Shame on you, American Airlines.
I’ve always believed that you learn more about a person (or a company) when things are bad than you ever learn about them when things are good.Like many others, I’ve complained about American Airlines in the past because of their poor treatment of their customers.
Today, however, I was more disgusted by this company than I’ve ever been by any company I’ve ever done business with. Since 2000, I’ve flown 578,814 total miles. I’ve spent literally tens of thousands of dollars with them. I’ve defended them to my friends, and continued to choose them when other airlines were (significantly) cheaper. I’ve cut them slack for poor customer service, for canceled flights, for marginal on-time delays, and hours spent on tarmacs waiting for gates to open up. And through it all, I continued to choose them, continued to spend extra money to fly with them.
Last night my grandmother died.
I have a committed trip to DC and NYC (ironically to speak about the Cluetrain 10 years later), which is fine since the family and funeral aren’t happening until Thursday. I needed to simply change the departure from NYC to Dallas to be one day earlier at a different time.
I called American and politely explained my situation. They had an open flight at the right time. They were willing to waive the typical $100 change fee (with a copy of the death certificate), but they were unwilling to waive the $359 fare difference. (UPDATE: I was more than willing to provide a death certificate and/or the number of the funeral home for the waiver of both fees and told them so) They had a chance to turn a terribly sad chapter of my life into a story about what a great company they were, and they passed it up.
Again I politely explained that I have nearly 600,000 miles flow, I’m a loyal customer, that I’ve been Gold or Platinum for years now. “Can we waive the fare difference?”, I ask. I’m not changing the flight, just the times of the flight, after all. The answer from both Mrs. Gibson and her supervisor, Irving was this:
“American reviewed the policy a few years back and decided that since funeral homes, doctors, and clothiers don’t discount their rates, we shouldn’t either.”
First of all, I was asking for them to waive an unnecessary fee, not give me a discount. Secondly, that’s a stupid comparison. Doctors and funeral homes don’t work on a sliding scale. Clothing is reusable. I could go on with how stupid this quote is, but it’s just not worth the time.
When I told Irving, the supervisor, that I’d been a loyal customer for years and that I felt that the “fare difference” (i.e. we charge more for certain times of the day for the exact same overhead) should be waived if for nothing else than because it was the best way American could return the loyalty I’d shown them over the years he said:
“I’m not here to argue with you, sir.”
And I’m not here to argue with you either, American. In fact, I’m not here to fly with you, defend you, or support you. Not only have I lost interested in maintaining our quasi-relationship, I’ll now actively work to find alternatives to using you. (Hard to do when you live in Dallas, but absolutely not impossible). I’ll encourage others to think twice about using you. All because you were more interested in potentially getting an extra $359.
Bravo.
You stuck to your principles, now it’s my turn.
(By the way, I’ve included a picture of Pat McKee, my wonderful grandmother as a way to remind American that this issue is not about policies, it’s about real people) I decided to remove the photo from this post, simply because it’s getting some surprising activity and my grandma would smack me upside the head if she knew I was using her photo in something this well trafficked. Thanks to everyone for your warm response and thoughts. I love you guys. The huge amount of support has meant the world to me.
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22 Responses to “Shame on you, American Airlines.”
I’m sorry for your loss. I am. However, it seems as though grief has momentarily caused you to lose perspective. Were you prepared to provide proof of your grandmother’s passing? Airlines (or any other company) can’t just waive fees for anyone who makes the claim that they’re traveling because a relative has died. Even among elite fliers, the number of people who would abuse this kind of good will policy is obscene. They have to protect themselves from cranks.
I also have to wonder at someone who would consider asking a company to waive a substantial, standard fee as providing the company is an “opportunity.” My dog is sick. I am now going to provide you with the “opportunity” to send me cookies. Sound fair? No. Just because you didn’t get what you asked for, it doesn’t make it a customer service problem. What you asked for was unreasonable.
Jake, Sorry to hear about your grandmother. I wished I could have made this article seen by the higher ups at AA, but I am just a lowly programmer working indirectly for AA.
