By RamonRamon is the creator of Travelling Companion. He focuses on flight reviews, hotel reviews, and helping stretch your travel dollars, miles, and points further while traveling in comfort.
In this series of five reviews I focus on the experience flying American Airlines in First Class domestically and Business Class on flights to the Caribbean. The posts compare American Airlines First Class and Business Class across four different aircraft on medium-haul flights between 3-4 hours where meals are served.
American Airlines First and Business Class Reviews American Airlines CRJ-900 SBA-DFW First Class Review American Airlines 737-800 DFW-DCA First Class Review American Airlines E-175 NAS-DCA Business Class Review American Airlines E-175 DCA-MSY First Class Review American Airlines A321 SJU-CLT Business Class Review Flight Overview This flight had the worse airline meal I had ever eaten in First, Business, or Economy class and it is embarrassing that American Airlines delivered an experience this bad on a three and a half hour flight. Pros- Freshly Upholstered and Comfortable Seats Cons- Barely Edible Food, Bad Drink Service, No USB or AC Power Plugs, No Seat Back Entertainment, Limited Wi-Fi and Streaming Entertainment Plane and Seats We left a packed Avianca VIP Lounge, which I have previously reviewed, at San Juan (SJU) airport and headed to Gate C4 for our departure. We were upgraded to Business Class in advance on this flight using our 500 miles upgrades. We boarded quickly with other Business Class passengers and as we boarded I was impressed by the updated upholstery. We were seated in the bulkhead seats 1D and 1F which had 36 inches of pitch and 21 inches of width on this version of the A321.The seats seemed new and had a nice comfortable head rest. 
American Airlines A321 First Business Class Seat
Once we settled into our seats our positive impression quickly faded as we scrambled to look for power plugs for our phones. The search was for naught as we did not find any USB or AC power plugs. I couldn't believe that American Airlines would refurbish the seats on the plane but not add power plugs so I confirmed with the flight attendant serving Business Class. She confirmed that the plane indeed did not have power plugs and said the plane was "not an American Airlines original". She meant that this is a legacy US Airways plane which American Airlines acquired during the 2015 merger with US Airways. These planes did not have in-seat power plugs and by the comment I assumed that this flight attendant was likely a legacy American Airlines flight attendant. The fact that this was a legacy US Airways plane made sense since we were flying to a legacy US Airways hub in Charlotte (CLT) and is a good reason to avoid many legacy US Airways hubs including CLT and Philadelphia (PHL). After resigning to the fact that we were not going to have power for the entire flight I went back into my bag to see if I could pull out my tablet or a book but the overhead bin was stuck. After trying to open the bin several times without success I asked for the flight attendant's help and after she was unsuccessful another flight attendant came over and was finally able to open the bin. After I was seated passengers continued to board and the flight attendants grew nervous that the flight would be delayed because the catering had not yet arrived. Finally, the catering arrived and our flight ended up departing nine minutes early.
Amenities and In-Flight Entertainment Waiting at our seats upon boarding was a thin blanket which I ended up not using on this flight. It seemed to be the same blanket American Airlines offers in First Class on domestic flights. Unlike the 737-800 I flew from Dallas to Washington D.C. this plane had GoGo ground based Wi-Fi which does not turn on until the plane reaches 10,000 feet. Because the plane also did not have a seat back in-flight entertainment (IFE) screen we needed the Wi-Fi to activate before watching any IFE. However, once the plane reached 10,000 feet I tried to connect and could not connect since the vast majority of Latin America and the Caribbean are outside of GoGo ground based Wi-Fi range. This was the same problem I had on an earlier flight from San Juan. I was again frustrated that American Airlines was using a plane for a three and a half hour flight that was not equipped with seat back entertainment, in-seat power, and that had IFE that did not work for the majority of the flight. The IFE finally functioned with about hour and half remaining in flight. I turned it on briefly to browse the IFE options but I was still frustrated by the lack of in-seat power plugs. 
