Difficulty Getting an AA Refund
 

I booked 2 seats LAX -> MIA round trip using AAdvantage miles. I upgraded for cash on both legs. AA changed my flight to an unacceptable time and flight so I cancelled and rebooked. They refunded my credit card for all 4 security fees, but only 2 of the upgrade fees. I called customer service only to be told they can't help with refunds, I had to do online. So I tried, I put in the info for each of the record numbers. Each attempt showed that I had been refunded the security fee. I agree with that, but nothing about the upgrade fees, not even the ones I actually was refunded. It wouldn't let me go any further. Next I tried to email AA. I was forced to pick one of 3 subjects, none of which were anywhere close to my issue. See attached. I have spend 4 or 5 hours today researching and documenting my issue, but how do I get someone to fix it? Thanks in advance.
https://cimg5.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.fly...6b78594df6.jpg

When you say that you "upgraded," do you mean to a different class of service? Or did you simply purchase Preferred or Main Cabin Extra seats within the Economy cabin?

Don't select advantage customer service - use Compliments and Complaints and contact customer relations to fix it.

AAdvantage customer service is to deal with your AAdvantage account and do housekeeping on it.

have you tried submitting on this link?
https://prefunds.aa.com/refunds/

Main Cabin Extra.

Yes, it only showed the security fee refunds, nothing about the 4 Main Cabin Extra charges. Even though they refunded 2 of them when it should have been 4.

Hmm? I didn't notice that option on their website, but I found it with a Google search. Thanks, I will give it a try.

Don't MCE charges get different "ticket" numbers? Check your CC statement for those and make sure you entered those ticket numbers, if you haven't already.

They do? Good lord, that's the IT kludge of the century.

I thought so. However, I've never bought MCE, so I could be wrong.

EDITED TO ADD: See https://www.aa.com/i18n/customer-ser...p#ticketnumber. I cut and pasted the relevant text below (emphasis mine).

Ticket number

Where can I find my ticket number?ExpandThe ticket number can be found on your:

• Confirmation email and receipt – look toward the end of the email under the 'Receipt' section
• Receipt from Airport / City Ticket Office – look at the bottom in the middle of the ticket
• Credit card statement

The ticket number is 13 characters long and also contains the airline code. The ticket number is the last 10 digits. Keep in mind there are separate ticket numbers for add-ons like seats, upgrades and bags.

OK. Note that these are not considered "upgrades," so if you have to communicate with AA, avoid using that term. You are seeking a refund of seat fees; as noted upthread, seat fees get their own ticket numbers, so try entering the ticket number for the missing seat fees on the AA Refunds page.

^ This.

There should have been a different ticket number for your MCE purchase. Should be in the email receipt you got when you bought it. You'll need to submit this as a separate refund request.

Thanks.

Amazing stuff. This just shows how short sighted and rudderless AA is. This is a horrible solution that will lead to way more long term cost in terms of supportability and upgrades.

As long as the bean counters see IT as a purely a back end cost center , they'll never actually invest and tap into the real benefit it can provide.

I found the receipt for the 2 Main Cabin Extra's for one flight, but unfortunately I have no receipt for the second one. They did charge my card though so at least I can now figure out which flight they did not refund. I don't understand why AA does not provide this information on my account logon. I submitted a complaint to Customer Relation online, so hopefully they will respond.

Yes, absolutely the case.
I recently canceled a flight where I had also purchased the "move to first class" offer for $199 shortly prior to the flight date.
I just canceled that flight and, while the ticket goes back into my account for future use, I did submit a refund request for the $199, which came with its own Ticket Number, separate from the original flight ticket. They were actually pretty prompt about it and refunded the amount to my credit card in a few days.

WOW!!! I had no idea the ticket numbers are on my CC statement. I will try that. Thanks.

(Deleted.)

Not to defend AA, but this is completely beyond AA's control -- it's a global requirement of IATA. While you can have countless transactions in a PNR, you can only have one financial transaction per ticket, so if a base ticket itself changes it has to be exchanged for a new ticket, and if add-on services get bought they get charged via a separate Electronic Miscellaneous Document (formerly a Miscellaneous Charge Order or Special Service Ticket). Each distinct charge gets its own distinct document number.

