Izabel

I am not a seasoned traveler, so I have a question for those of you who might know. I booked an AA flight to Hawaii eight months ago, using frequent flyer miles. I booked very early to insure that I had good seats which is important to me, as I am a single parent traveling alone with two young children. We had our tickets with our seat assignments mailed to us in August. Our flight was to have a 1 1/2 hour layover. Today I called the airlines to confirm my flights and they informed me that I had been bumped off my original flight and that the next available flight would give me a 5 hour layover. You can imagine how painful that would be with two young children! When I asked how this happened they said, they had sold my seats to someone else. I'm afraid this does not make sense to me, but I admit I am not that savvy about the airlines. After some initial reluctance, due to the fact that my original flight was now totally booked, the supervisor I spoke with then said she could get me back on my original flight, but without seat assignments and no guarantees of a seat. I am pretty frustrated and pretty nervous about what to expect, so I just wanted to ask if this has happened to anyone else and if there is anything I can do? Thanks for listening.

Melissa

I have not had this happen to me personally, but the airlines always overbook. They probibly bumped you because you are not paying for your ticket with your frequent miles, so they are taking a full paying customer over you. Ask them if you try to get on your origional flight without seat assignment if you can get on the other flight if you get bumped. I think they will basically just put you on standby if you do not have seats assigned. You might be safer to wait the five hours, then at least you know you are going. After everthing is said and done, I think you should write a letter to AA to let them know this practice should not be acceptable.

Penny

Izabel,<BR><BR>This is more common than the average consumer knows. The airlines are infamous about offering all kinds of incentives for you too book with them and accrue miles. You have technically paid for those seats with your loyalty to the airline, because it took a whole lotta miles to get those tickets to Hawaii. <BR><BR>I would not only write a letter to the airlines, I would also copy it to my senators and representatives and the D.O.T. and the D.O.J....these types of practice's must stop and until the consumer get's involved it won't.<BR><BR>As for the dilema of your flights...good luck....there is no way to know that you can be seated together on your original flights, and a 5 hour layover might be miserable with 2 children. Of course you don't say where your laying over, but, it still shouldn't have happened.

Vic

If you don't travel, how did you accumulate 105,000 miles which is the minimum for three tickets to Hawaii? That's 20 round trips across the US.<BR><BR>Airlines simply don't do things like this. They do overbook. They have to. Customers make reservations and don't show up. If the airlines didn't overbook, planes would go out with many more empty seats.<BR><BR>If more passengers show up than can be accommodated, then airlines will offer free travel to induce people to give up their seats. They will keep increasing the bounty until all are satisfied.<BR><BR>Airlines have many falling, but arbitrarily selling a FF's seat is not one of them. Remeber those with FF miles tend to be the airlines best customers.

xxx

Vic is correct, except there are many ways to get AA miles without flying. Ignore Penny's predictable airline-bashing. <BR><BR>Something here doesn't add up. Once issued, an award ticket is basically equivalent to a full-fare ticket and they will not bump you. <BR><BR>What probably happened (this actually happened to me) is that when they went through the first round of post 9/11 schedule changes, they cancelled the flight you were originally on and put you on the less desirable one. They probably then added the original flight back to the schedule since traffic has been improving. You wouldn't have automatically been put back on this flight.<BR><BR>If you go back to the original flight without seats, call every so often to see if things have changed. If you still do not have seats, show up plenty early and you should be fine.<BR><BR>This thread is a good example of the need to call periodically to reconfirm your flights if you book long in advance and have time or other constraints.

kate

I agree with Vic. The airline would never tell her: "When I asked how this happened they said, they had sold my seats to someone else." That's ridiculous. Even if they did which they won't, they'd never say that.