Hey Jake,
Really sorry to hear about your grandmother and AA being evil. I can’t believe how horrible people can be when it would be so easy for them to just help you out.
If you need airline help maybe MJ knows someone that can work some magic for you?
Sorry about your grand ma. I lost my last one a few weeks ago. It’s a shame that AA has chosen to flex its bureaucratic muscles. I do think they have lost perspective of the “customer” aspect of CRM.
Jake, my sympathy to you and your family.
At first I wasn’t going to comment–I mean, what do you say? But as I am sitting here working on chapter 5 of a book on social media (Jake is my Technical Editor) Dan’s comment really got me thinking about the role of posts like this one in changing “policies.” Companies like AA have them for all sorts of reasons, though I really hope that AA’s rationale wasn’t simply that since Funeral Homes don’t discount…
In particular, this comment from Dan got to me: “My dog is sick. I am now going to provide you with the “opportunity” to send me cookies.”
Well, Dan, YES! That is exactly right. If I know that your dog is sick, yes, that creates an opportunity for me to do something for you and your dog. In fact, I’ll go one better: Your dog doesn’t even have to be sick…I could just decide that since I was heading over to your place to watch the Super Bowl, and was stopping for beer anyway, that maybe I could grab a chew toy, too, since no doubt your dog will entertain us at least once in the 6 hours we’ll all be watching TV.
What kind of world would that be?
I was at NTB (a tire store) the other day: I wanted to get the alignment checked on my car. I asked if they offered a “lifetime” alignment. The manager said, yes, but that for a Mercedes alignments were more expensive. I could tell by the lok on his face that he’d had to explain this before, and it pained him. The fact some cars are more expensive than others to maintain didn’t shock me. What he said next did: With no prompting on my part, he looked at me and said “But if you’ll buy the lifetime alignment, I’ll waive the extra fees. Mr. Evans, I want your business.”
Guess where I’m buying the new tires for the Mercedes? Oh, and the Land Rover, too.
The opportunity that AA has completely missed–and yes, it was an opportunity, and it has been missed–was waiving a fee that is actually less than what NTB waived for me without hesitation. And Jake is Platinum flyer! I was some guy who drove up and asked for an alignment. The NTB manager could have said “Your car is expensive, pal. You can afford it.” In that case, I might have purchased one alignment that day. But I darn wouldn’t be telling this story right now, would I? How many people are reading this? That is the opportunity that AA missed!
What goes around comes around, and nowhere is this more true than on the social web.
I saw the coolest (yes, silly, but still cool) new Facebook app: it let’s you send good kharma’s to your friends. The more more send, the better the kharma. Maybe we should all send AA some good kharma. Given the exchange that took place, they obviously need it. I mean that seriously, too: It has to be tough working in a place that is so open and honest about its absolute contempt for its customers. Maybe with enough good kharma AA will alter its policies, and make the daily routine of its emplyees just a little bit better. Not to mention the stories that get told about them.
My condolences, Jake. Very sorry to hear about your Grandma … and I could tell stories from lots of friends and family that would match yours, with regards to shifty airline so-called “bereavement” policies - and it’s not just American that’s doing it. The whole industry is back peddling in areas like this, and as you, and *most* of your readers can clearly see, it’s so incredibly short-sighted … just when you need them most, they bail on you. The airlines are one of the few industries left that can still rely on a certain level of customer loyalty, and then they go and blow it.
Sorry to hear about your loss. My wife and I both lost grandmothers last year.
We had a different story for AA. They helped us out a lot. But I think it was because the emergency flight was delayed. It was mechanical I think so they bussed us and about 5 others from Orlando to Tampa, put us up for the night, and upgraded us to business class.
The situation is a bit different, but it was around a grandmother’s death and it was AA doing a good job.
Just a different story.
Sorry for your loss, Jake. Following policies blindly is an epidemic today. People have lost their common sense.
Jake, Sorry to hear about your loss.
