American Airlines

Economy class flights with American Airlines, Kansas City to New York JFK via Charlotte. Both legs had a clean aircraft (particularly impressed with the A319) with good cabin crew. Both flights on time. The seats were comfortable enough for the 2hr hops, and the Boeing 737 had wifi to pass the time. I don't fly AA very often but I would be happy to continue with them if this level of competence is consistent.

✅ Verified Review | Flew Miami to San Francisco. Service is well below normal standard, even in what they call First Class. On approachong American Airlines flagship check in at Miami I was told by female employee to go 'over there' where the economy check-in was. I continued and asked her why did she assume I was not entitled to check in there. She said she had to make sure not everyone try to check in there as it was for First class passengers only. Well, I was travelling First and I am a BA Gold Card holder (Emerald in Oneworld) so I was doubly entitled to check in there. Very off-putting for an employee to do this. Worse was to come. The so-called First class is anything but First class, apart from the seat which was comfortable. No welcome. Pre-departure drinks were not cleared. Moody flight attendants. No hand cream in toilets. No breakfast worth having (only two quiches, the one I had was very bland and soggy). No bread was offered, just sweet cookies. I deliberately did not eat anything in the lounge hoping for a good First class breakfast. If I had brought a McDonald's meal I would have been more satisfied. Entertainment was a table. In 21st century America? Why do we pay so much money to travel with them if they offer so little? American is a rip off. They claim they are changing. I dread to think what it was like before they allegedly changed and improved services. They charge a lot but deliver little.

✅ Verified Review | A red-eye flight from Las Vegas to Philadelphia with American Airlines. Flight was fully booked. All overhead storage was full, well before half the plane boarded. Our boarding group wasn't even called yet before they announced storage was full. This did cause boarding to take a lot longer than normal, as many people had to back track to check their bag with the front desk. The front desk continuously announced you could check your bag for free at the desk, due to the storage shortage, but it appeared most who were boarding ignored this. We gladly took them up on it, and dropped off our bags at the desk, well before everyone else finally realized they had no choice. This at least let us board quicker as everyone was now crowding the front desk. Desk crew was friendly enough, I think they were getting a bit annoyed despite multiple announcements that there would be no storage, that people were generally ignoring their calls. We flew economy, so seats were as expected. I'm quite tall, as is my wife, so it can be a bit uncomfortable with the small leg room after an hour or two. Knees not in the seat, but, not enough room to move them at all. So, if you are in the plus 6 foot range, and with a bad knee, can be a bit annoying, but, we realize you get what you pay for. Crew were friendly and pleasant enough, flight was mostly quite as it was leaving Vegas at 11pm and landing in Philly at 6. Napped most of the way, when I could, so nothing really to report. Flight was generally smooth and we arrived earlier than scheduled, so that's always nice. I only had a glass of water during the flight, so can't really comment on food/drink service, too much. I believe the Wifi on this flight however did not work. Disembarking was only troubled by other passengers. A middle-aged man near the back of the plane decided, rather than wait for the rows to ahead to disembark, he would just start pushing his way out, which caused people to get chippy. Not really the airlines fault, though they did not intervene.

Kona to Portland via Phoenix, and as usual, American Airlines doesn't disappoint. Horrible customer service on the ground and in the air. Employees are rude, take their time and are very slow. The airline does not communicate with its customers at all if flights are changed, and in my opinion, are extremely incompetent. Flew from Kona to Phoenix expecting an hour layover to Portland and when we land, we find out it's been changed to 4 hours. Mind you, a 6 hour flight with a screaming 1 year old plus being dragged through a 45 min process just to check bags because computers froze and then employees almost tagged our bags with the wrong tags. Then to have a 4 hour layover that was not expected, just to fly another 3 hours - worst travel experience of my life.

Miami to Boston with American Airlines. Just wanted to say that flight attendants not to be so rude when asking passengers about the emergency exits/whether they are comfortable or not. I was extremely uncomfortable sitting by emergency exit because I rarely fly and I didn't know what it entails. I was about to ask if I could switch but the woman spoke to me as though I was a complete idiot. I only chose this seat because it was one of 2 seats available. It was pretty awful to be publicly embarrassed because I was unfamiliar with the procedure. When I nervously stuttered that I didn't know what it meant she said, "You know it's a responsibility to sit here, right? Maybe you should have a look at the pamphlet and familiarize yourself." She didn't offer me another seat, she disdainfully informed me that I would "have to be moved if I couldn't assist." The gentleman next to me took pity on me and explained. Why would they go around asking if we're ok with sitting here/if we have any questions if they don't care if we're ok with it and are unwilling to explain? I'm pretty angry and embarrassed and it was a pretty awful experience.

Dallas to Seattle. American Airlines don't provide any priority boarding with babies (we had twin babies). During the flight I was rather rudely sent back to my seat by two crew members. I just asked for some water for my two crying babies. The lights for seatbelts were off and this was not during landing or take-off. There were also no command from crew to remain seated. To the credit of another flight attendant, she kindly brought us the water two times. Big thanks to her! No display about travel info whatsoever; no info where we are currently and how long till the final destination. There was no general IFE display screen at all. On all four flights (all at different times of the day), there was no food. Only the drinks and light snacks were free.

