And This is Why You Leave Early for Your Cruise

[Naomi Collison]

Yeah, we were assigned the two center seats in the center 4 seat section. I debated about just leaving it that way, and hoping that someone would switch. But I realized that anyone who pays extra for that aisle seat isn't just going to switch to a center seat and give up the extra they paid for such a good seat. So I moved my husband into the aisle seat next to my inside seat. At least, that way, when I need to go potty, I can crawl over him and not some stranger.

Thankfully I mostly fly Alaskan and don't have to deal with those issues yet, but when we do have to fly another carrier, I will typically book the cheapest seats. I am flying a family of 6 and it isn't cheap anyway. I try to seat at least one adult with the youngest two children and figure if we can't sit together and it causes someone else distress, I am sorry, please complain to the company to change their stupid policy. Till then, here's my daughters pacifier, you may want it.

 

[TXAKDisneyFan]

Those poor kids. I know they were in public and anyone can take pictures or video, but seeing the kids on that viral video really seemed unnecessary. The mother is an adult, but videoing minors and putting it online felt inappropriate.

As far as airlines go, it seems like people have had both good and bad experiences on every major US carrier. We usually fly Delta and Alaska - the regional Delta planes leave a lot to be desired (as most regional jets I've flown on do), but the long haul planes are a lot nicer (esp w the individual tv screens in the backs of all seats, including free shows and movies). Our worst flight ever was on Alitalia. Really, I think the airports you fly through and where the flight crew are from make the biggest impact on how the flight goes. We've had nothing but friendly crews out of the Midwest - and Minneapolis is my favorite large US airport. The New York and New Jersey airports, on the other hand...

 

[daisyx3]

We took flew to our cruise on AA this year--we flew out on Easter Sunday; the prices on Delta were high so I waited for SWA to release but when they did, they were higher than the others! No real issues going down, but coming back I heard the flight attendants saying they had downsized the plane and they had to reshuffle a lot of people and beg people to fly out the next day for $500--they were still 19 seats short. Lots of people on standby for every AA flight I saw so I think they did a lot of shuffling, which is not a great idea the Sunday after Easter. Personally I was miffed because my carry on which had been fine on the two legs down and the first leg home ( and Delta and SW flights without incident) was flagged by a FA in Charlotte and she made us bag check it.

 

[squirk]

Airlines typically blame the weather for delays, even if the delays were really due to other reasons, such as carrier mechanical issues or scheduling flights too close together. They're not liable for the weather, so they usually blame the weather, even if that's not the real reason.

That has not been my experience. I am a heavy traveler and have been on plenty of flights that were, by the airlines' own admission, delayed due to mechanical issues, pilots who were required to get more sleep, bad scheduling of flight attendants' connections, etc.

I have been comped with free meals and free hotel rooms many times in such circumstances. The airlines have deals with the restaurants in and near the airports, as well as the nearby hotels. These free nights and food are chicken-scratch to the airlines.

Please understand, I agree that airlines have, on the whole, some really poor customer service. However, who in their right mind would think the airline is going to comp you for your cruise because you waited until the last minute to fly and then got caught in bad weather?

Also, when an airline calls a delay due to "bad weather", I think a lot of people look out the window at their airport, see a clear blue sky, and then think the airline is lying. But if you're in Newark on a beautiful day, your plane might be grounded in Dallas due to truly bad weather and unable to make the trip to Newark to pick you up on time.

 

[bumbershoot]

Sometimes the person working the gate doesn't have the information. How are they supposed to know when the weather will clear and the plane will get there. Then if they say you will leave in 2 hours and it turns into 4 there would be a riot.

It's difficult the other way, too.

Virgin America from SEA to SFO to SAN (Diego). Weather was bad in San Francisco (shocking!) so we were delayed. Delayed again. Gonna be here awhile so go get some lunch and come back to board at x time. We all went to the closest food place. Bunches of us sat, ordered beer and nachos. The beers got there, and our nachos were on our way to us in the hands of our server when an urgent PA came over the speakers telling our flight to come back, that we had a window (of good weather slated for our landing time at SFO) and we were boarding. The server knew what flight we were all on, and she got eye contact with those of us she was working with and just waved us off. No payment needed.

Yikes!

And to finish that story...

So we got halfway boarded (my friend and I were onboard) and the airPORT closed because someone had gotten through the secure area without being checked. Security boarded our plane twice, looking for this woman. Finally found her somewhere and opened the airport. Got the rest of the passengers on the plane...we had lost our window. Pushed back from the gate and sat there until we had a window again.

