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I was supposed to depart on an American Airlines flight from Orlando to Dallas this evening, when I got the bad news: a 2-hour delay, due to weather in some vague unknown place. But there was good news, too: I learned about it in a personal phone call from a sympathetic agent with American Airlines, she tried her darnedest to get me on the next available flight. I was a bit stunned by this gesture! |
Unfortunately, this American employee couldn’t get me on another flight; as I’ve been telling you in this blog, we are now entering the very beginning of the holiday travel period, a period which is going to see very full flights.
Still, I really appreciated the courtesy of the call (I’m only sorry I didn’t get her name).
I travel quite a bit, but this is the very first time I’ve gotten a call like this. Wish this could happen to all of us all the time: being notified ASAP makes it possible for me (and you) to make plans, notify loved ones and rejigger the evening’s strategy. Of course, what I’d really like to know is exactly why my flight was late, where is it stuck now, and maybe a definitive answer to “how long a delay” (and if they don’t know, admit it, and explain why they don’t know). More information (at least for me) is better than the alternative, I suppose.
Anyway, back to the call I DID get. I got to wondering: did I get the call because I’m an AAdvantage member (frequent flyer), with Platinum Status? Well, calls were made, and, according to Danielle, a customer service rep for American, if you provide a phone number when making reservations (whether you’re an AAdvantage member or not) there is a “desk” within the reservations dept. that will attempt to contact you, to notify you of any delays.
Again, she said this is true for those who are AAdvantage members and those who are not. And notice she said American will “attempt” to contact you, so there is no guarantee it will happen. Plus, I wouldn’t be surprised if Platinum-status members were first on the “call” list, but I don’t know that for sure. All I know is, this was a nice experience.
One advantage of this delay? I had all this time to do more than few posts today and tell you about it! (too bad my flight alert i set up didn’t work …)
Update:
I finally got in around 1:45am in the morning - 4 hours late. There is a very important point here and advice I have given before, don’t take the last flight out in the evening if at all possible (in my case I had no choice), the pilots by the time we had left had 10 minutes to spare on their allotted FAA daily flight time and we were within minutes of being overnighted (no fun for anyone). The delay originally noted as weather by the agent that called me - was then explained as several mechanical failures and then they brought us a different plane that sat on the tarmac w/o a crew which we waited an additional 2 hours for. All those connecting in Dallas were overnighted — Holidays are going to be bad, but this is going to be a way of traveling life in the U.S. for a long time …
I had a similar experience with Delta last weekend. My son was flying home to Georgia from college for Thanksgiving. This is the first time he has travelled entirely alone. When the flight was delayed in Burlington, VT for 2 hours due to weather, a Delta rep (I, too, wish I had gotten her name) called to inform me of the delay. Because of the delay, my son would also be missing ALL of his connections. She very kindly re-routed him to a different nearby airport, AND called the Burlington, VT airport to make sure they paged my son to return to the ticket counter for updated boarding passes! What a refreshing change!! Makes me want to choose Delta for all my son’s other flights(he comes home 4 times per year because the dorms are closed for the holidays)
Comment by LWallace — November 21, 2007 @ 10:03 am
Nice to get a human to call you. I was on an AA flight out of San Juan that got canceled in October, I did get a call, but it was a short and dry recording saying “Flight XXX was cancelled… click” which arrived after I had already been standing in line for 30 minutes at the service counter to get on another flight.
I wonder if I would have gotten a nice helpful human if I was Platinum. At least I got out of there that night.
Comment by Bandora — November 21, 2007 @ 12:53 pm
We also learned the hard way not to take the last flight a few years ago, on Iceland. Without going into details it was a complete nightmare, and Iceland handled it poorly and infuriated us all. On the other hand, when our travel agent inadvertently cancelled one leg of our British Air flight, BA was great - we had to pay again (our agent later ate that cost), and though BA could have charged us any price, they honored the price we had originally paid, and got us on our flight. I really appreciate the valuable tips - such as avoiding being on the last flight out whenever possible. Thanks!
Comment by Dolores — November 21, 2007 @ 2:32 pm
Well Rick, my experience on AA this week was far different - and I wan’t on the last flight. On Monday, my family and I had the misfortune to fly on AA 461, the 3.40pm DFW-SFO flight. We knew before we headed to the airport that it would be :45 late due to the ATC snafu earlier that day at DFW. We got to the airport and gate in good time for the revised 4.25pm departure. At 4.15pm, they told us they were not able to board because the crew was just now arriving at DFW (I’m always amazed they don’t seem to know this until the last minute). To make a long story short, we eventually pushed off the gate shortly after 5pm and sat there for awhile before being pulled back to the gate due to an “electrical problem”. After maintenance came onboard and ran all their checks and presumably fixed it, we pushed off the gate again and headed to the runway. We were #1 to go…and then the captain came on to tell us we would need to return to the gate for a pressurization problem. Again we were held on the flight for awhile before they told us we could deplane if we wanted but needed to be back in :45 for departure. After :45, they asked the rest of us to deplane for “weight & balance” purposes. What a load of crap (weight and balance is not calculated at the airport but rather at AA’s Ops Control Center a few miles away). At this point they told us we had :30 to get food (it was getting late) before we were going to re-board. Well, you guessed it, :30 later they told us they had found a 3rd mechanical fault and that we would not be ready to go for another :30 and decided to hand out $10 meal vouchers - AFTER WE HAD ALL SCRAMBLED TO GET FOOD ALREADY!! We eventually left at 8.35pm, nearly 5 hours late and with litle information during the course of the delays and no apologies beyond a $10 voucher ofered too late to be meaningful. Upon arrival there was no gate so we got to spend another :30 on-board!! The captain’s only comment was simply “it is not our day”. The flight attendants ony comment was “we are suffering with you”. My only comment is “next time not on AA”.
Comment by Bob — November 22, 2007 @ 11:59 am
AA, as well as most airlines do have a desk at RES to contact passengers affected by today’s operation irregularities. Actually, they are doing the rebooks so hopefully it’s already done by the time you’re talking to an Agent at the airport. As long as it’s a typical day, they are staffed to “get around” to a lot of it. PNRs are placed on queues and Agents work them as they come across the screen.
On OSO days (off sked operation IE:thunderstorms earlier in the day at DFW) they can’t keep up with the volumn. Anytime things start lagging behind, their priority shifts to simply rebooking.
At DFW, there’s also an OSO agent working with the Ramp Manager up in the Operations Tower. RES is handling those PNRs that have definitely been affected. The Ramp Manager will decide on ‘close call’ connections which flights will be held and which ones won’t be. This Agent will then start re-booking those we’re not going to hold for. In this case, you most likely won’t be contacted as it’s just one Agent, not a whole department working a queue.
And yes, your status will place you higher in the queue.
I guess on slow days, RES can get to everyone. As an employee, I once got a call that my Honolulu flight I was “meal listed” on (non-revenue pass) had been cancelled due to typhoon in HNL.
Steve
Comment by Steve — November 23, 2007 @ 10:04 am