✅ Verified Review | I experienced a lengthy delay going down to Quito via Miami, but this was nothing compared to the problems on the return leg of my trip. Coming back home, I arrived at the airport very early and noticed that no staff were there to give me a boarding pass. I decided to use a machine to check-in and I was concerned when my reservation was not found. Once the staff arrived, I was informed that my flight to Dallas was cancelled due to weather. I researched the weather conditions in Dallas and found out that there were indeed thunderstorms, but they were brief and many other flights were delayed (not cancelled). Since the delay was "weather" related, the airline did nothing to help (no food and no hotel) and they repeatedly lied to customers. They had me re-booked on flights that were two days later, but I fought hard (and spent hours) to get onto a LAN flight that got me home just one day late. The cancellation cost me a lot of time and money (for hotels, taxis, and food) and the staff and service on American was atrocious. I truly believe that airlines use weather as a loophole to cancel flights that have light loads (saving them money) without having to take responsibility! The only good thing about the cancellation was that I ended up getting to fly LAN Airlines to Miami. LAN provides more leg room, comfortable seats, delicious meals with wine, and their staff really seem to care about the passengers. American Airlines is a nasty behemoth of an airline and I recommend avoiding them (even if it means paying more for a competitor).

My recent experience flying out of Oakland to Indianapolis via Phoenix has shown that American will stoop to incredible lows when trying to avoid FAA regulations regarding oversold flights. Our flight was oversold, and when they could not find enough people to take their vouchers, they announced a last minute delay. They didn’t follow any procedures for said delay. Their gate agents knew nothing and the flight information wasn’t updated until sometime after I had boarded. Once onboard, we were told the delay was due to a leaky coffee pot. I’m still at a loss as to what safety issues were at stake for this issue. The flight attendant wasn’t much better simply stating, ‘you wouldn’t water on the floor would you?’ Clearly there is a disconnect here, because missing a connecting flight over a little or even potentially a lot of water on the floor isn’t worth it, especially on a holiday weekend where my plans for the following day ended up completely ruined. Myself and probably a dozen other people missed our connecting flights. In my case, I arrived at my gate just as my plane was pushing off. My destination wasn’t a hub, and the people managing this flight couldn’t wait five more minutes to allow myself and the other two passengers who arrived at the same time I did, the courtesy to board. The next flight was four hours later (on a red-eye), and for my inconvenience, I got a meal voucher that would only be able to pay for a fast food dinner. Running through Phoenix, my laptop bag managed to open up causing my laptop to fall out. My experience with AA customer service wasn’t much better. They don’t get back right away, and they refused to escalate this. To this day, I’m still trying to figure out how a leaky coffee pot presents any real safety issue worthy of grounding a flight, and customer service didn’t have a good reason for it either. I was offered a measly 10,000 bonus miles, worth nowhere near what the travel voucher I should have received for essentially being involuntarily bumped. That will get you (if you’re lucky) one third of a domestic ticket, and not at all worth the inconvenience that was forced on me and fellow passengers. At best, this was someone’s incompetence. At worst, this was an unethical way for an airline to save a few thousand dollars. If it has really come to something like this to make a few extra dollars, then perhaps it’s time for their customers to find an airline that respects them a bit more.

✅ Verified Review | Mexico City to Miami with American Airlines. Check in at the airport was chaotic, very inefficient. When the plane arrived after it was delayed I saw that it had new livery, I assumed it was a new plane - but to my surprise it was an old plane on the inside. Legroom was horrible you could barely move your legs. The only thing they offer is some complementary beverages, if you want anything to eat you have to pay for it. Entertainment system is horrible, the wifi only works on continental America as soon as you leave Florida you are left only with the TV shows of the general entertainment system.

Kauai to Salt Lake City with American Airlines was the worst flying experience I have had. The day before the flight they moved my wife and I to different seats on the plane, that weren't even close to each other. We had make our reservations 8 months ahead of time, I figured that flights can change last minute, and they must have overlooked this detail. I called them to make them aware of the problem. I sat on hold with them for over an hour, till the representative came back and said they couldn't do anything about it over the phone and I would have to go directly to the airport to fix the problem. But also assured me that there were plenty of seats left and not to worry. I didn't want to take a chance, so I went online to check in and paid an extra fee to upgrade our seat so that I could move them together. When we got to the airport, they had moved our seat again, and they were no longer together again. They told me the plane was full and they couldn't do anything about it. Nor would they refund the fee I paid earlier. I would of made more of a big deal about it, but there was a family of 5 with small children in front of me that they did this same thing to, with seats not near each other. Bottom line, if you don't mind getting separated from your travel group, and treated like your are just someone to fill a seat, then by all means book with American Airlines. I never will again!