Beware This American Airlines Rip-Off

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I don’t use the term “rip-off” often. In fact, outside of how I sometimes refer to airline surcharges, I don’t think I’ve used that term to describe anything else on Traveling For Miles…but my recent experience with American Airlines is really best described as just that.

I’m in the UK right now and, a couple of days ago, I happened to be using ITA Matrix to search for flights between Europe and California/Hawaii for next year. Most Business Class fares for the complex itinerary I was trying to book were coming in at well in excess of $3,000 so I decided to see what Economy Class fares I could find.

While the Economy Class fares were considerably cheaper most were still coming in at between $1,200 and $1,500…except for one. American Airlines/British Airways had fare out of Paris that was pricing up at $997 for the round trip and, as I am limited to a very specific set of dates on which I can travel, that’s a fantastic fare for this itinerary.

I opened up AA.com to see if I could get the same itinerary to price up there (you can’t buy fares on ITA Matrix, you can just search for them) and I was routed to American’s UK website (presumably because my IP address identified me as being in the UK). I was in a bit of a hurry at this point so I didn’t force the page to change to the US website….I just logged in and used the multi-city tool to find the fare I was looking for.

There it was….but in British Pounds:

a screenshot of a computer screen

Right now £1.00 is worth around $1.30 so that made the fare I was being quoted pretty much what ITA Matrix had shown me.

I wasn’t quite ready to book and, as I’ve already mentioned, I was in a bit of hurry so I put the fare on hold for 24 hours to give me some time to get a few other things sorted out before I booked.

The next day I was very glad that I’d placed the fare on hold as the prices had risen considerably overnight….so I logged back in to AA.com to pay for the reservation

Then the website started acting strangely.

When I went to change the country in the billing address section to “USA” (my credit cards are US credit cards)……a screenshot of a computer

….I kept being redirected to this error page:a screenshot of a website

And no matter what I did, I kept being redirected to this page.

I called up the Executive Platinum line to see what was going on and was told that, as my fare had been priced up in British Pounds, I had to use a British credit/debit card to pay online.

I had two issues with this:

  1. That isn’t a fact that is highlighted on the booking page when you place a fare on hold on the UK site.
  2. It was American that redirected me to the UK site and quoted me in pounds despite the fact that (a) I had attempted to access the US site and (b) I was logged in when I placed the fare on hold so the site knew my home address was in the US.

Anyway…..

The agent, who had been quite curt so far (the Executive Platinum desk is a shadow of its once fantastic self), came up with what I thought was a helpful suggestion.  She said that “the rate desk” could convert the fare to US dollars and I could then pay over the phone – great!

After a few minutes on hold she came back with a price – $1,076 + change (I forget the exact amount)

Hmmm…..

At a conversion rate 0f 1.3 USD to the pound (a conversion rate backed up by Google) that made the fare £823.11:a screenshot of a currency

I asked the agent why this was happening and she quickly got very snippy and told me that it was a take it or leave it situation.

When she started her next sentence with “you may be an Executive Platinum….” (something I hadn’t once mentioned) I knew it was time to hang up….so I thanked her and did just that.

I wasn’t about to pay $75+ more for a fare just because American felt like ripping me off on an exchange rate….besides, I was pretty sure there was a work around.

I recalled that, some time back, I had spotted that American Airlines allows you to pay via PayPal and, sure enough, when I went back to the website to try to pay for my fare again….there was the option:

a screenshot of a credit card payment option

I had really wanted to pay for my fare with my Amex Platinum card to get 5 membership rewards points per dollar spent but there were two issues now:

  1. For some reason PayPal wouldn’t allow me to associate an Amex Card with my account while trying to pay for the fare.
  2. Transactions made through payment processing sites like PayPal almost never qualify for bonus spend categories…this is even mentioned in Amex’s T&Cs:

Air or hotel purchases made through a third-party payment account or on an online travel agency will not qualify for additional points.

Never mind.

I used my Chase Reserve credit card (which was already associated with my PayPal account) and the booking was confirmed:

a screen shot of a computer

It took a little over 16 hours for the fare to reach the “ticketed” stage (at one point I started to wonder if there was an issue paying with PayPal) and, when the charge hit my Chase account this is what it showed:

a long line of a white object

The transaction is still pending so the eventual price I pay may be a dollar higher or lower (depending what final exchange rate Chase/Visa uses) but, as you can see, I paid pretty much what I expected to….and not the $1,076 that American Airlines quoted.

Bottom Line

Just the other day I wrote about how I’m doing my best to avoid American nowadays as I’ve just about had it with the endless benefit cuts and service downgrades……experiences like this just reinforce that decision.

I’ve only booked this trip with American because (a) it was the cheapest fare going (by some distance) and (b) because I’ll have 4 Systemwide upgrades to use next year and this is a good opportunity to try to use two of them.

Moral of the story: Avoid booking on AA’s US site if at all possibles, or,  if you ever find yourself placing a fare on hold on American’s UK website and then have issues paying for it online, remember that the airline will probably try to gouge you on the exchange rate….and quite badly. Better to either try to replicate the fare on the US version of American’s site or, if you can’t, pay via PayPal.

Update: Before I wrote this post I contacted American Airlines customer services )via email) to express my dissatisfaction with the exchange rate gouging and, more importantly, the attitude of the Executive Platinum desk agent. I have just received an apology, 10,000 AAdvantage miles and an undertaking that someone will be contacting me shorty to discuss what went wrong. All three are appreciated (although I wasn’t looking for compensation) and I’ll be interested to hear wheat American has to say when they get in touch.


 

1 COMMENT

  1. I have a simple solution around this. I come across this issue all the time, being Australian but doing all my travel anywhere but Australia for the past 5 years.

    Whenever I am booking an airline ( especially UA !! ) I book as a guest. That way it doesn’t automatically direct me to the Australian home page, AUD and the highest, most outrageous taxes in the world ( America, you ain’t seen nothin’ ).

    Then, when I put my credit card details in, instead of NSW I put NY and I use a US zip. It always goes through at the much cheaper USD fare.

    Then, once I am ticketed ( usually within a few hours ) I go back in to the site, manage my booking, and add my FF number, select the seats etc; etc;

    Alternatively, you should consider a VPN. I use Golden Frog which is fantastic. I pay USD89 pa for it and it has opened up a whole new world. They even give you tips on how to achieve the cheapest fares by altering your “location”. eg; buy a ticket from Egypt in EGP or Sri Lanka in LKR and 9 times out of 10, it’ll be cheaper than Europe, USA or the hideously expensive and rip-off Australia.

    It has been a revelation for me and even better, I show the cost of my VPN as a business expense so I claim it on my annual tax return.

    AA problem gone.

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