[snoog187]

On July 5, 2008 my wife, 14 month old daughter and myself were supposed to be on AA flight 1651 leaving LGA at 9:25am and arriving in Miami at 12:35pm. This would have given us plenty of time to land, gather our luggage and make our way to our cruise ship which was due to leave at 4pm. Even with the initial “change” in itinerary we were only going to be delayed by a half hour, so there was no need to go into pannick mode. Well, that is until they decided to “change” the flight to a 1pm flight with an arrival time in Miami of 4:13pm. Well needless to say, we missed our cruise, but before I get deep into the story, let me give you a little background info.

Back in 2006 my wife and I were “bumped” off our flight heading to San Juan, PR where we were heading to catch…….you guessed it……a cruise! For our inconvenience, we were each given $200 vouchers. We used those vouchers last year in August to take our 4 month old daughter to PR to see her grandmother for the first time. Though I can’t remember our initial flight information, you can pretty much guess what happened…..the flight got “changed.” I believe we were supposed to arrive in PR around 5pm but instead we didn’t take off from NY until approximately 10pm (remember, we have a 4 month old with us). Needless to say, I wrote to AA and they sent my wife and I a $200 voucher.

That brings me back to last week when we used our $200 voucher to purchase tickets to get us to Miami for our cruise! Once we landed in Miami and realized the ship had already left, we went to the AA counter to find out what would happen. Upon explaining our dilemma to Francisco, he told me that he would put us up in a hotel in Miami overnight and get us on the next (and only) flight to Cozumel on July 6, 2008. Though this doesn’t sound too bad, I went further to ask Francisco what would happen upon our arrival to Cozumel and he said that we “would have to take care of that once we land.” He was only authorized to put us up overnight in Miami. So let’s get this straight, we along with my 14 month old daughter should fly to Cozumel and figure out the details once we land seeing as to how our ship would not arrive until Monday, July 7, 2008?! Well thankfully Francisco’s supervisor saw the ignorance in this solution and noted our account to show that we should receive a hotel stay in Cozumel as well. Oh yeah, did I mention that once all of the details were worked out, we were given a $20 voucher for dinner in Miami, a $10 voucher for breakfast and a $20 voucher for lunch the following day. Now, I’m not from Miami, but I can safely say that outside of the Burger King in the airport, there are not many other places where I can use these vouchers without adding my own money. Just to put this into perspective, we were given $30 for dinner in Mexico where the $1 is approx. 10 pesos, but in Miami, $20 was supposed to be sufficient for dinner?!

Oh yeah, did I mention that Francisco also gave my wife and I tickets to Cozumel and issued us a ticket for my 14 month old daughter to travel back to NY!!!!!!! Yes, we were scheduled to go to Mexico and she alone was scheduled to go back to NY!!!




As if it couldn’t get any worse, after we finally completed our cruise, we flew from Miami back to LGA only to arrive with 2 suitcases, as the other was put on the flight due to land an hour after we landed!!! I was told I would have my bag delivered to me that night, but of course it didn’t show up until 11am the next day.

Moral of the story……..see you on JetBlue!!!

By the way, you want to know what advice all of the AA employees had for us? They suggested that when cruising we fly to our embarkation point a day earlier. Did I mention that we were leaving on July 5? So this means that we should have gone to Miami on the 4th of July, stayed overnight and paid through the roof for everything as this was a holiday instead of just having faith in the airline to keep their obligation of departing on time!!!!!

[Silent Bob]

The last part is actually true, about booking a day earlier due to the fact that you never know what can happen. Just when you think you booked the perfect trip, everything confirmed and locked in, you find out either your flight's delayed, cancelled, overbooked (and you have no seat), mechanical failure, or your schedule was changed. So ya if u (or anyone ever go on a cruise) try to get to your city of departure a day earlier. Missing your plane is one thing, but missing your ship? Yikes! so far its never happen. but I've followed that tip for years! sometimes i try to get out 2 days in advance. Why? because i know the airlines, when it comes to departure times, are never consistent. But yes, a very good tip, one that i share around the office.

It also looks like they booked you to where your ship was gonna port next, which means you would have to find your way to the ship. again not a bad deal, most folks would have just gone home, but you made it.

Lastly, people, don't rely on food vouchers to get you through. They suck plain and simple. you end up spending your own money anyway, so why not just spend your own money and eat where u want rather than be restricted by what the airline gives you and the turn around and get angry because they didn't give you enough?