American Airlines turns a bad situation into a positive one

In business and in life, it’s not necessarily what things happen, but instead how you react to them. This goes for people as well as companies.

Last week I was on an American Airlines flight from Denver to Chicago. I was wiped out after a 5 day business conference in Colorado Springs, and I was hoping to get home on time so that I could kiss my kids goodnight.

The first sign that something was wrong was when I received the text message alert that the flight was 30 minutes late. By the time I checked in (2 hours before the flight), the delay had already reached 1 hour. After a quick lunch, I planted myself in a cubicle at  the Admirals Club to get some work done. Every 15 minutes, my phone would buzz with another alert telling me the flight was delayed even longer.

Turns out there was a mechanical problem with the plane in Chicago. After trying to fix the plane, they ended up swapping aircraft. Instead of taking off from Denver at 3pm, we ended up leaving from Denver at 8pm. To American’s credit, they did try to accommodate me on another airline, but all of the seats were full.

I didn’t grumble too much (other than a few Tweets), and tried to look at the positive side. I’d rather have a fully functional airplane than a broken one. Also, I did manage to get a ton of work done in the Admirals Club.

Today (less than a week later), I received an unsolicited appology email from American Airlines along with a 5,000 mile frequent flier mileage credit. It’s this type of attention and focus on the customer that keeps me flying with American.

Thank you American Airlines!