American Airlines #@$%^&

Our post-Palm Springs itinerary started with a flight from Ontario airport to Fort Lauderdale right in the middle of the week in which American Airlines cancelled all of their MD-80 flights. They cancelled our flight to Dallas and it’s connecting flight to Fort Lauderdale, both conveniently scheduled for the Friday prior to our Saturday boarding. Reaching AA by phone was impossible, but they left us a voicemail telling us that they had rebooked us on an other flight which would get us to Fort Lauderdale only two hours after our ship leaves the port.

Trusting the statement on the American website which promised to refund the ticket prices for people that chose to abandon their cancelled flights, we booked ourselves on Southwest airlines and had an uneventful flight (truly the best kind) to thunderstorm ridden Nashville, then on to Fort Lauderdale. We are still waiting to hear whether the refund of our American tickets will come through. We already have heard that American will not reimburse us for the cost of the full fare Southwest tickets we were forced to buy at double the cost of our advance-fare, but cancelled American tickets. After a year of traveling (all of the air booked on American) this was the only time we had any problems with American (well, there was that time with the suspected terrorist on the plane that caused us a multi-hour delay at a NY airport). Let’s hope they come through with that refund.