I have been rather vocal about my switch from American Airlines to United. But as I still have hundreds of thousands of miles, I need to spend them and American continues to squander opportunities to win me back.
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Little Old Me, and My Family
I get it, I get it – I’m not that important. I was just one of tens of thousands of Executive Platinum members. I wasn’t important enough to be a Concierge Key member, so when American Airlines lost me, they didn’t notice. I took my $17,500/year and went to United but American is running a $45bn/year business (revenue), I am a completely missable drop in an ocean of revenue.
Still, for lifetime American Airlines fans like my family had been, I find myself flying United but still hoping American will turn it around. My family has the same hopes. The familiarity of the routes, the partners, and the pride of American being “our” airline always leaves us just on the other side of the fence hoping for change that will bring us home.
Aircraft Maintenance
Our flight to Manchester pushed back from the gate early, a great sign and we were on our way. Until we weren’t. While I once loved the 767-300 that American uses on their Manchester route on some routes, despite a cabin renewal, the aircraft type is showing its age.
We sat parked on the taxiway in sight of the terminal and heard the dreaded “bing” after about five minutes in the same spot. I mouthed to my wife “delay” as the pilot expressed the same. A third-generator (the aircraft needs just one, the other two are redundant) failed to respond and would need to be replaced.
We taxied back to the gate after another 20 minutes or so parked just outside of it waiting for the ground crew to arrive, take out their glowing lightsabers and marshal us in. After another 20 minutes, they opted to switch aircraft and gave us a re-board time of about an hour and a half. They collected the unopened amenity kits and unopened bottles of water to transfer them along with catering to the new plane. If either were opened before leaving the aircraft, that was your bottle of water for the flight.
We took off in our replacement aircraft a couple of hours later and arrived in Manchester about three hours later than intended.
Product
I was excited to fly the 767-300ER with a new configuration. The last time I was on that equipment the seats in business class were dated and badly needed a refresh. They got it with the new “throne” style in a 1-2-1 configuration. The large armrest housed the passenger behind’s footwell and from what I understand, the aircraft’s size makes it difficult to add newer styled seats.
I had a window with my wife and daughter on the inside. My daughter had plenty of privacy with her armrest facing me and I did as well with mine facing her. However, my wife on the far end (4D) had the worst possible option. While my daughter and I had a little cacoon of privacy, she did not and was exposed to the outside aisle. That’s uncomfortable for anyone and while I am sure that due to the style, it needed to be that way, a privacy door or cover that could be slid out might make for a better experience.
I didn’t bother with the food and went straight to sleep. My daughter loves fancy business class meals and decided to have it. Our five-year-old gave rave reviews of the dining experience. My wife, who has a more discerning palate, wasn’t as impressed. I ultimately left American over lack of catering effort so I can relate.
Lastly, the concept of replacing built-in IFE with tablets is the worst idea ever to cross Parker’s desk – and that’s a tall order. The covers made them difficult to keep in place, there was no advantage to the customer and I can’t imagine that American saves much on fuel by having them considering that they still fly with the units on board where they are used or not. The flight attendants also have to collect them like the noise-cancelling headphones, usually, an hour before landing and I just don’t care for the Gestapo approach that the flight attendants have to take to collect them (some sprout legs and walk off the plane.)
Employee Disposition
Airline employees have a tough job to do. All of them. However, we had some interesting personalities that emerged on our journey.
Our first encounter was at Fort Myers, FL RSW (Regional Southwest Airport) checkin. The agent checking us in was curt, distracted in her own conversation with her co-worker (who was trying to help us) and tried to charge us for overweight bags despite our boarding passes indicating my minuscule Gold status and business class. The rest of our American Airlines experience was delightful until we made it to our departure gate in Philadelphia, parked conveniently next to our arrival gate.
Second, as we prepared to board for the first time a surly woman who may not have even been assigned to the flight, stood at the entrance to the boarding lanes. She shouted at her peers correcting them for helping a customer who approached them because they weren’t “a service desk.”
As my wife, daughter and I joined the boarding lane we were asked: “are you Group One?” That’s ok, people board in the wrong group all the time, I won’t make this about her assuming we weren’t in business class because we travelled with our child, though that has happened plenty before. I answered in the affirmative. “Well, everyone needs to carry their own boarding pass.” She shot back as though she had to make a correction no matter what. I looked at her and down at my daughter, everyone had their hands full with their carry-on items. “She’s five,” I responded. “It doesn’t matter, everyone has to carry their own.”
