuites to look forward to.

Abidjan

Yeah, double whammy for me for my October MLE-DOH-JFK flight, paid J, operated by QR and ticketed via AA. For no reason, my evening QR MLE-DOH was moved up 10 hours to a 10 a.m. depature. AA says they can't move me to one of the two evening flights as the original fare code isn't available. Then, just last week, my QR DOH-JFK was changed to the AA DOH-JFK option. Obviously, AA says a full refund is in order. But my hope AA will eventually find inventory in either, or both cases, to restore my itinerary to the original booking.

ijgordon

I think the other moral of this story is that dealing with reward tickets on partners can be a challenge. Be lucky you can book them at all and hope everything goes smoothly. This is not specific to any particular airline or alliance.

ryanbriar

This is the very important nuance. QR basically swapped out their operated flight for the AA operated flight. In AA’s view, they are getting you where you need to go within five minutes.

I get that it’s frustrating, especially given the hype of wanting to fly the Q-Suites, but I’d say you need to monitor award space. Also, I think I mentioned above, but perhaps there is web saver F?

Putting aside the metal swap nuance, also this.

In general, you’re going to have a much better success rate when there’s been a massive schedule change. I lucked out on this once when using a SWU for LHR-JFK F. Massive schedule change would have left me leaving LHR several hours earlier to get the connection to BOS. The agent was nice enough to force space open on a direct LHR-BOS flight. I was subsequently told that this should not have been allowed, but at that point I was confirmed.

This happened to me last week just before the outbound to MLE. Award F, but similar issue. Same flight number, but shifted from 7:30 pm to 10 am. No email etc. We were able to have AA put us back on the 7:30 pm via Twitter without issue (I also checked EF for space). In the event of pushback, I was fully prepared to let them know that a ~10 hour change was not going to fly. I would stress that the schedule change is the issue above all else and leave the AA-operated flight out of the equation for the time being.

Would you be able to take the refund and re-book to what you want, or has the fare difference jumped substantially?

smartytravel

Not quite. OP purchased a flight on a specific airline, at a specific time, with a specific plane in mind.

it's like saying: oh, you paid for BMW, but we are going to swap it for a Subaru for you. This drives, and this drives. No problem.
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Antarius

Conceptually, I get your point - in reality, that's not how airlines work.

Dave Noble

The airline never committed to a specific type of aeroplane, so nothing like paying for a BWM and getting a Subaru.

The booking was a contract of cariage from JFK-DOH. The airline was unable to provide that anymore and so rebooked on another flight departing at the same time. Both are business class

The passenger would be entitled to a refund if unhappy with the change - though in case of an award, it is moot since they are refundable anyway

smartytravel

It has been covered a lot of times. Sure, many airlines in the US are like monopolies and they don't need to commit to anything.

The reality is that a lot of people buying tickets pay extra for specific times, planes or airlines, and they expect to be delivered to destination exactly as they purchased the tickets.

golfingboy

Was your experience based on paid (revenue) ticket or award ticket?

IME when QR cancels a flight their system will run auto rebook moving customers to the next best available flight in comparable cabin (if available) or a lower class of service. Nothing more. If you do not like what the system rebooked you on you either have to find U space on a different flight and have AA re-ticket you on that flight. QR absolutely refuses to manually touch award reservations issued by partner airlines unless something goes pear shaped on day of flight. When I was in a similar situation, I had AA submit a request with the QR liaison and despite having 6 open seats on DOH-MLE three hours before departure QR still refused to release any saver availability. QR liaison desk is non-existent. AA called and emailed them on my behalf multiple times and never heard a single word.

My advice to the OP if they do not want to fly AA120 is to look at every single airport that QR flies in the US and if you find saver availability on any of those flights AA will force award space on the domestic sector on the flights you prefer. Let's say there is award space on MIA-DOH and you want to fly the 777 flight from JFK-MIA and there are revenue seats available AA will get you booked on that flight in J. This is what we did when our ATL-DOH flight got canceled but we found award space on IAH-DOH.

Abidjan

Good question. Unfortunately, fare is now 3x. I am going to keep an eye on EF, just in case. Glad you were able to sort things.

ryanbriar

That’s frustrating. I’d call back and press the time change as the driver for requesting the change until you are able to get it resolved.

The comical thing about my flight was after getting it sorted out five days ago, there was a plane swap this morning as our first class seats disappeared into Q Suites. No emails etc. Quickly called the EP line (no wait since it was 11 pm CT ) and had us moved to the 9 pm departure where there was first class cabin. Also bought us a couple more hours in the sun, which was a plus.

Microwave

For a change like this, QR wouldn't need to touch the 001 ticket itself; the ticket is what covers QR for the travel from A to B in a specific fare bucket, it doesn't specify the exact flight. QR could easily have rebooked the passenger onto another QR flight on the same day, putting them into the same inventory (even overselling that inventory if needed since it's their own flight they're dealing with), without having to reissue the 001 ticket. Technically, QR would revalidate the QR coupon on the 001 ticket, which they definitely can do in advance of the flight. This DL page for travel agencies (of all places) has a decent explanation of the process, and how the operating carrier would go about revalidating a ticket—when you see "Delta", read it as "QR", and when you see "agency", read it as "AA", and you'll have the exact situation here.

Ultimately, either QR chose not to move the OP, or they may have chosen to do so and AA decided that it would move the passenger to its own metal anyway and reissued the ticket. QR are limited by what they can do within the scope of revalidation, but since AA own the ticket, they can do pretty much whatever they want to it. At this point, since AA have done what they've done, I don't think the OP will have much of a route to get back on QR metal unless award inventory opens up on a suitable flight.