American Airlines schedule changes
 

AA made some significant schedule changes on many of their domestic flights and few internationals. Check your reservations if you are flying with AA anytime after September 1.

If the flight(s) have been changed you have 2 options.

1. Full refund - on any ticket

2. Asking AA to put you on a more convenient flight(s) on the same day. If you were originally scheduled on the first flight of the day and the new schedule does not work for you, you can ask to be put on the last flight of the day before, and of course it works the same if you were scheduled for the last flight of the day, you can ask for the first flight the following day if that's what you want.

Remember, once you accept the schedule change or new flights, the same fare rules apply per your originally bought ticket.

Some things that won't happen - AA will not put you on a different airline, so forget about that. The full refund gives you that option.

They will not allow you to change to a different day (with the exception I lined out above).

Some changes only involve a flight # change, so none of the above apply.

How significant does the schedule change have to be to qualify for a refund?

Thanks very much! Our schedule from SMF to CDG has changed fairly significantly, from a 10:17 a.m. departure to one at 7:30 a.m.--won't work for us. The alternative is to lose a day from our trip by having to spend the night at DFW and go on to Paris the next day. Not good.

Any idea when/if AA is going to notify travelers of the changes? That's one good thing about booking with Orbitz, which we didn't because of using upgrades.

Thanks for the heads up. Went to AA.com and pulled up 'my reservations' for my flight in 2 weeks. BLANK. Nothing there. Oh $&%$#@ was my first reaction, as I know it was there last night.

Turns out I just had to recall the the res. with rec. loc. # once again to pull it up. Flights haven't changed, but gave me a scare for a min!

<b>Patty</b>,

There is some disagreement on what is considered a significant change, but I believe that unless it's just few minutes difference, you can request and should get a full refund if that's what you choose to do. For some a 1/2 hour could make a difference.

<b>Underhill</b>,

AA may or may not contact you. Their contact system is far from perfect. I would be pro-active if I were you and contact AA as soon as possible to confirm the changes and see what if anything can be done. Don't forget, they also have 1 ORD-CDG and I'm not sure, but 1 another flight from the east coast. Rerouting is an option after a schedule change. They will work with you and in cases like this they may even be willing to fly you to London and actually book a BA flight to CDG. Not sure, but it doesn't hurt to ask. Good luck!

Thanks, AAFF.

All I need to do is get through to AA reservations; the current wait time is 30 minutes+.

I'm hoping we can get rescheduled from SFO via London IF business-class upgrades are available. Otherwise I guess France will have to do without us this year.

Wow, huge difference in mine. My flight was originally leaving 12PM. Now it leaves at 6:50AM, leaving me with an almost 10 hr layover.

AA,
This is an international flight. When looking at other current choices, I was only given alternative flights (connecting thru MIA) that would not allow me to get to my international destination in time. However, there are many flights going to MIA from my airport with layover of 4-5 hrs. These were not offered as connecting flights with my international leg (not clear why).
Since the change to the domestic leg is massive (the international leg was also moved up by 2 hrs), can I ask to be moved to one of the later domestic flights as my connector even though it does not appear as a choice on the thru journey?

Write down the flight numbers and times of the flights you are willing to accept and call them back. Some agents are better than others. It also helps when you provide the info for them in situations like this. You should be able, without any questions, move up your domestic flight to have an acceptable layover, unless they are sold out, but I doubt that very much.

Good luck!

Well we got seriously lucky with a change - re-timed (later) BOS-ORD flight means we can now go LHR-BOS-ORD-SEA this September without long hang times in BOS and DFW. Get home <b>3 hours earlier</b> than previously booked (still a pretty hellish day, just less so.) Woo Hoo!

EXP AAngel on making the change: &quot;Cool!&quot;

AA,

Any suggestions on how to get through to a reservations agent without that half hour on hold? Is there a better time of the day to try?

I'm glad to hear there's a full refund available and will be calling AA today. We made our reservations in April for a trip to Grenada at the end of November. We originally had about 1:30 between flights in SJU - we now have 3:00 going down (not bad) but 7:15 coming back! AA's got GND wrapped up but we may be about to do better with another carrier getting to SJU.

This morning I reached an agent after barely one minute--wow! He was very eager to re-route the first leg of our flight so as now to have to issue a refund. Now we're going out of SFO on a wide-body (whee!) and then connecting at DFW to our original flight. Coming back we still have the same itinerary, which means we now have an open-jaw flight for the same price.

Thanks for reporting this, AAFF. Our November trip SFO to BNA through DFW has been &quot;nudged&quot; a bit time-wise. The return flight fom DFW to SFO has a change of equipment from an MD-80 to a Boeing 767-300, with a 2-3-2 seat configuration in economy. We've been assigned seats waaay in the back. The AA site will not accept any change of seat assignment, though it's showing all the seats as available. Do you think it's simply a matter of not yet opening up the plane for seats? Would I have better luck phoning? We'd much rather be closer to the front on one of the two-seat sides as we had secured when the flight was on an MD-80.

<b>Betsy</b>,

In situations like this, it's always best to call.

Good luck!

Betsy's post made me think of something else. What options do you have, if any, if it's only an equipment change (provided you find out in advance and not at the gate)? Going from a 763 to a 752 might make me less happy than a schedule change depending on the circumstances.

Thanks AAFF! I'll try the website throughout the day and phone late tonight if I haven't been successful.

<b>Patty</b>,

equipment change on it's own, will not get you anything. The airline guarantees the class of service. They don't even guarantee a seat assignment.

So, as long as you get the same class of service that you purchased, then it does not matter what equipment they use.

That's what I thought :( thanks.

For what it's worth, I called at about 9:15 in the morning PDT and got right through.