So after reading the news the last few days I am sure everyone is aware that American Airlines has cancelled a number of flights the past few days. However, luckily for me I don’t fly to Phoenix until tomorrow but alas I called just a second ago to find out the status of my flight and nobody picked up-just a machine with a lovely message. “I’m sorry but your flight has been cancelled” says the machine and then it attempts to connect me to a person to tell me my options and as you might expect-all lines are busy. This is thrilling to me because I have no idea what my status is for my flights tomorrow and if they can reschedule me. Now I have to keep calling all day until I hopefully get someone on the phone and then who knows anyway. My only other option remained that I book a jet from Jettly, for I couldn’t afford to miss this meeting.

You know what the best or worst part is that right before the machine lady tries to send you to the operator she quickly mutters ticket fees may apply. I mean really, are you really going to charge people for your airline cancelling like 2000 flights and leaving thousands stranded. Nice customer service. I am so annoyed right now with American, who obviously failed their inspection after they cancelled a ton of flights two weeks ago as well for the same reason. Roger Frizzell, an airline spokesman, said the inspections involve technical compliance as opposed to flight safety. Well that’s really reassuring now isn’t it.

American Airlines canceled 1,094 flights on Wednesday — 43 percent of its total daily flights — and 460 flights the day before, the company said in a statement. The flights were scrapped so inspectors could make sure the airline complied with a federal directive relating to how wires should be bundled in the wheel well of MD-80 jets, the company said.

“We apologize for the inconvenience this has caused our customers,” Chief Executive Gerard Arpey said in a statement. “American will do whatever it takes to assist those affected by these flight changes, and our employees are working hard to ensure that we remain their choice for air travel.”

Whatever it takes they say? I’ll keep you updated as the day goes on. According to their website, we are entitled to a rebooking or a full refund of the price of the ticket. That’s wonderful and all if they actually mean it (I doubt it) but what happens if we really need to be where we are scheduled to go and can’t afford to reschedule. Now that really sucks and once again we are at the mercy of the airlines who seemingly have no clue what they are doing as usual.

By the way if you go to the American website, it says in their advisory at the top of the page, “Aircraft Inspections Affect Some AA Travel”. If by some they mean half then yes I guess thats right but give me a break-I hate the airlines!

UPDATE:
My flights are officially all cancelled and I was given a full refund by American Airlines. The very unpleasant man on the phone was so discourteous as he informed me the only way he could reschedule me was on USAir the following day which would get me into Phoenix at 9pm, which would defeat the whole purpose of me going out there in the first place. He then bestowed his vast airline knowledge upon me saying that I was lucky to be getting a refund as the airlines don’t normally offer full refunds…Thanks for that little tidbit of airline information sir, I was completely unaware of airline policy of not issuing refunds until you told me.

Second, don’t make me feel like I am lucky to be getting a refund-it’s not my or any other passengers fault that your planes can’t pass inspection. I know these operators are all bogged down with angry callers, I get that it must be awful to deal with this, but don’t be rude with people who may have really important appointments to keep that they will not be able to make because of all these cancellations.

Additionally, telling me that I can’t be picky when it came to rescheduling is not a good way to win loyal customers. If I am scheduled to leave early Sunday morning, why would I be excited to fly to Phoenix and arrive Saturday night, so I could basically miss everything I am going out there to do, sleep and then leave. His explanation is that a lot of flights have been cancelled so there is only so much space on other airlines. I get that but American should’ve cancelled these flights earlier than day before to allow people to have a fair shot at still making their destination in their timeframe-even with another airline.

This whole thing has been extremely poorly handled and I am really annoyed at this whole situation. I know I am speaking for thousands of passengers when I say that I hate the airlines and American has really dropped the ball on this.

Hopefully, I can reschedule my appointments for the weekend but either way I will try to avoid American for a long time moving forward.

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