“Here you go Lucy, make sure you carry your own boarding pass.” I said as I handed the boarding pass down to her – I was as loud and obnoxious as her request was. It’s not a real rule, and if it is, in perhaps thousands of flights this is the first time – on any carrier, anywhere in the world – the rule has been enforced in my experience. That’s the kind of pedantic garbage that some American flyers have had enough of. I know those employees exist everywhere, and frankly, the rest of the actual gate staff were friendly and accommodating, but one sour apple still ruins the bunch.
Onboard our experience was just ok. The flight attendant serving my daughter was lovely and said she reminded her of her niece, Lucy was properly pampered. I, however, hardly garnered a response from her, but I’m fine with that. Take care of my child and I am forever in your debt.
Carly’s flight attendant was insistent that she eats when he prefered, though many others ordered and did not eat as well due to the short flight time and late start. The problem was that Carly was standing up, putting away something in her bag and was instructed to sit so that he could drape a napkin over the table. It was more important to him that he went in order and set her table right then, rather than just move on and come back. There were seven available seats in the cabin, many others were sleeping, it shouldn’t have been a big deal.
Conclusion
American is still struggling with some ageing aircraft and their customer service. When the amenity kits weren’t replaced on the new aircraft, I couldn’t decide if it was me who was so cheap that I wanted to score an extra one and got mad that I couldn’t or American Airlines was so cheap that they couldn’t possibly just give a customer an extra in order to expedite re-boarding. Most of the staff were friendly, the pilots apologetic and maintenance did the right thing by not flying the plane when they had an adequate backup available. But the customer experience isn’t great. Had we spent money and not miles for this flight at around $2500-3000 roundtrip, I wouldn’t be back. The treatment, the catering, the seat style, none of it was competitive with other carriers.
To that extent, as we continue to spend our miles out of our Advantage accounts and give American opportunities to reintroduce themselves to us, they continue to reinforce that the grass really is greener on the other side.
What do you think? Have you flown American recently? How was your experience? Have you tried the airline you left and felt regret or confirmation in your decision?
I flew the 767-300 transatlantic (westbound) a few months ago. No delays, but agree about the cabin showing its age and the IFE issues. The Samsung tablet was handed to me with a totally dead battery. IIRC the power wasn’t enabled until the plane reached cruise altitude so for quite some time there was no IFE. And then of course AA insists on collecting their precious headphones (now B&O) way early, in my case more than an hour before landing, and when I asked to be able to finish the movie my request was rejected. Small things in the big scheme of things, but those count in business class. United is a better experience in business class, remaining old seats aside.
I used to be a Platinum member myself and purchased an Admirals Club membership which cost me $500. For the past 3 years I was battling Cancer and couldn’t travel much. I called and asked if there was anything they can do so I wouldn’t lose my status, they said my status would expire at the end of the year unless I traveled which I couldn’t. They also couldn’t hold my Admirals Club membership, which I only used a few times. Since I would have to start from scratch, I took my business over to United Airlines. I am happy with my decision. The planes aren’t as packed as American. I don’t fly enough to be in the top tier so they probably won’t miss me. They play it up every October about breast cancer awareness, but God forbid you get diagnosed with cancer, you’re out of luck with American.
Sorry about your cancer. Hope you had good insurance.
That is something we are trying to work on. Getting people bankrupt when they get cancer so your airline status doesn’t seem that important anymore.
Always working for you.
– the party of the tax cuts for the rich
Sorry. This was insensitive. I hope you are doing fine now.
Medical emergencies shouldn’t be the time when people have worry about any other things in life.
Hope you keep making progress.
if you really regret your stupid Cancer reply reeking of Trump Derangement Syndrome, just ask the blogger to remove it. I’m guessing you actually like that it’s sitting there as an obnoxiously unnecessarily political post, but whatever floats your boat, Debit. #winning
I left American as an EXP a couple years ago for United. What says it more was I did work for United for almost 10 years but was laid off after the merger. I swore to never step foot on their metal again. My best job is 100% business travel around North America and Germany every few months. After 2 years with AA, I just couldn’t stand it anymore. Doing trans cons on old USAir metal with no wifi or power and horrible seats. Get treated like crap because I’m only EXP and not CK. And frankly, their international partner routes can’t touch Star. I booked a trip a few weeks ago from LAS-MIA because they gifted Platinum to me out of nowhere in first just to see if things were any better. Nope, worse than when I left.
I am not American but after having flown American air carriers (and Air Canada), I now avoid them. As a Singaporean and when flying from Singapore to the US, I’d rather pay more and fly on Singapore Airlines because they have a consistent standard of good service. No point trying to save money on some American air carrier and be subjected to arbitrary treatment from their staff.
I’ve flown 100s of thousands of miles on each major national carrier and my conclusion is that United (other than Polaris lounge) is even worse than AA. I’d be a million miler by now if either of these airlines knew how to treat people.
