An Open Letter to American Airlines

Now, let me ask you this. If you book (and PAY FOR) an airline reservation AND you get an itinerary confirming said (paid for) reservation, wouldn’t you assume that you actually had a ticket for the particular flight in question? Call me crazy, but in my naivete, I actually believed that this is the way the system worked. Apparently, I was mistaken.

Yesterday, I plunked myself down in front of the computer to do what normally takes about 95 seconds – checking in online for a flight the next day. The American Airlines site’s inability to recognize my itinerary’s unique record locator number was my first clue that something was amiss.

After a couple of phone calls and over an hour of my precious Sunday, here is what I found out. Because I had the exact same flight booked today as I do next Monday morning (from Orange County to San Jose), American Airlines took it upon themselves to CANCEL one of those reservations, believing in their infinite wisdom that I either (a.) made a mistake and didn’t have a clear handle on my own travel needs (because clearly, no one goes to the same city two weeks in a row for business!) or (b.) (and perhaps more likely) that I was somehow trying to scam them out of precious ticket fares by nefariously booking multiple trip legs on the same itinerary. (I booked a total of four legs on this single itinerary.)

My travel agent gave a less than satisfactory explanation for the whole situation, going as far to say that this was MY fault for booking my flights the way that I did. She actually said “Don’t you think it’s reasonable that an airline would cancel your reservation when they see you had booked more than one flight?”

Come again?

Using that logic, the airline would only ever allow people to book one-way trips.

With my patience rapidly waning, I not-so-calmly explained in a not-so-soft voice that as a customer, I actually thought it was reasonable for an airline to graciously KEEP the reservation that I had so graciously paid that airline for.

Thankfully, I was able to get on my originally scheduled flight this morning, but when I was at the airport checking in (since I couldn’t check in online), I asked the agent to confirm the other three legs of my trip and guess what she found out?

Yep, that’s right, American Airlines had cancelled ANOTHER one of my reservations.

I think it’s reasonable to expect that JetBlue and Virgin America will be getting a LOT more of my business from now on.