American Airlines does not care
Original booking on flight 751 leaving 3:40 connecting in LAX. 45 minutes' connection time. Flight delayed 40 minutes before we even checked in. Check in agent put us on standby for the 3:55 flight # 777. Went to gate B13 and were told by gate agent that we needed to wait till everyone boarded to see if we could get in. We were in the first 5 standby passengers. Once all boarded, same agent told us we were not getting on and should go see customer service. Customer service told us by now all flights were overbooked and we should never have been put on standby. This was since the plane for our original flight had been sent to maintenance, we should have been put on any another airline to get to our destination. After several minutes while customer service looked into options, they told us we were confirmed on the next morning 6:20 flight but should try to get on the 5:55 flight out of gate C28. Went to gate C28 and repeated the B13 standby routine. Once again after every one boarded. The gate agent told us we were not getting on that flight. My wife asked the agents to look at the tickets customer service had given us and to please confirm we were guaranteed to get on the next morning 6:20 flight as we did not want to out our 8 & 5-year- old kids through yet another day waiting at the airport. After looking at the tickets all 3 gate agents said that we were not confirmed for the 6:20 flight as customer service had told us. This brought my wife to tears and she pleaded with the agent to look into it. This agent checked again and this time told her that only she was confirmed but neither myself nor the 2 kids were confirmed. At this time when my wife and myself were trying to tell her that we could not go through this fiasco again, she turned rude and started admonishing my wife. When my wife took her ticket back from her, she started yelling and said "since you snatched the ticket from me, I don't want to help you – you can go back and have customer service help you because I will not". I asked this agent for her name and she said it was - D. Kelly. Once again we went back to customer service to resolve the matter as we did not want to do another wasted trip to the airport only not to go on our trip. This too customer service (a different person) confirmed that we were indeed confirmed on the 6:20 flight. I also called American Airline customer service and they too informed me over the phone that all 4 of us were confirmed and the customer agent even read off the seat numbers. At this point, we decided to head home and show up for the 6:20 flight on the 10th.
What is abundantly clear from our ordeal is that:
1. American Airlines staff is inadequately rained to carry out their duties and understand their own booking/seat assignment system.
2. American Airlines staff does not have any regard for paying passengers as they know their employer does not have any care for addressing poor b
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