Nightmare flight with American Airlines

Tigertedd

Context:
A family of 5, 2 adults, 3 kids, 15, 8 and 7, flying from Heathrow to Lima, Peru via Miami on 20th December. Booked as one ticket with British Airways, but the second leg was a code share with American Airlines. The initial BA flight from Heathrow to Miami was delayed by an hour. This made it touch and go whether or not we would catch our connecting AA flight.

However, the AA flight was delayed by 2hrs, so there was no issue. We waited patiently at the gate for 1.5 hrs until our group was called, group 7, one of the later groups. When we went to the boarding staff, we were informed that we had been unbooked on that flight, and rebooked on a flight the next morning via Baraqilla > Bogota > Colombia with Avianca. They told us they thought this was a ridiculous redirect, and that we should go to the AA desk to see if they can find a better route.

We're still not panicking, there are worse places to be stranded than Miami. Maybe we can get a bonus day in Miami for our troubles and take a flight the next evening. The gate staff said that our bags should still be available. We assumed some automated AI system had assumed we would miss our connection and had automatically bumped us off in favour of someone on stand by, and automatically picked a route that technically worked, but wasn't at all practical.

We spoke with AA. This conversation took about 3 hrs to sort something out, meanwhile our children were getting more and more exhausted. The first hour was spent convincing the lady that we weren't late for our flight. She couldn't understand how we would be bumped off the flight if we had arrived at the gate on time. I got to the point of asking them to pull the security footage to prove that were at the gate.

Once that was sorted, she suggested that we just take the flight that's been given to us. That close to Christmas, they couldn't get all 5 of us onto any other flights. However, her supervisor took a look at the route, and met it with the same indignation as the people at the gate. So we eventually worked out that there were two seats available on the same direct flight to Lima on the following day. We booked my wife and youngest daughter on that flight, and the rest of us were on stand by.

We were informed that we wouldn't be able to get our bags, and were given 2x $12.50 vouchers each for 2 meals, and a hotel room. Turns out the hotel room was two double beds, so all three kids had to share a bed.

But at least we got our bonus morning in Miami, and could spend an hour on the beach.

The next day we came to the airport again. My wife and daughter got on the plane, and they had one more seat open up. It was like Sophie's choice deciding which of my kids would go with my wife, and I chose my son, the next youngest child. After a very teary goodbye at the gate, this was not we planned it, this left my daughter and I stranded without a plan B. They put us on stand by for the next flight 5 hrs later, but with no guarantee we'd get on that. So they sent us to AA desk again to see if we could find a different route (I didn't mind taking an unusual route with only one daughter to worry about).

AA declared it wasn't their fault or their problem, and they'd done more than enough already, and sent us to the BA desk. The BA rep was furious once he'd worked out what had gone on. it was quite funny watching him bring all his colleagues over to have a look. His supervisor declared it simply wasn't possible, until he showed her the evidence, and she nearly had a hypoglycaemic attack then and there and my daughter had to give her a Jolly Rancher!

My understanding is that someone from AA had jumped the gun. They'd overbooked the flight, saw that there was a family of 5 that were on a delayed flight from Heathrow so probably wouldn't make it, there's an easy win to get 5 seats back,. so they bumped us off and made 5 other people very happy. Not realising that the subsequent flight would also end up being delayed. We were told that shouldn't happen until 15 minutes before departure time.

On top of all of the above, our luggage had been sent on the alterative route through Colombia, and was now in Baraquilla. We knew this, because we'd had the foresight to put AirTags in our luggage. Well, most of it was in Baraquilla, for no reason at all, my bag was in Nicaragua, on a beach, living it's best life! unfortunately, that was the bag with most of our Christmas presents in! Apparently it should be impossible for bags to leave the airport without us, that's a massive security issue. And again, it took some convincing to make people believe the AirTags weren't lying.

The furious BA rep tried his best to find us an alternative route, even considering flying back to Madrid to fly back to Lima at one point, and eventually marched round to the AA desk, had a quick with the AA staff, and then stormed off.

AA were eventually able to find us a flight via Santiago de Chile, leaving that evening. My wife and 2 kids arrived in Lima just after midnight on the 22nd, and my daughter and I arrived about 14 hrs later.