Awwwww your poor wife had an aisle seat, and her discerning palate didnt like the food.
Completing a status match from 1k to AA. Not impressed with AA. Staff seem friendlier, which is nice, but the planes I have flown within US ex-sfo have been the oldest dogs. No in seat entertainment and no power on a 5 hr flight. Miserable! Luckily I am flying partners overseas for much of my travel. BA to LHR in A380 economy is comfortable. I will not be flying AA within US, or perhaps at all, but traveling enough partner airlines to keep Plat status for lounge access and fast track.
As AA crew- I hadn’t non-revved international in 11 years preferring to buy my ticket as I need to be somewhere on a certain day, not whenever… I used a pass coming home, LUS crew from BUD- PHL. Started out like normal. Nuts/beverage after takeoff, dinner and wine, ice cream sundae. (Coffee or tea never offered). From that point on I was never checked on nor asked if I’d like anything for the next 8.5 hours. 2 hours out (I work b/c so I know the drill) I look for breakfast set-up. Nope, nothing. Captain makes an announcement that it’s too bumpy to do a service (WHAT TURBULENCE?) Usually Premium Cabin gets served no matter what. I wanted a pre-landing cup of coffee (and I was hungry)- none offered. Forget breakfast. As an employee- I was appalled.
I totally agree with you. I left AA after millions miles flown and threw away unusable World Wide upgrades. I am now flying Delta for domestic flights and LH for my Europe flights. An other world 🙂
There needs to be more competition. We need a few strong international airlines but there can be more domestic ones.
An airline should not be allowed yo have both domestic access international. Either be domestic or international. Within domestic increase competition. International can compete with other international airlines.
We need weak domestic (u.e intense competition) and strong international airlines.
You have to be insane. You left a US airline due to their catering effort! Have fun at United. I’m pretty sure the chicken used in the curry I had the other day from IAH-NRT was taken out of a cat food can. United food absolutely sucks , DL is worse. They all suck. Who flies a US carrier and makes decisions based on catering ? That worth like $9 of that.
…United, as linked in the post. Wasn’t the only reason but it was the last straw (see image in linked post as well.) Polaris and United has been great.
Totally agree. It’s been a slow death. On to other carriers whenever practical. Just short of 3 million miles and I’ll never see any more systemwide upgrades. Not that I would be able to use them anyway.
First World problems.
It’s a first world travel blog, they are all first world problems.
And here you are with a third rate comment.
I also left AA after many years flying them. Their focus? Make money fast, who cares about costumer service.
I’m on Delta when I can, and ANY European based carrier when I can.
I even own AA stock! For now.
I will say this about AA: Old AA was a fine, if occasionally stodgy airline. Old HP was a fine carrier once they fixed their operational problems (circa 2003 or so). TW was never a good airline, but at least they were on an upward swing when AA bought their corpse. No, the real disaster at AA today is US. Everything wrong with AA today can be traced directly to Doug Parker’s purchase of US and his team’s inability or unwillingness to obliterate the anti-customer behavior of ex-US staff. And, of course, that behavior is most rampant in all the former US hubs and outstations, PHL and RSW being prime examples of both.
I’m shocked at your comments if you are a frequent flier….headphones?????are you kidding, first of all, get your own….why would you wear headphones someone else wore…and they give you little cheap earpieces so you can finish your viwing… that’s what you complain about… dont you have your own ipad? All the industry has its issues but as a df plat exec, I am treated better, I get upgraded most of the time, I’m first on the next plane if there is a problem with a plane, the plat desk is extremely helpful and when I travel with family they too are upgraded….all of the complaints I hear are a bit off because all airlines have issues.better to stick with one and learn how to make it work…a delayed flight or an employee who is having a bad day isnt reason to complain or leave..and if you really expect gourmet food on a plane, I’m even sorrier for you. I want a nice seat, with extra room. And if you think they treat you poorly in first, fly coach..I’m onto my next flight to get my status for next year…..
I was concierge key for seven straight years. I received a letter stating that I hoped that you enjoyed the key service unfortunately you did not do quite enough I only spent $47,000 and had 180,000 miles . Hmm not quite enough. Over my lifetime I have accumulated with AA more than 6.5 million miles. I have been loyal AA has not been. This summer was a disaster with so many delayed and canceled flights. I believe the comment one made American is not happy unless you are unhappy. I will acknowledge that things have gotten better this fall. But never the less I have developed a new strategy obtain executive plat status Which I did and the search for other airlines for especially international travel . Mission accomplished United is worse
I left United a few years ago, as they were having similar customer service issues, so I tried AA and DL. Ultimately I went with DL, even though I liked AA’s international partners much better (especially in Asia). I found exactly the same issues with AA… While most employees were kind, there was always one or two who would just bark at customers, or seemingly try to start arguments with customers.