I can very much relate to your point about good business. Let me tell you about what happened to me on a Disney trip a couple of years ago.
I had a close relative who was terminally ill with cancer. We had no idea how long he had left in this world, but we had previously had a week long trip booked at DisneyWorld. On the very day we were leaving, we got the news of his passing.
I was expecting to have to pay a heavy penalty for cancelling and re-booking, but they simply said, we’re sorry about your loss. Please call us back when you can. We look forward to your visit when the time is better for you.
You can’t imagine how much loyalty Disney won from me with their simple, sensitive handling of this. I was expecting to have to provide proof. I was expecting to lose money. I was greeted with kindness and sensitivity, instead.
They may or may not have lost any money in the deal. But they certainly won the loyalty of my whole extended family. And the good press every time I use this as an example of the kind of “opportunity” you’ve written about…
AA definitely missed out.
[...] (who is a Poobah blogger and big brain Web thought leader) : UnAmerican Airlines, talking about Jake McKee’s recent problem with AA when his grandmother died. The short of it is that American Airlines not only decided not to waive the opportunity to soak [...]
Hi Jake,
It was great meeting you and listening to your presentation this week. I am sorry to hear about your grandmother and I think this is truly a missed opportunity for AA. As Pete’s story from above emphasizes, companies can leverage communication at these rough times in a much better way.
It is sad that it takes an event like this to put things in perspective but the silver lining may be how you view AA now and how\who you will do business with in the future.
I hope the comments and discussion this has generated have at least given you some relief from what I am sure is a rough time.
~Eric
Hi Jake,
I’d be the first one to validate your dissappointment with AA, and I totally support your efforts to disengage from them in response to their cold response to a loyal customer in need. Still, I can’t help but feel compelled to make two points, not so much in AA’s defense but to flesh out what’s happening here.
1) From a pure business point of view, I don’t think you’re correct to characterize their “fare difference” as a “variable pricing scheme” that is merely there to get you to pay more for the exact same thing. From their point of view, the seat you wanted to change to was more expensive because if you didn’t take it, they expected somebody else to pay them the extra $359 for it (plus whatever your original fare for the segment was). You note that they would only *potentially* be getting this extra money, but given how many flights leave the gates totally full nowadays, it is quite possible that giving you that seat would have actually caused them to leave someone else behind, and forego the extra $359 in real cash revenue that they otherwise would have received. In fact, given the airlines’ bizarre pricing schemes, that other person would probably have been charged even more than the total of your original ticket plus $359 for their last minute “walk-up” reservation, and there are people (mainly biz travellers) who are actually willing to pay that. Still, we’ll stick with just the $359, but I think it’s only fair to recognize that this is likely real, not just potential, money to AA.
So therefore, what you are really saying is that if AA were a more customer-oriented airline, they would have recognized this as an opportunity to spend $359 (at least) to reward the loyalty of your half million miles and many tens of thousands of dollars of business. I personally think they should have done this–you are a good person and a great and loyal customer. But let’s be fair–$359 isn’t chump change, and it’s not unreasonable that they would take pause before handing it out. After all, they did already wave their $100 change fee, which clearly was an amount that they *were* willing to pay to reward your loyalty. So, my point is that for AA, this may be less a question of whether you are worthy of being rewarded than of how much they can justify paying to do so. If they did agree to $359, should they have still agreed if the amount were $1,000? More? Is it not reasonable for them to put a limit on what they’ll invest to maintain your loyalty?