American Airlines Streaming In-Flight Entertainment
Food and Drinks The entire food and drink experience on this flight was terrible. It started on the ground when we were not served any pre-departure drinks because of the late arriving catering. I overheard the flight attendants discussing whether they should serve a pre-departure drink, however, they decided not to do so because the ice from the previous flight had melted and they only had juice and water. Once the catering arrived the flight attendants were more focused on departing on time because of American Airlines strategic push. The flight attendants ended up spending all of their time putting away the catering instead of taking care of passengers. About 20 minutes after takeoff the Business Class flight attendant distributed hot towels and took drink orders. After the drink orders the flight attendant brought around our drinks along with warm nuts. We ended up ordering red wine which was okay.  Red Wine and Warm Nuts
As we waited for the flight attendant to come around for meal order we smelt the scent of burning bread in the galley. The flight attendant didn't return to get meal orders until about 45 minutes after takeoff. This was the longest I could remember waiting for a meal order on any Business or First Class flight. The flight attendant started meal selection from back which meant we ended up picking last. On this flight American Airlines was serving dinner and the options for other passengers were a choice between the beef filet or Southwest lasagna. By the time the flight attendant reached us the only remaining option was the Southwest lasagna. I was very annoyed since I wanted the beef filet, however, Christina and I went ahead and took the Southwest lasagna. About 1 hour into the flight the food was finally served. Despite ordering the same dish Christina and I received different sides. I was served two salads while Christina was served a salad with a side of Indian flavored chicken which did not fit the Southwest lasagna theme at all.
Ramon's Southwest Lasagna
Christina suspected that she was served this chicken dish because she asked if the lasagna had any meat. Also, on the side of our meal was a hard white bread which was unremarkable.
Christina's Southwest Lasagna
The first salad which Christina and I were both served came with butter lettuce, cranberries, and arugula. Christina and I agreed the butter lettuce was really bad but she did enjoy the cranberries. My second salad was served with arugula, tomatoes, and parmesan cheese. The second salad was even worse than the first. The ball of parmesan cheese had no flavor and the tomatoes were disgusting. I mostly left both salads untouched and moved on to the main dish the Southwest lasagna. The lasagna had cheese, corn, and was topped with what tasted like sriracha sauce. I usually love lasagna but this was barely edible and I can easily say this was the most disgusting dish I had ever been served on an airplane. Who puts sriracha sauce on lasagna? The meal service ended with a warm chocolate chip cookie which I usually look forward to on American Airlines but thsi time was served a little hard.
American Airlines Chocolate Cookie
Overall, this was the worse meal I have been served in any class on an airplane and it is embarrassing that American Airlines would serve this meal to anyone especially Business Class customers.
Service The Business Class flight attendant on our flight certainly tried hard but seemed to be in over her head. This started from the minute we walked on the plane where she and the other flight attendant seemed really nervous about departing late and focused more on this issue which was mostly out of their hands instead of serving the passengers. The manner in which she talked about the plane not being an American Airlines original showed her frustration with the airline's product. After take off she was very slow taking food and drink orders and delivering food. Once the meal service was complete she was slow to clear away dishes and empty glasses. At one point we waited an hour for her to clear our empty glasses. When the flight attendant heard us complaining to each other about the meal and saw that our food was barely eaten she apologized and offered us compensation. American Airlines rolled out a compensation program in 2018 which flight attendants can use onboard called iSolve and it was my first experience with this system. As Gold elites Christina and I ended up with 7,500 miles because of our issues with the food which I thought was fair compensation. The flight attendant also sent us home with a bottle of wine as an apology. I really appreciated that the flight attendant tried hard to make up for all of the issues on this flight and I gave her a one of our outstanding service coupons for her effort. We ended up talking and she told me that flight attendants constantly send American Airlines management notes about all of the issues but management doesn't listen to staff. Unfortunately, this is symptomatic of a bigger problem at American Airlines where management doesn't listen to employee or passenger feedback and leaves employees apologizing for the airline. It is clear that American Airlines needs to work on staffing for these flights and service training for flight attendants to improve the passenger experience. Take Away The comfortable and newly upholstered seats were not enough to make up for the many problems on this flight. The lack of any seat-back IFE on this flight was compounded by the lack of any power plugs for the entire flight and streaming IFE for the vast majority of the flight. The food on this flight was disgusting and added to an embarrassing Business Class experience from American Airlines. Furthermore, the staff on this flight were overwhelmed and the Business Class flight attendant was left having to apologize for American Airlines embarrassing experience. My advice is to do your best to avoid lasagna and the legacy US Airways A321 when flying on American Airlines.