For the last 2 years I’ve been flying about 4 times a month with Delta, and have not once had a bad experience. The food has been passable, not Cathay or JAL, but better than United and AA, and the staff are consistently happy to be there and provide fantastic service.
I’ll be the first to admit I’m a DL loyalist but I’ll be fair and say I’ve not had a terrible AA in-flight experience. Marginal to not great with a few bordering on bad? Absolutely – that’s all I have. But where I’ve had the most problems is ground staff. Two sequential delays of 15 minutes and you know you’re in the dreaded rolling delay. Last two flights on AA this has happened. To make matters worse, nobody was at the gate to assist in case we missed our int’l connections. I head to another AA gate where the agent isn’t busy. I ask her about our flight and if they have any info on *why* it’s delayed. Both times their immediate response is “I don’t know, I’m not working that flight.” I can see that because they’re at a different gate, but they are front line representatives for AA and should have a responsibility to help customers, especially if they’re to be potentially stranded by the airline. But not at AA. Their new culture is “No three times, relent on the fourth time only if the passenger is clearly correct and pushes you.” It gotten pretty bad at both outstations and hubs.
I, too, have put American Airlines in last place of the big 5 (UA, DL, AA, AS, WN). Not a total boycott, just last choice of 5.
First off, we are NOT AA. Us air now.
My AA is being run into the ground.
Truer words never spoken.
At least if you have usair crew odds are almost 95 percent you will,get a pre departure drink of your choice if you are up front and if you have to slum it coach odds are in your favor you will get multi beverage services on a trans con as a posed to one 2 hrs into your flight with the AA true AA crews nothing else.
From AA to UA? LOL!!!! If you have to change it os either Delta, JetBlue or Greyhound.
JetBlue is great if you live in Boston or FLL. From PIT I have one option, Boston, and I think they only run it once daily. Greyhound, while cheeky, would be ineffective for business. Delta is supposed to have great service and I don’t doubt that they do, but I would have to connect every single flight in ATL or MSP, neither of which reduce my time in the sky or are at a cost advantage.
Apart from a couple of minor issues, United has been pretty good. Flights run pretty efficiently, I am consistently upgraded (about 70% from coach to domestic first) and the employees seem to care.
Disgusting airline. Stopped flying them years ago because of their staff.
There are a few airlines I will NOT fly, no matter what. AA is one of those as are Biman, RyanAir, Lion Air.
Safety, spot on. Redundancy is needed bla bla bla. Better delayed than died. Hospitality? Well…. You can’y beat asian services. So?
This is just a trip report with extra grunts. Slow day at the office?
I’ll be sure to go from the East Coast of the US to Manchester, England via Asia for better service in the future.
Lol! Clearly the dude was geographically challenged.
Yeah… Yeah… Yeah… Don’t forget to label it with mileage run or trying new airlines or something catchy….
It’s quite a contest as to what part of your experience was the worst, but I would vote for this:
“Carly was standing up, putting away something in her bag and was instructed to sit so that he could drape a napkin over the table. It was more important to him that he went in order and set her table right then, rather than just move on and come back.”
That may be how you treat the cattle in the back of the plane, and that’s where that particular flight attendant should be working; he has no clue what sort of experience and customer ser vice Business Class is supposed to be.
On those shorter Atlantic routes I understand that the service times are short. But there are maybe 15 meals to get through. Why does it operate on their schedule down to the moment?
Why do so few travel bloggers fly primarily Delta? Delta is one of the big three in traffic, and by most accounts is the best in terms of customer satisfaction. It is a giant with business travelers and has a significant presence in many of the largest markets. Yet almost none of the boarding area bloggers primarily fly this airline. Why?
I can only answer for myself. Principally, three reasons: 1) No one can trust SkyPesos, they burned all bridges with the mileage program and that’s what we are all playing the game for anyway. 2) Their hubs (outside of JFK and SEA-ish) are pretty inconvenient. Want to connect in ATL? No? How about SLC? No? How about MSP in January? Not great. 3) Their partners are not great, and often poor value for miles (Virgin the lone exception). Delta won’t let you burn SkyPesos at any price for true first class, partners are pretty limited unless you want to head to Europe and none of them are aspirational. Is Singapore aspirational, yes, so is Cathay Pacific first. China Eastern, not so much.
Those are my takes on it but perhaps others will differ.
My answer would be
1) Most of the big 3 mileage programs are converging anyway
2) Who cares about connecting (in the US anyway) – fly direct.