2) Let’s not forget the overall context that this sad response from AA occurred within. The airlines are waging all-out war on their customers because they feel that their customers have taken advantage of every one of their weaknesses to suck the life out of them. Jake, you are very much the exception as a customer who has repeatedly chosen to pay more to retain his loyalty to his airline when other options are cheaper. Most fliers nowadays scrutinize the web to find the absolute lowest fare for a trip, and will change airlines and accept weird routings just to save $10. (In fact, I think the web detrimentally entices people to act out irrationally compulsive behaviors when planning a trip, but that’s a different discussion….). When the airlines are being hammered by high fuel prices and numbing financial losses and try to raise their fares by $15/ticket, just one of their competitors will keep the original (money-losing) price, the business will all shift to them, and all the others have to rescind their increases just to keep butts in their seats. So, after years of feeling that their customers don’t give two hoots about which airline they fly on as long as they get the absolute lowest price offered by anybody, the airlines finally decided to push back. They’ve concluded that there’s no margin in trying to be seen as being better than the next guy, they only want to fill as many planes as they can given that at the fare levels they’ve been forced to accept, their only shot at making any money is to fly totally full. The more money they spend on providing “amenities” (such as peanuts, pillows, and fare accomodations to the bereaved), the more seats they need to fill to breakeven. We’d like to argue that if they provided better service they’d fill more seats, but sadly, their experience tells them otherwise.
As perhaps you can tell, I’m ambivalent about this circumstance. I’m no friend of the airlines–I think their behavior is often wretched (such as what happened to you), and the industry has a sad history of screwing everybody who touches it (including its employees, customers, and investors). Still, the flying public is ruthless and unreasonable, and seems to believe that they are owed the right to fly anywhere they want for a fantasy fare that is well under both the airline’s cost of providing the service as well as any reasonable assessment of the value of the transportation service to the user. Frankly, I see this as the inevitable result of airline deregulation, which I always saw as a mistake, but we Americans love our unfettered free market, so this is where we are–a very sick domestic airline industry, and all-out war between it and its customers. In this light, AA’s response to you was not a mistake, and shouldn’t come as a surprise to us.
My condolences on the loss of your grandmother.
Steve Tulsky (linked via Doc Searls)
What’s the cost of one huge-ass negative publicity hit? Seriously cheap! Wow! $359 buys a big black eye to a business that has TONS of competitors willing to take your money.
(Sorry about your grandmother).
Jake,
My condolences on your grandmother’s passing and cheers to your consideration of her wishes and removing the photo lest you be smacked upside the head. Sounds like she and my grandmother went to the same grandmothering school.
On that note, I was speaking to my 83 yo grandmother today and let her know that I’d be making airline reservations this weekend for my family of four (Memphis to Phoenix and we might be able to meet her there). Anyhow, resultant of how they treated you, my reservations will not be with them. I’ll be sure to follow up with whoever we go with. It won’t be American Airlines, or is it AA.
Dugg and Stumbled (via @CBrogan ’s tweet).
[...] the value of customer relations. They’d rather stick with their policy and keep my $50 (and Jake McKee’s $359) than create customer goodwill (and [...]
“From a pure business perspective” - and that’s the root of the problem. Companies like AA treat customers like walking wallets, not people.
In reality, there is no such thing as a “pure business transaction” People - somehow, some way, are involved in even the simplest transaction.
There’s doing things right (AA and other company “protect us from the customers”) and then there’s doing the right thing.
As for the $359 - the whole pricing scheme is an artificial construct - so they aren’t actually “shelling out” anything. They set the price and they can choose to sell the seat, let it go empty, or use it for special consideration of a customer.
AA valued my measly $50 luggage fee more than they did my business - so I will not be flying with them again unless absolutely forced to . So, let’s see $50 plus $359 - versus say just one roundtrip ticket Chicago/NYC of $550.00. Hmmm…too bad they can’t do math.
As for sick dogs, certainly that’s a great opportunity to show some care. Anyone see how Zappos responded to a woman’s Mom dieing? Now, that’s doing the right thing.
I am so very sorry to hear about your grandmother and I’m terribly sorry AA didn’t take the opportunity to be a ‘people company’. That really sucks.
We had a family emergency in 1990, five of my family members were in an auto accident in Seattle on vacation, one of whom died. My cousin, who was around eight, was in a cast from his feet to his chest. We desperately needed to get him home to Dallas, in time for his father’s funeral. The airlines were SO uncooperative with us - my dad was on the phone all day making magic happen - and that he did! John was home in time for the funeral.
Darn those airlines!