Gadling

Antonia Bell from San Antonio wrote me recently, upset that she could not send a letter of complaint directly to American Airlines through its Web site — something wasn’t working.

Bell is one of the thousands who were left high and dry during the airline’s massive round of flight cancellations a few weeks ago. Bell was responding to a post I wrote reporting that a group of AA pilots have just launched a Web site of their own and are looking for irate customers to post their AA horror stories for the world to read. AA recently launched its own blog that I can only imagine might work in part to offset criticism it receives in other forums.

Anyway, Bell was kind enough to send me the letter that she has faxed to American. Nothing earth-shattering here, but I wanted to share it with you:

April 9 2008

I couldn’t even get this complaint to go through from your website—-why am I not surprised? I know I’m probably just one of the thousands of complaints you’re receiving as a result of your flight cancellations, but if there’s anybody who cares up there, this is why I’m done with American, after 30 years of being a customer:

1. Your e-mail notification system didn’t work…I only found out about the cancellation because of news stories.
2. Miraculously, I got thru on your 800-number yesterday about 5:30-6PM CDT. The young lady I dealt with said she was reticketing me on CO 1505/1629 and putting notes to that effect on my record (Record Locator: PCHGPR). When I got to the airport this morning, she had done neither, and the CO flights had sold out several hours earlier (middle of the night, I’m guessing).
3. Your Automated Response telephone system consistently misrepresents how long the wait is, and in some cases is contradicted by a later recording. At 4AM this morning, it said the wait was 58 minutes…..1.5 hours later, I was still on hold.
   

Your systems are broken, and nobody seems to care. I cancelled my trip, since there was no point in going at a later time. When I rebook, it will be with another carrier—-or I may give up traveling altogether.
For business, travel isn’t really necessary with the technology that’s available. That will probably be the death of the airline industry.

Antonia Bell
San Antonio, TX

American Airlines customers: Are you angry at the company? Well, AA pilots want to hear from you.

Following a week that saw the carrier cancel more than 3,000 flights, leaving tens of thousands of passengers stranded, a group of AA pilots has just launched a Web site — Tell Your AA Story — where they want you to air your frustrations about the airline’s recent and future performance. The site has already generated more than 56,000 hits.

Check out this welcome message, taken directly from the site (the caps are not mine):

Had your travel plans destroyed by the actions of AA lately? Even if they’re not listening–we are. Whether you were traveling on business, for pleasure, or for an emergency, we realize that the mismanagement of American Airlines has cost you dearly. It doesn’t matter if you lost a day at Disney with your family, a day of work for your business, or a major family event, the unfortunate truth is that your life has been disrupted, your plans destroyed, your business derailed–all for one bad reason: THE PROFIT OF A FEW AMR EXECUTIVES.

AA’s 12,000 pilots are in the middle of contract negotiations, so the site’s launch seems as much a collective bargaining move as a response to last week’s cancellations, even as the Allied Pilots Association, the pilots’ union, says it is neither.

If you’re flying out of Boston, New York, Miami, San Francisco and a handful of other cities today, you are likely to encounter a few dozen AA pilots outside protesting the company’s recent performance. At key hubs, 30-50 AA pilots will be passing out literature promoting their new Web site between 11 a.m. and 2:30 p.m.

This just as American says it is back up and running at a full schedule (the pilots say their actions will not translate into flight delays). AA clearly has more than just frustrated customers to be concerned about. I’m reminded of Grant’s post earlier this month about an AA flight attendant who used an awards ceremony as a forum to take AA management to the woodshed over a whole host of consumer and safety issues.