3) Aspirational partner redemptions are available via credit card spending
When it comes to my actual business travel, I don’t see any reason not to pick Delta. American is fine too provided you are flying transcontinental or on an E jet. I see little value out of United, especially given poor pricing out of Newark
I like AA. My wife and two kids had an Ord to Vancouver to Sydney itinerary coming up and the direct to Vancouver got cancelled. The new flights were ord to Dallas to Vancouver to Sydney. I rung up today and they swapped all of them to ord to lax to Syd all in business. Pretty awesome of them! AA biz on a whole is way better than United. And as a platinum I get exonomy plus for the whole family on booking. Saves me tons of cash through the year. Makes a big difference on short haul with three kids.
Plus I think the aa lounge in chicago is way better than the Polaris 🙂
If I need to fly star alliance awards I buy lifemiles.
> I can only answer for myself. Principally, three reasons: 1) No one can trust SkyPesos, they burned all bridges with the mileage program and that’s what we are all playing the game for anyway.
I got some bad news for you on that. You moved to United, and now United’s miles are exactly as reliable as skypesos. Many bridges still burning over there in Unitedland.
While I don’t disagree with any of that, we’ll see how you feel about #1 once MP starts charging 375,000 miles each way for J from EWR to Italy during peak season. You know it’s coming…
Delta does have a great soft product. But the residuals for business travelers are horrible. Partners are very poor. International route network is very small. Their redemption rates are horrible. These are things that matter. And connecting through MSP or Atlanta is really not feasible most of the time. I did the status challenge with DL last year and tried them out for a couple months. The small values you get in the soft product are far outweighed in the benefits. I do international vacations every few months. United, I have no problems getting anywhere in the world I want to go for about 70-90k miles in business class. DL, you can’t even get an econ seat to Europe for that. I am going to Paris on Tuesday for 2 days, then Singapore for 3 then Bangkok for 7 with business on every flight for 146k miles. DL can’t touch that.
Writing this up as you have is the right thing to do – shame them. Yes, there are good people there (too), but the ratios are terrible. We’ve all experienced it, and many times. The anecdote about some gate agent on a power trip insisting your 5 yr hold their own boarding pass rings all too true. How often do you encounter a mean staffer on Cathay, Singapore, or JAL?
They are usually too busy trying to hold her hand down the jet bridge.
AA literally has the youngest average fleet of any US carrier. at only 544k lifetime miles since 2002, are you even flying them that much? You said youre a EXP member but then you post a screenshot of you being a “gold”
Hopefully you have a better experience at UA, but im a former UA 1K who left during the Smisek days. Grass always looks greener on the other side. Im not really even defending AA, they irked me all summer long with the delays/cancellations that wern’t even their fault.
I’ve been a loyal American Airlines flyer for a little over 5 million miles (21 years straight of Executive Platinum status) and this is my LAST YEAR with USAirways! Let’s face it, American Airlines no longer exists! It’s USAirways with a post it note over the sign, scribbled with “American Airlines”! USAirways was a cobbled together regional airline that made a screwd move when American blinked! The flight attendants are surly on their best behavior! I never fly through a USAirways hub because the gate agents think they’re running an amusement ride that you should be oh so happy that they let you board. They are rude, condescending and oh-so unhappy to talk to a passenger when their co-worker is soooo much more interesting! Every trip I’ve taken this year …. let me say it again – EVERY TRIP I HAVE TAKEN THIS YEAR has has a late or cancelled flight which caused me great stress and/or to business a business or family function … and so far, I’ve flown 178,000 miles this year! You do the math! A few were actually weather but by far the majority were mechanical or late / timeout crew! That’s it! I’m done! I loved AA for many years, many miles, and many dollars but, as much as I loathe United and Delta, here I come!
Ironically I left AA as my preferred carrier after a terrible gate agent experience on a PHL-MAN flight a couple years ago. Now down to my last 500k in miles so I can relate.
There needs to be more competition. We need a few strong international airlines but there can be more domestic ones.
An airline should not be allowed yo have both domestic access international. Either be domestic or international. Within domestic increase competition. International can compete with other international airlines.
We need weak domestic (u.e intense competition) and strong international airlines.
No.
This is a ridiculous idea, that airlines in the US should either be domestic OR international but not both. WTF
Most memorable AA experience: connecting in PHL, I see a suitcase fall off a Moving luggage truck on the tarmac. It’s raining, I stop at the closest gate, in clear sight of the orphaned suitcase. ‘Excuse me, a suitcase just fell off a luggage truck on the tarmac behind you.” She lookEd me in the eyes and said, “I do not care.”