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By RamonRamon is the creator of Travelling Companion. He focuses on flight review, hotel reviews, and helping stretch your travel dollars, miles, and points further. Flight Overview An inexperienced crew of flight attendants delivered the worse service I had ever experienced in Economy on American Airlines, handled a passenger emergency poorly, and this flight experience showed that American Airlines needs to improve its communication. Pros-None Cons-Poor Emergency Communication, Inexperienced Flight Attendants, Poor IFE, Inadequate Wi-Fi, Barely Functional Power Plugs, Poor Plane Maintenance, and Poor Delay Communication San Juan Condado Trip Report San Juan Condado Trip Overview American Airlines Boeing 767-300 Economy PHL-SJU Review AC Hotel San Juan Condado Avianca VIP Lounge American Airlines Boeing 737-800 Economy SJU-PHL Review American Airlines A319 First Class PHL-DCA Review Terminal and Boarding After we left the Avianca VIP lounge we headed to C4 which was a short walk from the lounge. This is where the poor experience on this flight began. This flight ended up being emblematic of American Airlines’ poor communications, inconsistent IFE, and bad service. When we reached the gate the flight was delayed by 15 minutes but they waited until the scheduled boarding time to announce the delay. This is one of the frustrating aspects of flying with American Airlines, the airline does a bad job communicating delays. I have had many flights where the plane is not at the gate at the scheduled boarding time yet American Airlines still shows the same boarding time and departure time. In this case, I had no clue what caused the delay because American Airlines never communicated what caused the delay and never updated the boarding time. If we knew the flight was going to be delayed and the new boarding time we could have waited in the lounge instead of standing at the now crowded gate.  SJU Gate C4 As we boarded the flight attendants called groups 2 and 3 and no passengers boarded. This has been my experience on a leisure routes such as San Juan because not as many elites fly these routes especially on the weekend and because of less competition, they are much more likely to be upgraded to Business Class and therefore board with Group 1. We were the first to board in Group 4 and the gate agent asked my last name which I had never experienced before and I assumed was due to computer issues.  Boeing 737-800 Plane and Seats The Boeing 737-800 is the most common plane type in American Airlines' fleet and the airlines had 304 of the planes at the end of 2018 so it is likely if you fly domestically you will eventually fly this plane type. The plane has 3-3 seating in economy and in the version we flew had 114 seats in economy (31 inches of pitch) and 30 in main cabin extra (34 inches of pitch). We were seated in row 8 of Main Cabin Extra and lucked out by not having another passenger in our set of three seats.  American Airlines 737-800 Cabin The interior of the plane was much newer than the 767 we flew over from Philadephia but after getting seated we realized that it still had issues. Each set of three seats shared two plugs located below the seats. While the plugs actually worked, which isn't always the case on American Airlines, they were so loose that they were nearly useless. Every time I plugged in the phone charger it fell out. The only way I could keep my plug in was to hold it in firmly with the hand which I quickly grew tired of doing and I eventually just gave up. If American Airlines insists on passengers bringing on their own in-flight entertainment then it must make sure that all of the power plugs work.  Boeing 737-800 Power Plug However, the non-functioning power plugs were not the end of issues with the plane. When I went to use the bathroom I noticed that one of the seats in the last row on one side was completely broken and unusable. This demonstrated the extent of American Airlines maintenance issues on this plane and was symbolic of there fleet-wide maintenance issues.  Broken Seat In-Flight Entertainment This version of the 737-800 did not have seat back in-flight entertainment (IFE) and instead had overhead screens. However, American Airlines is so opposed to seat-back entertainment on domestic flights that they are taking out screens already installed on Boeing 737-800s. Instead their solution is to offer streaming entertainment. American Airlines typically uses the overhead screens to show the safety video, announcements, and stream entertainment. The IFE system had numerous issues during our flight which began right after departure. The flight attendants attempted to screen the safety video on the IFE and the entire system malfunctioned so they had to do the safety demonstration manually. Eventually the screens started to work and they screen a movie I had no interest in watching.  