My two youngest had their bags, but the rest of our bags arrived on the 24th. Luckily, mine arrived. However, it is a modular bag, and the detachable daysack, where I'd put the AirTag, is what was in Nicaragua. That has definitely been stolen, that daysack doesn't just fall off, and that is where I put the Christmas presents. Frustrating, as we know exactly where it is, but the chances of the Nicaraguan police knocking on someone's door to retrieve it are slim.

The compensation claim:
So, that is the story. Now we're trying to unpick it to claim compensation and expenses. And there are so many moving parts, I could do with some advice as to how to sort this all out.

The initial tickets were booked through BA, so I've submitted a complaint with them. However, I've had a response saying the flight we were bumped off of was an AA flight, so I need to put a complaint through with them.

Meanwhile, I've put a claim through for lost luggage with AA, and annoyingly they want receipts for everything in it. Well some of the stuff I've had for 15 years, there's no way i still have a receipt, but at least we've still got digital receipts for Christmas presents, so they are actually refunding us £780. But that still doesn't cover everything in that bag.

And I've made a start on a Travel Insurance claim, but I'm not really sure what I'm claiming for, until I've got everything I can from the Airlines.

In terms of compensation, I'm not sure what rules I come under. The initial delay was to the BA flight ,from the UK, but the mistake was made by AA in Miami. So do I come under EU/UK rules, or USA rules. And what are USA rules.

And delay compensation is for delays over 3-4 hours. We were delayed by 24-36+ hours. That's completely different kettle of fish.

It's so messy, I'm considering getting one of those no win no fee lawyers I've seen pop up in the Google ads whenever I've tried to search for help and advice on this. I've spent hours of my holiday having to unpick it all, had to spend most of our spending money on emergency items, and then our emergency credit card got cancelled. I didn't come this far just to not do anything for 2 weeks. Not to mention the uncertainty of what we can and can't buy, what we'll be refunded for and what we won't, how much debt are we putting ourselves in. It's been a bloody nightmare.

We won't let the buggers get us down though. We've had a nice time regardless, and the kids have had a great adventure. It's certainly not a holiday we'll soon forget.

Anyway, any help or advice will be greatly appreciated.

Caz3121

I doubt you will get far under UK regulations...you don't mention the reason for the BA delay but at this time of year there are many delays due to weather or ATC which would mean no compensation and as you say the BA delay did not cause you to miss your onward flight.

there is information on the American Airlines site  under 

Compensation for involuntary denied boarding

https://www.aa.com/i18n/customer-service/support/conditions-of-carriage.jsp

there is no difference in compensation level for 4 hours and more than 4 hours. Might be worth checking your travel insurance policy for delay payments - some give a token amount for each 12 hours of delay

mr_stripey

What a nightmare. Don't have any advice as such but wanted to note and acknowledge your stoicism and pragmatism. Many would have totally lost their **** at such a turn of events (including me!).

It may be that calmly appealing to AA (if you can find someone to hear your tale) might get a better outcome than trying to nail down a specific regulation that may have been breached.

Tigertedd

Caz3121 said:

I doubt you will get far under UK regulations...you don't mention the reason for the BA delay but at this time of year there are many delays due to weather or ATC which would mean no compensation and as you say the BA delay did not cause you to miss your onward flight.

there is information on the American Airlines site  under 

Compensation for involuntary denied boarding

https://www.aa.com/i18n/customer-service/support/conditions-of-carriage.jsp

there is no difference in compensation level for 4 hours and more than 4 hours. Might be worth checking your travel insurance policy for delay payments - some give a token amount for each 12 hours of delay

The BA delay was an aeroplane fault. They did mention that. But as you say, that didn’t cause any issues in the end. 

Funny thing is though, whenever I speak to anyone from AA, they insist we missed the flight and it’s BA’s fault so we have to speak to them. That literally happened for the 3rd time this evening, this time from their complaints department.

It’s like they can’t even compute that something might have gone wrong at their end. The lady on the customer services desk took an hour to convince that we hadn’t missed it, we’d been at the gate for 90 mins, and were first in the queue when our group was called. She just couldn’t compute. 

I’m starting to suspect what might have happened is they knew they’d overbooked, and they saw that our plane was delayed so they immediately bumped us off, only after that did something delay the second flight by 2hrs. But it was too late. 

I’ve read the actual American legislation, and they’re supposed to give notice in writing about why we’ve been denied boarding, and information about what our rights are. We had none of that. 