AA’s 772s and 77Ws do have a great hard product. The seat, the privacy (even without a door), the bathrooms and the lounge/self serve bar area are all high quality. The new leather amenity kits with This is Ground are nice too. AA may suck but it does do long haul international business class right (on par with mid tier airlines). The cabin crew is their weak point because of unions and affirmative action policies that condemn us to 65 year old flight attendants (in some cases) and others who are not ideal. I’d say the cabin crew on Norwegian Premium provide friendlier and more caring service but these are 20 and early 30 year old mostly Europeans who are happy and know they will move on to other jobs better suited to raising a family by 35. AA is a lifelong career which may be 30 years too long.
You switched from American to United. AA (Executive Platinum) = UA (1K). With the new United policy, $17,500 will make you Platinum at most. In other word, you downgraded yourself. Oh, and enjoy the new “dynamic” award ticket policy from United.
Incorrect. As you will have seen in our United MileagePlus coverage, now that partner airlines also award based on RDMs you can easily qualify for less than $12,000 in actual money out the door if flying partners. I was 1K, and will remain 1K going forward.
@Kyle: You’re right- if one is doing 8 roundtrips Newark – Singapore, assuming $1500/each trip + 4 UA segments, the total cost could be less than $17,500. Again, 8 roundtrips Newark – Singapore.
There are other opportunities. I calculated one route on Air China that would produce 1K for $11,700 with fewer trips plus the four UA segments.
I echo many of your sentiments, Kyle. As someone who is years invested in AA (Exec Plat and 3M mile flyer) the frustration and noticeable decline is becoming systemic. And Parker just throws band-aids on what are deep and complex wounds.
With that said, I am staying the course. Why? Because every week or two you find an incredible employee or a flight with really great service that gives you some sort of hope for AA. That is that there are still a number of employees that seem to care. Further, while I agree that United and Delta are delivering a better product overall, the differences are not huge enough to swing me over. Delta especially….yes, the service and front line employees are the best. But the planes are often old and SkyMiles is completely worthless.
I will say that of all the places to judge AA, choosing Philadelphia is just asking for a bad experience. I avoid it like the plague. The airport itself is disgusting, employees are surly, aircraft is often the worst to Europe, and the F/A’s are some of the most awful of the old USAir days who have years of seniority and are just putting in their days until the end. A flight earlier this year to Zurich on an aging 767 was perfect example. The F/A came by for orders and when I reached for the menu to quickly look said, “You’re not ready. I don’t have time to wait” and moved down to the next person. It’s pretty par for the course with Philadelphia crews. They are not expediting service in a polished manner so as to get you more sleep. They are rudely expediting service so they can all go gossip in the back galley and complain to each other about what a miserable job they have.
The culture in Philadelphia will probably never change unless a radical overhaul takes place. It’s like a sports team with aging and failing players who are all embroiled in drama. Until there is a youth movement and restructuring starting from the top down it will only get worse. As well, like a sports team, Philly will never attract the best as who would want to work in that disgusting facility. They need a new “arena” as well.
Just my thoughts…for now I am not jumping ship and I value Emerald in One World too much to lose it. But it’s teetering for sure. If American devalues any more the program to Delta levels or the service deteriorates further, yes…I will go to United in a heart beat.
If you are looking for AA to change you are wasting your time. AA is struggling with a identity crisis. They dont have a clue whether they are AA or US airways. They dont believe that their own actions are destroying the airline and they achieve profits from nickle and diming. Take my advice, run!.. you wont regret it.
Been with American Airlines for over 24 years. The customer service is absolutely horrible. After seeing an older gentleman treated rudely , I even called to complain. The staff definitely give the impression they are not happy at their jobs. The demeaning , rude, condescending attitude is opposite of the glorified self congratulations in the magazines in board. Do the writers or CEO ever travel economy to fond out what goes on? After over 6 million collective miles as family, moving to United.
Kyle, you’re absolutely right. You’re not important
Aw, thanks.
I flew American to Orlando the first week of November (PIT-PHL-MCO, then MCO-CLT-PIT coming back) and had good experiences on every flight. I do NOT have status, but I didn’t have any issues with any of my flights. Boarding for all flights was timely and we left on time! Enjoyed flying the A330 for the first time on the MCO-CLT leg.
Kyle as a retired commercial pilot, I feel the need to correct one misstatement. For Extended Overwater Operations (like your Trans-Atlantic flight to Manchester) two sources of electrical power (not one) are REQUIRED. It is possible that there might be further limitations requiring a third electrical source (back-up generator). Given that AA made the decision to change aircraft for your flight leads me to conclude that there is a requirement for a back-up electrical (third) power source. The fact that your delay was relatively short is actually kind of amazing. It is no small feat to properly transfer passengers, luggage and catering on a large aircraft. Still, I have no doubt that the delay was inconvenient.