IFE Overhead Screens I could have blocked out the bad movie if the streaming entertainment was working or if I could listen to music on my phone. However, as I mentioned earlier that was a major problem on this flight because the power plugs barely functioned. To compound the problem when I logged onto the streaming IFE it was not working because, just like on our flight to Puerto Rico, American Airlines utilized a plane with GoGo internet, which also provides the streaming IFE, and only works in the continental United States. This was very frustrating and unfortunately is the case on many American Airlines narrow body jets sent to Latin America and the Caribbean.  GoGo Internet Unavailable Message Service and In-Flight Emergency
Typically, it is difficult to judge service in the economy cabin because of limited interaction during flight but on this flight I experienced the worse service I have experienced in an American Airlines economy cabin. About one hour into the flight, on this four hour flight, the flight attendants still had not begun drink service. Instead the flight attendants were chatting in the forward galley. Finally, when the drink service began the flight attendant did what I thought to be impossible and messed up drink service in economy. First, American Airlines generally offers a choice between cookies and pretzels. Not complicated at all I know but somehow we were not given any choice and the flight attendant just handed us both pretzels despite the fact that he had a lot of cookies left and offered them later. Second, he served Christina the wrong drink and never asked me what I wanted to drink. Christina asked for a Ginger Ale and he asked in response, Sprite? Christina once again said Ginger Ale and since he had completely ignored me I told him I would like apple juice and he asked, instead of the Sprite? I said no and he handed Christina a Sprite anyways. As he walked away I had a puzzled look on my face since this was the first time I have seem a flight attendant mess up an economy drink service. This particular flight attendant was young and seemed very inexperienced and it showed me just how much American Airlines needs to work on its service training. Overall, all of the crew seemed very young and inexperienced and unfortunately this came into play in a much more important way than the meal service. With about one and a half hours left in flight we began to experience turbulence and a passenger pressed the flight attendant call button. The flight attendant, who was seated because of the turbulence, asked the passenger to press the button again if it was an emergency and the passenger pressed it again. It turned out that a passenger felt light headed and fainted in the middle of the flight. The flight attendants asked if there was anyone with medical training onboard and two passengers responded and went over to help. At one point the flight attendants seemed to be in a state of panic unsure what to do and ran to get blankets and talked to each other in a nervous tone. The panic from the flight attendants made passengers very nervous. At one point the captain even came out to check on the sick passenger. Several passengers asked what was going on and if we would need to divert the flight. However, through this whole incident there was no communication to the passengers from the flight attendants or the captain. None of the passengers knew what was happening and at one point in the middle of this medical emergency, a flight attendant got into a verbal altercation with a passenger. Eventually, the flight attendant went over to apologize to the passenger. The was the American Airlines crew on this flight dealt with the emergency really showed me that American Airlines needs to improve its communication in emergency situations and its training. In the end we landed in Philadelphia 17 minutes late. Take Away American Airlines failed in all phases of this flight and this my first review where I have nothing positive to say. American Airlines failed on multiple fronts including in communications, training, maintenance, service, and in-flight entertainment. This airplane was poorly maintained and it showed with the barely functional power plugs, broken seat and malfunctioning overhead IFE screen. The communicated the delay poorly and failed to keep passengers up-to date during an in-flight medical emergency. Worst of all the airline sent a very inexperienced and inadequately trained crew on this flight. This was my worse flight in economy on American Airlines and the airline really needs to focus on improving its communication and training. This flight began the process of me questioning my loyalty to American Airlines. By RamonRamon is the creator of Travelling Companion. He focuses on flight reviews, hotel reviews, and helping stretch your travel dollars, miles, and points further. Lounge Overview While the lounge was above