The absolutely brilliant thing about Virgin America is the "mood lighting", which kept everyone on board beautifully calm and happy. I hope Alaska keeps that....

I agree. Airlines make it very clear to people traveling with children that they are seen as an annoyance. Unfortunately, the attempt to ignore and sideline children only makes them more difficult.

I have never seen that, and we've been traveling with my near 12 year old since 2005.

Also, when an airline calls a delay due to "bad weather", I think a lot of people look out the window at their airport, see a clear blue sky, and then think the airline is lying. But if you're in Newark on a beautiful day, your plane might be grounded in Dallas due to truly bad weather and unable to make the trip to Newark to pick you up on time.

True.

Walked into Seatac on a gorgeous, beautiful, amazing day, to find chaos at the United counter. Every flight from the east was delayed or not coming. Atrocious weather on the east coast, but beautiful on our coast. We were just flying to Anaheim, but we had 2 plane changes since we were using miles, and our planes just weren't where they were supposed to be!

 

[Hundredacre]

I

That has not been my experience. I am a heavy traveler and have been on plenty of flights that were, by the airlines' own admission, delayed due to mechanical issues, pilots who were required to get more sleep, bad scheduling of flight attendants' connections, etc.

I have been comped with free meals and free hotel rooms many times in such circumstances. The airlines have deals with the restaurants in and near the airports, as well as the nearby hotels. These free nights and food are chicken scratch to the airlines.

Please understand, I agree that airlines have, on the whole, some really poor customer service. However, who in their right mind would think the airline is going to comp you for your cruise because you waited until the last minute to fly and then got caught in bad weather?

Also, when an airline calls a delay due to "bad weather", I think a lot of people look out the window at their airport, see a clear blue sky, and then think the airline is lying. But if you're in Newark on a beautiful day, your plane might be grounded in Dallas due to truly bad weather and unable to make the trip to Newark to pick you up on time.

I know. Hopefully she was exaggerating.

 

[KKKKCS]

Well, I intend to let my feelings be known, once this trip is over. American is a partner to Delta, and DCL uses Delta for their flights. And I hate Delta. I was hoping that American would be better, until I found out they are partnered.

Thankfully, ours is a direct flight (albeit - 11+ hours) so I'm going to really try to remain calm and pleasant during it. Maybe drugs will help.

Delta and American are not partners. They are direct competitors, do not code share, and are members of competing alliances. Delta is Skyteam, American is OneWorld.

 

[jujubiee4]

I understand her frustration . Heck with the price she probably paid she saw her hard earned money down the drain. Unfortunately
lot of people skip insurance for whatever reason.

I try to fly Virgin America or Jet Blue always even if its more. United? Last year coming back from the hawaii cruise this was
not available from Vancouver. With dread i chose United. We arrive 2 hours ahead like they want. Looked on the screen and it
said on time. Breathed a sigh of relief. Not even 15 min later it said delayed 1 hour then 2 hours. Gate agent said it was because
weather problems at LAX. She actually told me she thought it was fog. I thought that was strange. 2 hours turned into 3 4 5.
At this point i was furious because every time it was time to board they said it would be another hour. Suspicious i called a friend
of mine whose husband is a TRAFFIC CONTROLLER at lax to see if she knew anything. Um come to find out other planes were
landing it was UNITED who was having problems because of construction going on at their gates.

To say i was HOT is putting it lightly. Even though i wanted to yell at the gate agent i knew it wasn't her fault. Anyone who has
worked in customer relations know lot of times you are are given a "canned" response from corporate to placate the
paying public.

My problem is we had insurance and could have stayed the the night in beautiful Vancouver but every 45 minutes the loudspeaker would
come on saying we are expecting to board anytime.......then another delay. Sure enough when we finally arrived we were dumped
off near the tarmac exiting the plane outside then boarding a shuttle to the airport because of the construction.

I wish they would have just told the truth there were gate problems which were causing chaos and i could have made other plans with
my kids.

As for that woman Wow . I could never become unglued like that in front of my kids. As someone who has grown up and watched her
mother have major meltdowns it is terrifying for a child to see.

 

[SleepyDeb]

As someone who has grown up and watched her
mother have major meltdowns it is terrifying for a child to see.