Sir, we too, were surprised that they called a 90-minute switch and nailed it. The pilot announced that there were three generators and plenty of redundancy so I am parroting his words though I could have misheard. Thanks for your clarification.
I too may have miss-spoken. Despite being a retired commercial pilot, I was NOT qualified for international flights. Therefore, my citing Extended Overwater Operations (ETOPS) requirements might not have applied on a Trans-Atlantic flight as it would have for a Trans-Pacific flight. Some Trans-Atlantic flights can probably remain within a specified distance of airports (in Canada, Greenland, Iceland, & Scotland) and therefore not need to meet ETOPS requirements. If ETOPS requirements were not applicable, we’ll have to assume that AA had a solid reason to inconvenience all of you by making the aircraft swap. If that is the case then unfortunately the Captain was unaware of the reason, or he felt that sharing it was not relevant to the passengers.
RE: “Lastly, the concept of replacing built-in IFE with tablets is the worst idea ever to cross Parker’s desk – and that’s a tall order. The covers made them difficult to keep in place…”
Hallelujah! So glad to see someone else say this, too!
I (and nearly everyone else I know) *HATE* the super awful, low rent & much inferior streaming to one’s own personal device method for IFE.
So much so, that for flights longer than 2 hours airlines and/or aircraft that lack real seatback IFE are only considered if there’s no other option available.
Baby sitting the hand-held or propped up devices is such a nuisance & buzz kill, that we don’t even bother trying anymore most of the time for the NYC-RDU-NYC flights that Delta insists on using those vastly inferior Bombardier CRJ-700/900s instead of its gorgeous, new Airbus A220s (despite usually charging a pretty penny for flights just under 500 miles), which are among the only flights we regularly take aboard aircraft that lack seatback IFE.
Anyhow, the problem, as many have already noted, is the lack of meaningful competition within an industry that has already taken on most evils normally seen when competition is lacking (product degradations; aircraft densification; mileage devaluations; restrictive fare rules; obscenely high penalties & surcharges; opaque pricing; customer UNappreciation aka “hate selling”; etc., etc.).
What’s needed is divestiture and/or facilitation of new entrants – ASAP – as it’s become abundantly clear that four major airlines (AA, DL, UA & WN) controlling more than 80% of the market is only working for shareholders, but certainly NOT for the consumers (especially those in Economy class) without whom NO AIRLINE WILL EVEN EXIST.
It’s long past time for the passengers who **PAY THE BILLS** to be treated better!
And to do that, there needs to be something better than an arrogant and abusive CARTEL that controls the skies and thinks/acts like the oligopoly that the industry has become over the past decade (or so) as no less than FIVE – yes, 5! – major airlines were killed off (Northwest, Continental, AirTran, US Airways, Virgin America) since 2008.
“Oligopolies are GREAT!” – said by no one except the Oligarchs & Plutocrats who are the only ones reaping the benefits of the excess/windfall profits when the only “competition” they believe in is which airline can “suck best” – and get away with it.
to me this post seems like a bunch of trivial whining. Sure delays are frustrating. AA has areas they can do better at, and sure PHL is 2nd in rudeness as a city only to say, Baltimore.
But the stuff you wrote about seems kind of making a big deal about nothing. If your wife’s seat was so bad compared to yours and your daughter’s, you should have traded. You wanted extra amenity kits and water? Seriously? And your wife standing when guy wanted to set her table could simply say “I’ll be done in a minute, please hang on.”
I’m amazed a 5 year old appreciates “fancy business class meals.” Yes, I’m a parent. You being as loud as you could to be obnoxious like the gate agent gestapo accomplished, what, exactly? Except stoop to her level?
Like someone pointed out already, your lifetime mileage of 500k miles in almost 20 years of flying AA isn’t very significant, especically if a few of those were at Exec Plat levels. You must have had a 2-3 years of very heavy years flying AA and then not much else the rest of your flying career, and with $17k spending, you’re not who they’re trying to win.
I spend even less with them, but am lifetime plat. Flying is just not what it once was, but that’s not just AA.
@JSW – You make some salient points and some I disagree with, others were in the post but I will reiterate them here.
1) The rest of the staff at PHL was passable if not regarded as “nice”, the one woman shouting at her co-workers and myself was the issue. The rolling eyes of her co-workers tells me it’s not a “Philly” thing.
2) I did offer to switch with my wife, of course, I’m not an animal. She didn’t think it would affect her sleep as much as it did. Some things in this world we only find out after we try them out.
3) I called myself cheap at the same time I pondered American being a little cheap. What’s it worth to American to manage the disbursement of a bottle of water especially during a two-hour delay that they would give us in the lounge or upon request anyway to us or any other business class passenger? It was more about posture. Also, the amenity kits are some of the best I have seen for repurposing. I’m unashamed of grabbing an extra if I can do so without stealing as in, there was one at my first seat and another at my second seat.
