[alan.carter@comcast.net]

I’m having a problem with tickets that I purchased from American Airlines on Dec 14th for my daughter traveling from Seattle to Nantes, France. She was planning to leave for France on Jan. 14th and when I looked for a flight using a travel search engine and found an American Airlines flight for the amazingly low price of $200. We did not know exactly when my daughter would be returning from France but since the French consulate requires that a return flight be booked before issuing a visa I booked a return flight on American Airlines and chose a refundable fare so that I could change the flight once she knew when she would be returning to Seattle. We chose the tentative return date as June 15th. The lowest cost fare class which the American Airlines web site states is refundable is the "Economy Saver" class. For June 15th the price of an "Economy Saver" class ticket from Nantes to Seattle was $2800 which I purchased in conjunction with the outbound flight. A day or two before the outbound flight I called American Airlines to request a refund on the return flight. Their response was surprising: they said that the return flight was not refundable because the outbound flight hadn’t been booked as refundable. When I questioned how a flight that was sold as refundable could be non-refundable they assured me that it is stated somewhere "in the fine print" that if a refundable ticket is bought as one leg of a round-trip then in fact the ticket is not refundable unless the other leg of the trip was also booked as refundable. Obviously, had I known that the return flight was not refundable I would not have purchased the "refundable" class of ticket. Now when I look up prices on American Airlines flights from Nantes to Seattle I see that the "Economy Saver" ticket class that their web site says is refundable can cost three times as much as a regular ticket. When I asked about changing the date of the return flight the American Airlines representative said that I would be charged a change fee. Is there anything I can do about this?

[jimworcs]

This strikes me as an unfair terms case. I would get screen shots of the current terms and conditions showing they are selling a 'refundable' ticket which costs more and which ultimately is non refundable. You should then file a complaint with the state Attorney General's office. I would also take a punt at filing a small claims court. If you can present clear evidence of misleading representation, I think you would have a better than average chance of winning. The hidden condition that your outbound flight also needs to be refundable is so obscure, that AA themselves can't tell you where the condition is... just that it is 'somewhere' in the small print. That is clearly an unfair term. To be bound by the term and conditions, the airline must provide a means for them to be be clear and available to the passenger.