I'm pretty sure I get a ticket number when I pay a guest fee for Delta SkyClub access. It's essentially the receipt/transaction number, which you even get on, say your groceries from Walmart.

Thank you. I found the ticket numbers for the Main Cabin Extra charges. It was the 13 digit numbers on my credit card statement. Checking on AA it clearly showed 2 were never refunded.So, they just held my money until I asked for it? They put me through hell figuring it out. I have the better part of a day working on this, for $161.52. I wonder how many of their customers might not even notice it, or be frustrated into submission? It is totally unacceptable for any company to expect their customers to navigate their unique processes with absolutely no assistance.

Thanks everyone, hopefully it will now be resolved. I found the ticket numbers for the Main Cabin Extra charges. It was the 13 digit numbers on my credit card statement. Checking on AA it clearly showed 2 were never refunded.So, they just held my money until I asked for it? They put me through hell figuring it out. I have the better part of a day working on this, for $161.52. I wonder how many of their customers might not even notice it, or be frustrated into submission? It is totally unacceptable for any company to expect their customers to navigate their unique processes with absolutely no assistance.

This is actually pretty routine for all carriers. It's not AA-specific. Think of it as a transaction ID and it doesn't seem as odd.

I have never had a carrier arbitrarily not give a refund when they very clearly were supposed to do so. And, I would certainly think that when I reported this issue to AA Customer Service they should have been able to either help, or give clear guidance. I really don't care if that is routine with all carriers, it is outrageous. Thankfully, Flyertalk member Antarius gave me the solution. Thank you Flyertalk I have always received great assistance here.

I had not heard the word 'kludge' in 35 years. Got a kick out of seeing it and recalling back in the 80s when IT was still 'computer programming'.

I never said not giving you a refund is routine. I said using ticket #s for all sorts of transactions is routine and that you should look up the ticket # on your CC statement and submit that at prefunds.aa.com. I believe this is the route you took.

One of my more idiosyncratic beliefs is that it was a huge mistake to rebrand Management Information Systems as IT, because managing/designing/implementing the information systems is the important thing, not the technology.

The IATA ticket thing is really interesting and explains why DL treats a gift card as a really flexible but nonrefundable ticket and why DL processes buying a ticket with a gift card as a ticket change (thus presents to Amex as eligible for fee credit).

Got it.

Still, there's no reason for it to be a totally standalone transaction from a customer perspective. You can't buy MCE separately from a flight, which makes the MCE purchase a subsidiary record of the flight purchase. Whether it is ledgered as its own transaction on the back end is one thing, how it's managed, displayed and transacted is another.
​​​
​​​​

I learned 3 important things as a result of this experience:

1: American Airlines has no real customer relations dept. They just let their computers send out sincere apologies without addressing the issues. See attached message I got after filing a complaint.

2: I can always count on members on FlyerTalk Forums to assist. I did locate the needed transaction numbers on my credit card statement and successfully used the online refund request. Today I received emails notifying me my refunds were being processed. Apparently I will never get an explanation why they held my money. They were not holding it as a credit, because I have since booked flights.

3: Probably the most important thing I learned is the definition of KLUDGE. It is a haphazard or makeshift solution to a problem and especially to a computer or programming problem. :-)


https://cimg5.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.fly...0cc1d599f4.jpg

In case anyone is interested, here are the refundability rules for seat fees charged by AA:

https://www.aa.com/i18n/travel-info/...abin-extra.jsp

(Scroll down to "Terms and conditions.")

Lot's of good info, but of course since I booked with AAdvatage miles my miles were immediately reinstated and the MCE fee should have been refunded. BTW, the security fees were refunded. I should not have had to through this ordeal to find out how to get what I was owed. No human person was available who could fix it.

Even more information about refunds of seat fees here:

https://www.aa.com/i18n/fragments/me...SeatsTerms.jsp

(Note the last sentence: "Keep in mind you need to submit separate refund requests for your flights, seats and other purchases.")

I learned one thing - read the fine print! ;)

Wow, she worked hard that day. I got the exact same response, same day, same agent! To a totally unrelated issue which went unresolved from CR.

I just want to thank everyone for the extremely useful information in this thread. Saved me hours of additional headache!