First and Last Trip with American Airlines

Last month, my wife, 4-year-old daughter and I took a trip to Alabama for a friend's wedding. We chose to fly on American Airlines because it was the cheaper option and we were definitely on a budget for this trip.

Our flight left Sacramento at 6 a.m., so we made sure to get to the airport at 4:30 a.m.. We arrived to find a long, winding line in front of the American Airlines check-in counter. We waited for about 30 minutes, as the line slowly moved forward. There appeared to be just one person working two of those "self-service" kiosks that every airline has now. Finally, after lots of waiting, an irritated American Airlines representative comes over to the line and very rudely says "you know, you can use those over there," and points to unmarked, currently unused kiosks up against a nearby wall. The response from everyone in line, including myself was, well why the hell didn't you say that 30 minutes ago?

Everything went smoothly at the gate and we boarded our flight and left on time. We got settled in and flight attendants started making their rounds. When they got to us, I requested a muffin. And not a free muffin mind you, one that I was prepared to pay two dollars for. What I got was a rude response about how they only had 24 muffins on the flight and there were 150 passengers, and they had already run out. How do you only bring two dozen muffins on a 6 a.m. flight across the country? That's just poor planning. Then immediately following this exchange with the flight attendant, my wife asks for coffee and is told "we're out, we have to make some more, we'll come back later." Guess what? They didn't come back later. Throughout the entire flight, the flight attendants were rude and not helpful at all.

We arrived in Dallas-Fort Worth and wandered around until our connecting flight boarded. There was a slight delay because the crew was still cleaning the plane. Which is funny, because when we finally got on the plane, our seats were filthy. There was trash and food all over the seats and the floor, and my wife stepped in fresh, gooey gum. How do you step in gum on an airplane immediately after it was cleaned? We complained to the flight attendants, but they seemed completely disinterested and, just like the earlier flight, were very rude.

After we arrived in Alabama, I decided that I was not at all going to let American Airlines slide for this bad experience. So I called their customer service line and requested that we be given a free upgrade as a gesture of goodwill and an apology. I was shocked by the rude response of Kirsten, a customer service supervisor. She said, "I'm sorry we don't do that. If everybody who had a bad experience got free upgrades, we'd run out of seats." So basically she's admitting that they routinely get bad service complaints. Now, understand that I'm not saying they should give out upgrades every time a flight is delayed or there's a mechanical problem. Those kinds of things happen and they would run out of seats. I'm talking about holding your company accountable when your entire staff from top to bottom is rude. Needless to say, Kirsten and I did not see eye to eye and I didn't get my free upgrades.

So, I decided to email American Airlines, and outline my complaints to them, hoping for some kind of compensation. I got this:

"After reading your email describing your disappointment in us, we, too, are disappointed and can understand why you are upset. We are truly sorry we let you and your family down in so many ways during your recent travel with us.
At the same time, we are glad you wrote to us. We regard every single customer contact as a welcome opportunity to listen, learn and most importantly, improve. You can be sure that your constructive criticism will help us do a better job next time. In view of all you have endured, I can understand your request for a complimentary upgrade. Unfortunately, we were unable to comply. While we agree that in certain situations compensation is in order, we do not believe it is fair to our customers who purchase this premium service to offer complimentary upgrades as a compensation option."

So they did apologize, which is something. But being the cheap guy that I am, I still would have liked some compensation.

Sometimes being the squeaky wheel works, sometimes it doesn't. But I firmly believe that you can't let companies get away with stuff like this. Because if you do, it's only going to get worse and worse.