Penny

Vic and others,<BR><BR>You don't have to fly anymore, just sign up on incentive programs to accrue those points.....like credit cards...just like the GMC card where you can get rebated in amounts applicable towards the purchase of a new vehicle, and I know you are so much more informed about the a/l's and their practices....but I've been seeing it happen for a long time now....but, I am nothing...just a travel agent who has worked this industry 24/7 for many years now...and my clients don't share with me their horror stories, much to the same tune as this lady...Am I bashing the a/l's or just open enough to expose them for their bad business practices?<BR><BR>Just because it has never happened to one of you (and how a lot of people here wish it would) doesn't mean it doesn't happen at all. Izabel has my sympathy and support.

xxx

Penny,<BR>Amazing how you've worked 24 hours a day, seven days a week, for years. Don't you ever get tired, dear?<BR><BR>Tell me, Penny, how many reservations for award travel have you booked? I'm telling you that what Izabel thinks happened did/does not happen. Period. Not now, not never. Yes, I'm sure I do know more about AA's policies and practices than you do. <BR><BR>I feel sorry for Izabel too, but AA did not bump her off that flight in favor of a paying customer.<BR><BR>Every time you post here you erect a large billboard advertising the fact that there is no minimum intelligence requirement for becoming a travel agent.<BR><BR>Go away.

Izabel

Thanks for the ideas and support. I wanted to tell you that I finally found a kind person to speak with at the airlines and xxx was correct. AA did cancel my flight after 9/11 and then added it back without me on it. Really I just wanted an honest answer as to why it happened. The gentlemen who told me they "sold my seats" actually did say that. I can't explain why someone would say that, but obviously his explanation was partially correct, he just used the wrong words. Finally, with this empathetic agent, I was able to get a totally different flight through a different city with seats together and so the good news is that talking to the right person did help. In telling my story, though, I have heard from a couple of other people that they were bumped off flights also, so I do believe it happens. I just didn't understand how it happens, which is why I thought I'd ask here. My story has a happy ending though and thanks Penny for your support. And just to help Vic understand, my late husband traveled extensively and these were his miles. We were going to go to Hawaii as a family one day. This trip was especially important to me and the kids, so you can imagine how stressful all this was for us. Anyway, thanks for your help everyone!

Penny

Izabella,<BR><BR>Have a really great time....he'll be there with you..always.

Vic

Izabel, I'm sorry your post threw me off. If you didn't put in the line about an AA agent telling you they sold your tickets, I would have suspected what XXX thought.<BR><BR>XXX is absolutely right you must have misunderstood, no airline let alone AA would do such a thing.<BR><BR>Well anyway have a great trip. AA is the best. It's comfortable. They give you about 4 inches more legroom. You're really set with your youngsters, legroom and no fat guy sitting in the middle seat. You'll have a great trip.

xxx

substitute am for and

Jim Rosenberg

Getting back to the original post, yes, something like that happened to me and it really isn't related so much to the tickets being award seats, per se. As flights were cancelled and schedules re-configured, it made a mess of the multiple classes of seats/fares that are sold on particular flights. In my own case, I was re-scheduled for a return flight a day earlier from Europe and the only alternative was to stay four days longer. (Of course, I probably could have also cancelled entirely because the change was so substantial, but I still wanted to do the trip). Hawaii presents particular problems for some airlines because they may offer the option of allowing many more award seats for customers who opt to cash in higher amounts of miles to get around capacity controls. At some point, even a packed aircraft can become unprofitable if the average fare per seat drops below the cost of providing it. Glad to hear you were able to get the schedule you wanted. Happy contrails!

Vic

As xxx and Jim Rothenberg probably know the airlines reduced their schedule about 20% after 911 which resulted in considerable dislocation for many passengers. The airlines went to great effort to reaccommodate their passengers, but ultimately the customers choices were accept the change or receive a full refund.<BR><BR>Generally, most airlines terms of carriage allow the passenger to chose between the reaccommodation or a full refund if the new arrival time is greater than two hours of the original. I'm sure the airline were more generous after 911.

Vic

AA did initiate the most recent commission cuts, and I understand your resentment. But that doesn't change the fact that AA wouldn't sell an award seat to a paying customer. Joyce, I think you'd agree.<BR><BR>In my mind the only thing that distinguishes the coach experience is legroom, and AA has the most by far for it's ordinary customers. That really does make a difference.

Joyce

Yes, Vic I do agree. The Mess was because of all of the schedule changes. The automatic reaccomodation made by the computer put people on flights not near what they had.<BR>It took me hours on the phone with AA and CO to fix the mess they made with the tickets I had issued for my sister and her family and my mother to fly on 9/22. They changed the schedules 3 times in 2 weeks.