I agree. The poor children. My father had a severe head trauma when I was a kid and he had a MAJOR anger problem after that. The stuff that happened at home was far more severe, but the stuff that happened in public was horrifying, especially when the police were called. For others to see that ugly side of him was just too much for a child to bear.

No matter how magical the cruise may or may not have been, I doubt very much that her children enjoyed it. They probably spent it wondering what they could have done to make the melt down not happen and dreading the flight home. And now that the video has gone viral, their lives are probably hell.

For their sake, let's not share the video any further.

 

[southerngirl528]

I would not have yelled like that but most companies treat customers so poorly. American Airlines is an awful company.

Sorry to hear you've had such awful service from my favorite airline. I fly AA almost exclusively. I am not a super frequent flier but take them as often as possible and always to Hawaii. The airline I loathe is Delta. I paid $65 one way for a "premium" economy seat that did not have 1 inch more legroom and the seat would not recline at all. I mean, at ALL. Because I had liked DL for years before I wrote complaining about paying that much for a seat I considered inferior to a regular coach seat and got a condescending letter with no apology & certainly no refund. I had another situation later that I felt was of some import and again, wrote. Got a pretty scathing letter in return. Guess bottom line is that anyone can have a bad experience (or 2 or 3 or...) with an airline someone else loves...

I'm finding that out. Did you know that an aisle seat is a "preferred" seat"? It costs extra if you want to sit there. Same with window seats. And, their special meals don't include low salt meals. Sadly, I've still got to use them.

It seems so many airlines are going to that now. Most airlines I see now are starting to charge extra for the first few rows in coach too. (???) Frustrating as the dickens isn't it PrincessShmoo? I will say this, I am a FF with AA and I do get some of the categories of seats that there are smaller charges for at no cost as an AAdvantage member.

We flew American Airlines once to wdw (ironically!). Every single person we interacted with was rude and unpleasant. Employees were very, very unhappy. We had connections and the planes were all late. It really stood out as the worst airline we have ever flown. I don't know if we just had a bad experience, but I would never try them again. But we never complain about stuff unless someone hands us a comment card. Hopefully you have more luck!

I have noticed a bit of an uptick with this since American merged with US Airways, which I thought was pretty bad for several reasons. A couple of times I have gotten someone grumpy at the call center & I have politely asked if they were part of the merge or had they always been with AA. Most of the time I find they were US Air. Might be coincidence but it's happened a lot. I've had just one really rude flight attendant and when she said something like "that's the way we do it at American", I retorted, "Not before the US Air merge". I must have hit the target because she almost immediately had a complete change of attitude and actually apologized to me. I've had some really outstanding flight crews on our longer AA flights.

Delays due to bad weather are an inherent risk you take when traveling

What always amuses me is when the weather really IS the cause of a delay and people get completely bent out of shape. I mean, I'm not singing and dancing about it, but I always want to ask, "So would you prefer they fly all of us in questionable weather where we might NOT make our destination alive? Of maybe wait a bit for the weather to clear....".

As for that woman in the video's behavior, I'm sorry she was WAY, WAY out of line. Those gate agents had zero to do with the airlines decision to delay for whatever reason. There are ways to speak up about issues without yelling, threatening or acting like an out of control brat. Disgusting behavior. Yeah, I wouldn't want to miss my Disney cruise either, but by george I've learned to insure pricey vacations like cruises.

 

[southerngirl528]

Now, I book all of my flights on American and they have recently merged/partnered with US Airways - not Delta.

This is the correct info. Lots of airlines are "codeshare" partners with other airlines that are entirely differently held companies. Like American has an agreement with Alaskan Air but they are NOT the same company.

American & US Airways merged fairly recently. Delta has ticked me off one too many times, but the funny thing is, DH, who travels all the time flies them almost exclusively. But here's the catch for lots of this whole discussion here: if you achieve FF Status with an airline, it opens up a lot of new possibilities and niceties. We will be flying DL to Honolulu in several months (on DH' Delta miles) so it will be interesting to see how their 1st class service is. I am generally in coach with all my fellow "peasants". Smooshed together like sardines.

 

[bbak30]

Wow....

 

[southerngirl528]

OK, maybe I used the wrong terminology, but our next trip the flights to and from the ship were both booked through Delta, but the second leg is on American. And I had to go through Delta to pick my seats. I figured that meant that they worked together.