And the thing that really bugs me now I’ve just spent half the evening responding to their complaints department is that they did the bare minimum for us, and sometimes less. Ie we spent 3hrs trying to sort out a plan b with them. The lady at the desk complained that she’d been working for 8 hrs and hadn’t had a lunch break. My wife went off to hug some snacks, and came back with a chocolate bar for her. But at no point did anyone consider a commentary colouring book for our kids, offering a cup of tea or coffee, or even a glass of water. Or even a ‘this might take a while, would you like to sit down.’ She’d been working without a break for 8 hrs, we’d been up since 3am and it was now about 2am our time, with 3 kids. No consideration for basic human decency. The next day, one of the ladies at BA we were speaking to was about to have a hypoglycaemic attack, so my daughter was able to find some jollie ranchers for her.

they gave us a hotel room, but 2 beds for 5 people. They gave us vouchers for food, but 2x $12.50 for each person for over 24hrs. Don’t know if you’ve tried to buy a meal in an airport, but you don’t get a lot for $12.50. The least I’d expect is that breakfast is included with the hotel room, and if not, that the $12.50 would cover it. But no, breakfast was about $20 per person. 

We had a similar (but not the same) issue with easy jet a year or so ago. A simple overbooking this time. And they actually dealt with it really well, and at least we ended up with an unplanned night in a super fancy hotel suite in Istanbul. When you’re crap compared to easyJet, you really need to be hanging your head in shame. 

Tigertedd

mr_stripey said:

What a nightmare. Don't have any advice as such but wanted to note and acknowledge your stoicism and pragmatism. Many would have totally lost their **** at such a turn of events (including me!).

It may be that calmly appealing to AA (if you can find someone to hear your tale) might get a better outcome than trying to nail down a specific regulation that may have been breached.

Well I’m now in communication with someone in the email. But again, their first reaction is that it’s BA’s fault and I need to speak with them. I’m waiting to see if my follow up to that, explaining all the ins and outs, will reap any further reward. 

But we’re flying home tomorrow, with a couple of hours to kill in the airport. I’m tempted to have one last go chatting with customer services people. I don’t want to go all Karen and start demanding an upgrade, but I’m thinking, if I can get one good thing out of this, surely that’s the least I can ask for.

like i was kind of expecting that on the way here. It seems a really simple solution: “well we could a) put you on a flight back across the Atlantic to Madrid, where there’s a direct flight to Lima you can get on that will get you there by tomorrow night, or b) we actually have two unsold seats in business class in the next direct flight out of here, you can jump on there. We kill two birds with one stone, we get you where you need to be as easy as possible, and we earn a. Couple of brownie points with this customer we’ve just completely screwed over for the last 24hrs.”

but guess what, they would rather consider option a than option b. It’s crazy. 

jimi_man

You haven’t detailed the exact flight timings but I’m guessing what happened is that the BA flight was an hour late and therefore put you under the Minimum Connection Time at Miami (I think it’s 90 minutes). What then happens is that the BA computer will take you off the flight out of MIA automatically as it ‘thinks’ you won’t make it and it doesn’t make any difference that it was delayed two hours as the computer won’t know that. It just goes on the BA predicted arrival time v the AA scheduled departure time. And it’s generally an automated process via computer rather than a human bumping you to make way for other people (which has no bearing. You’re either within the MCT or you aren’t - irrespective of whether there are people waiting to snaffle your seats). 

So you queued at the gate not knowing that you’d been offloaded. Hence the kerfuffle that you had to deal with (with spectacular aplomb I might add, from your account!). 

Unpicking it will be tricky. I suspect IDB will be refused as you didn’t make the MCT. BA’s flight was under three hours delay so they aren’t on the hook there either. You were eventually rerouted but in an entirely unsatisfactory way (IMO) but I’m not sure there is anything to claim there. USA has different rules to the U.K. which makes it tricky! 

There is a forum called Flyertalk and they have a BA section and a section within that on delays and it might be worth posting in there. The advice you’ll get will be absolutely spot on. 

mdann52

It's worth mentioning that under these circumstances, there's specific case law here (flightright GmbH v Iberia (Case C-606/19)) that means you can hold BA liable for the delay caused by AA.

AA are liable - but if they push back, you can also claim the delay compensation from BA.

But it's the overall itinerary that matters, so the AA legs are in scope for UK261 as well.