4) Of course our daughter appreciates fancy business class meals, see about 20 other posts on this site to that effect.
5) You may not have been to the site before (welcome), but for our regular readers, they know that I was loyal but infrequent to American for the first 12-14 years of my history with them and an EXP over the last few. I have since moved to United and been very happy since (link in the post.)
6) I fully recognize they aren’t trying to win me, I think I described myself as “little old me” but they aren’t trying to win anybody right now. Their benefits have fallen behind all of their peers (10 posts), performance is below Spirit and bests only Frontier (5 posts), their employees are unhappy (30 posts) and their management is not even close to United or Delta (15 posts.) They would give me their top published status for $17k/year in spending though, so I would say they do value business of flyers like me, apparently, more so than you given that you spend less. That won’t be enough to get me away from United who has done a great job. For what it’s worth, I spent 18 months as both a 1K and an EXP (http://bit.ly/2FuNbMh).
@SJW,
RE: “You must have had a 2-3 years of very heavy years flying AA and then not much else the rest of your flying career, and with $17k spending, you’re not who they’re trying to win.”
Sorry, NOT sorry – but this arrogant, elitist clap trap is precisely the problem.
Anyone who is a fare paying passenger, or has flown/spent enough to earn a frequent flyer award, should be treated as a valued customer.
That we’re not, despite yet still being among the 85% of less than frequent flyers that without whom, NO LARGE AIRLINE in history has been able to make do without us, and without whom, those obscenely generous compensation packages for the C-Suiters plus the even more offensive & obscenely generous multi-billion, resource starving annual share buybacks wouldn’t be possible.
And that’s the problem with the toxic, Gordon Gekko-style “Greed is Good”, shareholders only matter business model that’s only worsened in an era of excessive industry concentration (aka Cartel/Oligopoly).
If someone’s paying good money for a product offered for sale, THEIR hard earned money would matter more if the business selling that product actually had to EARN their business instead of the present “eff” you arrogance and belligerence that’s only possible for companies that know they’re the only game in town, or that choices are so limited among an exceptionally few “options” that essentially look, act alike & offer nominally distinguishable products at essentially the same price points, such as cable tv/internet companies (Verizon Fios, AT&T, Spectrum, etc.), and/or entities where one has few, if any, choices at all such as a trip to the DMV – or as the expression goes “fighting City Hall”.
Maybe $17k is a pittance to you; but if one is spending $17k, to cite your example, or even “just” $1,700, that should matter.
That is doesn’t to our airlines, the biggest of whom are fast approaching $1 billion per week, yes, PER WEEK(!), in revenues speaks volumes as to just how overly concentrated, indeed CARTELIZED, our airlines have become over the past decade or so as excess concentration allowed for the elimination of FIVE – yes, 5! – major airlines (as noted in my comments above).
Our airlines don’t give a rat’s butt about most passengers because they don’t have to – and they know it.
That alone should tell us just how desperately lacking the industry is in terms of being meaningfully competitive.
That alone.
Indeed, what we have now, is every bit as toxic & antithetical to deregulation, as things were before the industry was deregulated.
Lack of choice.
Horrible & expensive rules – only except of being imposed by bureaucrats at the old Civil Aeronautics Board (CAB), crafty bs “rules” and a gauntlet of ever higher & more restrictive “fare fences”.
In fact, the way things are now, it’s nothing more than the opposite side of same old dirty coin we had before the industry was deregulated.
Only it’s much worse with horrible service aboard overcrowded, high density aircraft that used to be limited to 3rd tier charter airlines that at least offered better onboard service even if one was squished into the same 16.5-17” wide seats packed into 30”-31” pitch “no legroom” rows.
In the 7th paragraph (not including quoted portion ‘RE’/replied to) of my reader comment immediately above, should be:
“That it doesn’t [matter] to our airlines, the biggest of whom are fast approaching $1 billion per week…”
With apologies for the error.
You know the funny thing for me is I mainly flew US when I lived in the USA and honestly they were fine. I mean it was alway just very short haul so not even sure it was “mainline” US but I did quite like them.
Your experience would be my best experience with AA. I spent this year $30k so far and its a sh%t show. Every flight is delayed and there is always something wrong. Im not talking about simple things, I dont complain about them… but 4 hours flight delays, plane swaps, seats swapped, flight cancellations (not weather, msotly crew and mechanical), rude flight attendants, terrible customer service and i could go on and on.
Here I was expecting to hear something surprisingly interesting about spirit and I couldn’t chew Half way down this AA rant.