[kmcginley]

I flew roundtrip for Christmas from Bloomington, IL to Hartford, CT. My car was left in the long term lot in Bloomington. On 12/27, I was to fly from Hartford to Chicago, and then catch a flight from Chicago back to Bloomington. The connections were a bit tight--the flight was supposed to arrive at O'hare at 3:35 pm, and the flight to Bloomington was to leave at 4:10 pm. The gates were very close together though.

The flight in Hartford boarded, if anything, really early. I was hopeful this was going well. It was not to be. We ended up leaving Hartford 45 minutes LATE--and this is what really bothers me--with never ANY explanation at all. Instead of arriving at 3:35 pm, we got off the plan at 4:15 pm. The gate for my connecting flight was literally right across the aisle. My heart leaped with joy when I saw that THAT flight was delayed almost 40 minutes and still in Chicago! My joy was short-lived. The same thing was happening--they had boarded the flight and closed the door on time, but proceeded to just sit there. They wouldn't let me on the flight, said it was closed. Firstly, I was checked in and they KNEW I was on the flight from Hartford--since the flight to Bloomington was delayed, it was completely within reasonable to expect to allow me on that flight. They were not very nice or sympathetic at the gate, in fact implied that this was all MY FAULT! How is that possible? American was responsible for the delay--I still had NO idea why the delayed even happened.

So then I troop up to the line to try to get me where I was going. That person was also completely unhelpful. Said there are no more flights and I would have to spend the night at o'hare. I couldn't do that, had to get home (home was a 2 hr drive at this point--the end was in sight!). I asked her for options. She said she could fly me to Peoria (about 1.5 hrs from Bloomington), when I asked her how I was supposed to get from Peoria to the Bloomington airport to get my car, she suggested I catch a bus. I asked her who was going to pay for that bus and she suggested I could "try" AA customer service without much conviction. In the end they flew me to Champaign, IL, about 50 miles from the Bloomington airport. I had to pay $100 to get to my car.

What upsets me was the generally unsympathetic attitude of everyone I dealt with with American Airlines. They clearly just didn't care at all and could not offer me any suggestions at all for what to do. They gave me no sense, even though this situation was their fault, that anything was going to be done to help me get home. I was clearly on my own. The communication was terrible--I have the AA app for my phone and it is VERY SLOW to update and talk about delays. Flights on the app show as ontime tens of minutes after they are clearly delayed. The Delta airlines app is just so much better. I will do everything in my power to AVOID AMERICAN in the future!

whew, I feel better Kate