Upset with United flight change

[seashoreCM]

The link refers to "flights that were cancelled or significantly delayed as a result of the tragic events of September 11".

I have been been fighting AA for a refund over a flight change that will mean we would miss our next flight (tickets purchased separately) as the change falls short of their refund policy by 10mins.and they will only give me a credit that is useless to me in Australia.

"Connecting" tickets purchased separately need much more time at the connection point. I would actually consider more than 12 hours. This in turn happens to be much longer than the schedule change tolerances for any airline.

You may be entitled to a refund if one set of tickets gets a significant schedule change but you could still get stuck with the other set.

On a not so recent trip of this character (New England to China connecting in Hawaii) I allowed 48 hours at the connection point. Fortunately I had time to spare and there were activities (family activities) that could be enjoyed there.

 

[jsilvers]

The link refers to "flights that were cancelled or significantly delayed as a result of the tragic events of September 11".

And makes clear that the policy predated and was not specifically related to 9/11. Your point?

 

[MAH4546]

The link refers to "flights that were cancelled or significantly delayed as a result of the tragic events of September 11".

I have been been fighting AA for a refund over a flight change that will mean we would miss our next flight (tickets purchased separately) as the change falls short of their refund policy by 10mins.and they will only give me a credit that is useless to me in Australia.

AA has insanely generous accommodation policies as long as the change is greater than 30 minutes.

http://www.aa.com/i18n/agency/Booking_Ticketing/Reaccom/rule_240_80.jsp

Though it has no obligation to you if your onward flight was booked separate, unless that onward flight is on Qantas, where, per oneWorld rules, AA will treat it as if you are a through ticketed passengers.

http://www.aa.com/i18n/agency/Booking_Ticketing/Reaccom/oneworld_tkt_policy.jsp

 

[Scotch]

Thanks to all who encouraged me to remain persistent. You guys rock! I finally got around to calling this morning; it took me 45 minutes on the phone but I got the seat assignments!!! The first agent insisted that there was nothing they can do; when I mentioned asking for a supervisor she initially wouldn't get one -- she just said even a supervisor can't get us seats now that they are in airport control (but of course I can pay to upgrade to Economy Plus seats). [I still don't understand why all the non + coach seats got moved to airport control a month before the flight.] She repeated that these things happen when a schedule changes, but I reminded her that the original flight we booked only changed time by roughly 15 minutes; the schedule change was because they bumped us off to the later flight. I also explained that it's okay if they can't assign us 4 seats in a row the way we originally had; my concern is that the kids, particularly the 6 year old, is assigned a seat next to a parent. I mentioned that I can understand the loss of seat assignments if they had changed a plane or cancelled the flight; but I didn't understand the loss of seats I secured so long ago simply because they decided to bump us off to a later flight a month before departure. The first agent finally handed me over to another agent (whom I assume is a supervisor), who proceeded to tell me the same things. After hearing me out some more, she said she'll check with another department and see what they can do. She returned and said they assigned me 4 seats in a row!

I must say I was getting ready to give up and plan to show up at the airport a few hours earlier than we had planned. But persistence, politeness, and the presence of young kids helped. Let's hope that I don't have to go through this again for this trip.

 

[Scotch]

It's likely that the only way to fix the situation is for the supervisor to use Economy Plus inventory.

I just checked the seating chart to check the location of the seats. Your prediction came true!

 

[gwynne]

Thanks to all who encouraged me to remain persistent. You guys rock! I finally got around to calling this morning; it took me 45 minutes on the phone but I got the seat assignments!!! The first agent insisted that there was nothing they can do; when I mentioned asking for a supervisor she initially wouldn't get one -- she just said even a supervisor can't get us seats now that they are in airport control (but of course I can pay to upgrade to Economy Plus seats). [I still don't understand why all the non + coach seats got moved to airport control a month before the flight.] She repeated that these things happen when a schedule changes, but I reminded her that the original flight we booked only changed time by roughly 15 minutes; the schedule change was because they bumped us off to the later flight. I also explained that it's okay if they can't assign us 4 seats in a row the way we originally had; my concern is that the kids, particularly the 6 year old, is assigned a seat next to a parent. I mentioned that I can understand the loss of seat assignments if they had changed a plane or cancelled the flight; but I didn't understand the loss of seats I secured so long ago simply because they decided to bump us off to a later flight a month before departure. The first agent finally handed me over to another agent (whom I assume is a supervisor), who proceeded to tell me the same things. After hearing me out some more, she said she'll check with another department and see what they can do. She returned and said they assigned me 4 seats in a row!

I must say I was getting ready to give up and plan to show up at the airport a few hours earlier than we had planned. But persistence, politeness, and the presence of young kids helped. Let's hope that I don't have to go through this again for this trip.

I always think calling when you are prepared (I look up flights/times to have possible suggestions), patient, and polite is quite helpful. Good news that everything worked out for you.

 

[*Seanaci*]

OP, sorry you had this happen. I wouldn't wish it on my worst enemy!

Last year, we booked with Frontier in July for our Dec 22 flight to Orange County. 6 weeks before we were set to fly, I got an email stating our flight had changed. Ok. No big deal. I'm not sure if they cancelled our original flight or what happened, but it did. I wasn't going to stress. I double checked our seats, as we had paid for the stretch seating so that using DS5 (at the time) carseat was easier. When we checked in for our flight at the airport on departure day, our seats were all over the plane. Not even 2 of us were sitting together. Which meant my 5 year old son would have been on his own. So we demanded at the ticket counter that at least one of us was sat by him. She ended up seating my mom and son together in the 1st row of 1st class. And she managed to get the rest of us in the stretch seating thought not altogether.

We get through security and get to our gate and sit. Time comes for us to board the flight and everyone is ready to go. Except the pilots. They took everyone off the plane, told us to stay close to the gate. We got told so many things in the 2 hours before the flight was officially cancelled.

I will tell you this much, at the 1 hour mark after being taken off the plane, I tweeted out to Frontier. They tweeted right back and kept me in the loop on things. So, by the time everyone was getting their emails and the GA's were announcing the flight cancelled, I was already booked on the next available flight out. I didn't tell anyone in my family. But went to the gate agent and asked her to print my new boarding passes for the flight (as the twitter agent had instructed). She looked at me and told me there was no way I was on that flight because it was full.

I never told my family...I didn't want to get excited and it be true that we weren't on the flight. So, when it was announced to head to the concourse ticket counter, I booked it (my mom came with me). At the same time getting on my phone to wait for an agent. Needless to say, I got through on my phone before I moved 10 feet in line. To be told all I needed to do was head to my gate and get the boarding passes printed. My good karma moment came when I handed my phone (with the agent still on the line) to a mom from a family we befriended whilst waiting on cancellation news so that she could get her flight rebooked.

I can't sing the praises enough of using social media when you're in the situation I was in. Had it not been for Twitter, we wouldn't not have flown out that day and would have spent the night in the airport.

Use ALL avenues when it comes to getting through to your airline. Especially when you're sitting at the airport like we were.

As a matter of fact, even though we had a poor experience with Frontier last December, my parents just flew with them again before Thanksgiving. I kept tabs on their flight (whether they would get out or not as they flew out of Dallas the day before thanksgiving just 2 days after their ice storms) via Twitter. Frontier was just awesome and so kind even after my 20 tweets to them.