average it was still the best domestic Priority Pass lounge I had experienced which was driven by the presence of hot food and good hot drinks. Pros-Good Food, Wide Drink Selection, Good Machine-made Hot Chocolate Cons-Indifferent Service, Empty Food Containers San Juan Condado Trip Report San Juan Condado Trip Overview American Airlines Boeing 767-300 Economy PHL-SJU Review AC Hotel San Juan Condado Avianca VIP Lounge American Airlines Boeing 737-800 Economy SJU-PHL Review American Airlines A319 First Class PHL-DCA Review Location After we cleared security we entered the San Juan Luis Muñoz Marín Airport (SJU) duty free shopping area. This duty free area was smaller than the one that we saw in London-Gatwick but similarly required passengers to walk through it is access the gates.  SJU Duty Free Once we excited that duty free area we entered the terminal and saw signs pointing us to the Avianca VIP lounge. The lounge is open from 4 am-8pm, located at the beginning of Terminal C near American Airlines flights, and operated by a contractor Global Lounge Network. SJU has four terminals (A,B,C,D) but three of the terminals B, C, and D share a security check point and Jet Blue operates the majority of the flights out of Terminal so this lounge is easily accessible to all flights back to the U.S. except on Jet Blue. We followed the signs for VIP Lounge and saw a large sign naming all of the memberships that the lounge accepts and airlines that grant select passengers access to the lounge. We had access to this lounge through my Priority Pass membership a benefit of my Chase Sapphire Reserve Card.  Lounge We headed up the elevator to the third floor and went through a double doors to enter the lounge. We were checked into the lounge quickly by an agent who seemed bored. The lounge itself is small and had four types of seating. Small white chairs and dining tables at the center of the lounge, high top tables with black chairs near the bar, red chairs and white tables by the windows, and black chairs with white tables in a separate TV viewing area. The lounge had three TVs but they were all on very low volume. The general atmosphere was very casual compared to other lounges I have been seen. However, this makes sense since Puerto Rico is a primarily leisure destination for tourists. The lounge also featured a departures board which is typical of an airport lounge.  Lounge Seating One of the things I appreciated about the lounge were cute signs that were all around to label the different areas of the lounge. For example, one near the food said "Grab a bite to eat" and another in the lounge said "This is just a closet". It is nice to see a little bit of light-heartedness in a airport lounge.  Lounge Sign Food and Drinks The food selection in this lounge was the best I have seen in a U.S. Priority Pass lounge. It was the first time I had seen a U.S Priority Pass lounge with a hot meal option. The lounge served penne pasta, which was average, along with chicken with mushrooms which was very good! The lounge also served a salad with apple vinaigrette, parmesan cheese, and balsamic vinaigrette as additions.  The lounge also had signs for a soup and fruit but both were empty during our visit. For dessert the lounge served angel food cake. I am not a fan of angel food cake but Christina is a fan and thought it was very good.  The lounge's drink selection included a self-serve bar with a selection of wine and liquor. Below the self-serve bar were three coolers containing beer and soft drinks. During our visit they also were serving a fresh fruit punch which I throughly enjoyed. Another highlight of the lounge was the two Nescafe machines.  The machines served a variety of coffee, including lattes, cappuccinos, and espressos, along with hot chocolate. I really liked the hot chocolate primarily because it served with real milk unlike most machine hot chocolate which are served with is served with hot water. Am I the only one who hates having hot chocolate with water?  Service
I had limited interaction with the lounge staff here but when I saw the staff at work they seem to be indifferent. As I mentioned at check-in the staff members seemed bored. She was not rude but not give us a friendly greeting. The staff walking around the lounge also did not seem to be a in a rush to help or answer question but no one was rude. Overall I would say the staff here was indifferent to the guests in the lounge. Summary Overall, the Avianca VIP Lounge was an above average lounge which was good enough to make it the best domestic lounge I had experienced. I liked that the lounge's location was near the American Airlines gates and that it had hot food options, some of which were actually good, and a wide selection of alcoholic drinks. If you find yourself waiting for a flight at SJU the Avianca VIP lounge is worth checking out. |
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