Shmoo, that is an interesting scenario. It sounds like perhaps you booked through a 3rd party like Expedia or Travelocity perhaps??? I see those type of companies "bundle" what I consider "mismatched" flight companies often. I do NOT like booking through anyone except the airline as I have more control. I know when SW was merging with AirTran (this might still be true, haven't flown them in a while), you could book a flight on southwest.com but it would be an AirTran flight. But because I booked on SW, I could not get a seat assignment. I would have been able to choose my seat since AirTran offered that, unlike SW. For me flying can be frustrating enough, so I try to cut out extra complications when possible.

Maybe AA & DL are codeshare partners?? Now I'm going to have to login to my AA account and check. I'm curious.

 

[PrincessShmoo]

Shmoo, that is an interesting scenario. It sounds like perhaps you booked through a 3rd party like Expedia or Travelocity perhaps??? I see those type of companies "bundle" what I consider "mismatched" flight companies often. I do NOT like booking through anyone except the airline as I have more control. I know when SW was merging with AirTran (this might still be true, haven't flown them in a while), you could book a flight on southwest.com but it would be an AirTran flight. But because I booked on SW, I could not get a seat assignment. I would have been able to choose my seat since AirTran offered that, unlike SW. For me flying can be frustrating enough, so I try to cut out extra complications when possible.

Maybe AA & DL are codeshare partners?? Now I'm going to have to login to my AA account and check. I'm curious.

Nope, the flights were booked through DCL.

 

[MakiraMarlena]

I'm guessing she would have been able to take the cruise with that takeoff time. Bet she didn't have insurance.

American was quite good at getting me back to DC from San Juan after that big snowstorm in January. and they put me in the exit row.

Just remember that if you go on a rant in public, somebody's probably going to film it and put it on the internet and it will end up in a British tabloid.

How can American expect children to sit for that long in those conditions and not fall apart?

The kids were fine. It was the mother who fell apart. The older girl was trying to calm HER down. They were likely more upset because she was embarrassing them.

 

[Skiton]

There are so many "discount" airlines right now (we used to love Frontier, now but I won't set foot on one of their planes since they changed their business model) I keep wondering when someone is going to create a "luxury" airline. Not luxury as in, every seat is first-class, but a marketing strategy that says, "YES! We are going to charge you two hundred dollars more for a ticket, but we will not charge you to check or carry on luggage, we will give you a free alcoholic drink, we will serve you a meal on flights longer than 3 hours, we have free movies and wifi, and we guarantee friendly and accommodating service." Is there no market for this? I would pay for it.

 

[FigmentSpark]

The airlines already have this, but people still buy the cheapest ticket because it's there. You can get the 'better' seat, more miles and free baggage, but you pay what a business person pays.

 

[cpdrn7]

I saw this on the news last night, according to disney cruise line she did make the sailing. I understand the frustration yet safety has to be first and foremost...how could she not understand that?

 

[bumbershoot]

Nope, the flights were booked through DCL.

I think in this case DCL is acting as the 3rd party travel agency, hooking together those airlines that usually have nothing to do with each other.

 

[Jennifer777]

There are so many "discount" airlines right now (we used to love Frontier, now but I won't set foot on one of their planes since they changed their business model) I keep wondering when someone is going to create a "luxury" airline. Not luxury as in, every seat is first-class, but a marketing strategy that says, "YES! We are going to charge you two hundred dollars more for a ticket, but we will not charge you to check or carry on luggage, we will give you a free alcoholic drink, we will serve you a meal on flights longer than 3 hours, we have free movies and wifi, and we guarantee friendly and accommodating service." Is there no market for this? I would pay for it.

Delta reduced it's price for first class on a lot of their flights a couple years ago. We've taken advantage of this in the past for as little as $224/ticket one way. We just bought tickets for about $560 RT/per person (MSP -> MCO) for a trip this fall, which is pretty reasonable IMO considering coach would have been well over $300 on that same flight once you factor bag fees and seating assignments. First class includes expedited ticketing and security at the airport, 2 free bags, a meal, alcoholic drinks, a pillow and blanket and premium entertainment, snacks, bottled water, outlets to charge phones/laptops and usually better service. You're the first ones on and first ones off the plane and your bags are the first to come off the baggage carousel. So, it's not a luxury airline or a plane full of luxury seats but if you want to pay a couple hundred more for luxury service, you may be able to do that through Delta and some of the other airlines right now. Sun Country had some reasonable first class rates out of Orlando too.