zurfer

Two days ago I booked an American Airlines May flight through the American Express travel portal. Nice deal using membership reward points. AMEX portal displayed 3:08pm HNL departure however email confirmation indicated 1:50pm departure. Thought I made a mistake so checked online again and AMEX had same flight with 3:08pm departure whereas AA site showed 1:50pm departure. Sometime later AMEX showed 1:50pm departure same as AA. One possible explanation is AA flight time changed and AMEX had not updated while I was booking.

The problem is 1:50pm is too early and I prefer to depart 3pm or later. Reached out to AMEX and they only see current flight times so change to later time doubles my cost. AA says third party reservation so cannot make changes. Suppose I may have to leave earlier than planned however I'm curious if someone has a suggestion on how to proceed to get a later flight from AMEX or AA. Thank you

dhring

This morning I found a good fare on Amextravel.com for SJU-MIA-LAX one way in Business on AA. I purchased the ticket and received a confirmation from Amex showing both legs in Business. However, when I went to www.aa.com to select seats, I saw that the MIA-LAX leg was actually in Economy. Then I called Amex and was told that while the ticket price was based on R, this fare code was blocked (RC) on the second leg so it went into G (Econ). After more than an hour on the phone without resolution, I told them to cancel the booking since it was still within the 24 hour cancellation window.

The Amex rep and supervisor did not offer to fix the problem and provide the business class seat per my confirmation. It seems like the result was a bait and switch, resulting in one very unsatisfied customer. I have booked many AA flights through Amex Travel at good prices without ever running into this issue. Even if the issue is a website technical glitch, shouldn't Amex be responsible for providing what they confirmed? Inquiring minds, etc.

vip66

I know I should not trust Amex Travel, they are largely not helpful, with inexperienced "travel advisors", excruciating long holds, etc. But this is something new:

I booked a BKK-JFK (May 12), EWR-LAX May 14), LAX-BKK (Jun 20) ANA issued ticket on Amex Travel using my Platinum card, in J (P-fare).

Flew BKK-JFK outbound. But I had to change the next segment, EWR-LAX. P-fare states "reprice using historical fare"; I'd done this before on a tix just like this, no issues. But there was a double-whammy.

First, UA (operating carrier on EWR-LAX) canceled the original EWR-LAX flight, rebooked me, and took control of the tix. For 4h I tried, unsuccessfully, to make a change and was shuttled back and forth between UA, ANA, and Amex, all blaming the other parties for not being able to make changes. UA eventually released the hold. At that point, all Amex could do (12h before the next flight), according to the supervised who was helping me, was to remove the EWR-LAX segment in order for the tix to not cancel itself due to no-show. My EWR-LAX was wasted but, oh well, LAX-BKK outbound was safe. Which is what the Amex supervisor who removed the segment stated. Except it was not safe.

When I called Amex again, several days later, to try to re-add the EWR-LAX segment for another date, the new supervisor told me my ticket was gone! It was in "exchange" status and if I wanted to put even the LAX-BKK back, I would have to essentially purchase a new one-way.

I am beyond furious at this point. After wasting, literally, 6h on the phone I am told "sorry, you need to book a new ticket [for $6k, at this point, because we screwed up]." They offered to "review the [original] call" with the supervisor, but this will take two weeks. With, I am sure, the same outcome.

Any recourse here? Or am I left just to fume about the wasted money, let others know Amex Travel sucks, and move on?

llary

I'm curious what Amex Travel are offering that make them attractive over booking flights direct?

I'm so skeptical about booking flights through travel agents that I've never even bothered looking into what Amex Travel offers.

I have used an agent 3 times in my life for booking flights and 3 for 3 have been a total disaster.

nexusCFX

IAP fares.

ijgordon

I think one lesson is to keep it to simple round-trips on single airlines.

I'm wondering if this could be a course of action?:
Eat the cost of a new EWR-LAX ticket & reservation (for now).
Go to the airport VERY early before the departure from LAX back to BKK, at which point ANA, who would normally have no problems taking control of a ticket at this stage, can help troubleshoot. Be prepared to potentially have to pay a walkup fare (or alternative) but document/record the relevant conversation about a missing ticket.
Go after Amex Travel to refund your new EWR-LAX ticket and any additional ticket purchased. Let them review the calls, and then start elevating, maybe direct to CEO whose office is probably set up to handle serious customer complaints, and ultimately small claims court (although I believe damages limit is $5k, alternately you might have to go to arbitration).

sdix

Pay with points then points rebate

IAP fares.

5x points on bookings.

notquiteaff

Plat gives 5X on airline bookings, too.

Kacee

Only personal Plat. Business Plat you have to buy from Amex.

vip66

Brief update:

Amex Travel remained unhelpful, doing their slow "call review".

However, ANA pitched in. Despite the really long wait times on calls to ANA (>1h), their customer service was actually trying to help me. They reinstated the ticket (albeit, with slight changes due to current fare availability) and reissued it within a couple of hours of my call. They actually followed up on returning calls, something that rarely ever happened with Amex Travel.

Thus, after consistent negative experiences with Amex Travel, I vouch to never again book a ticket through them. IAP discount is simply not worth it.

nexusCFX

I have a booking in standard (U) business on SQ via IAP. JFK-FRA-SIN-SIN-MLE, MLE-SIN, SIN-SFO. And then I upgraded the JFK-FRA-SIN to F using Krisflyer miles. I definitely do not recommend such madness to anyone as it is a booking that gives me incredible anxiety for what could go wrong and the AMEX Travel agents are so inept.

But, at the time, IAP somehow had the upgradeable business fare (U) for about the same price of 5500 as the restricted lite business fare, whereas through SQ it was 8000 for the (U) fare class. Had never seen such huge savings before, assumed it was some kind of error with the fares they filed to IAP so I had to do it. Praying nothing goes terribly wrong and that I don't have to alter it.

pbd456

The US amex offer discounts for IAP fare ex BKk?

I think you should contact ana from the start because the ticket is issued by ana. Ana took control of the ticket once you have flown the first segment

vip66

No, no IAP discount in this case; I suppose I dislike the 60min hold times to reach ANA customer service, so I had booked through Amex Travel.

ANA did not have control of the ticket until things went sour. In the end, they helped me out.

ijgordon

60 minute hold times is pretty good for the US airlines these days. I'd be surprised Amex Travel is consistently less. I can certainly imagine you have changed your view regarding the trade-off of hold times vs. competence. It does become more difficult of a calculation when there are meaningful $ savings on IAP.

Kacee

Sounds like you're just guessing.

I've consistently had hold times with Amex under 2 minutes. The problem is that the frontline agents are not trained or empowered to do anything except read off a script, so the calls inevitable take at least 30+ minutes as they repeatedly put you on hold to speak with someone else.