Is American Airlines child unfriendly?

[Masalamama]

We just took our second long haul holiday overseas with our 7 month old. Not sure if American Airlines actually likes having babies on flights!! They don't provide baby food, which I had to carry only then for each pot to be opened by security and rendered useless for consumption over an 18 hr journey! Only one bassinet per flight and no guarantee that we would get a free seat to park our car seat.

I tried buying a seat for her on the way back a week before departure. The customer service rep advised us to wait until a day or two before the flight. Then we were told the $367 ticket would cost us $2,480!

No one bothered to show us how to use the car seat once on the flight. And finally, we had to wait an hour for our stroller outside the aircraft in Miami, which we then found in a corner of baggage reclaim, by which time our lo was ready to explode with anger... oh, and US customs took great offence to the banana I was carrying for her tea!!

Ironically, the AA charity of choice is one fr deprived children... doesn't charity begin at home? They could start feeding the babies on their flights!!

Is this normal? Emirates was far better when we flew to India. Any other airlines I should avoid with a barge pole?? Let's just say I won't be flying AA in a rush...

i heard that the best are virgin, BA are pretty shite these day and dont ever fly with an american airline, although i hear that canada air are good , but prob dont fly to where to want to go . HTH

That's about par for the course re AA. No service at all really.

Would stick to using a British based carrier when flying to the US - you will be more likely to get a better service overall. Cheaper is not always cheerful and US airliens are operating generally one step ahead of Chapter 11.

Virgin's service has gone downhill over the years, there have been lots of cutbacks made throughout the fleet.

Seats are usually a lot more expensive closer to flight departure. You would not have been given a seat for your child to sit on anyway, they would have expected you to have her on your lap for the duration!.

US customs do not like passengers bringing in fruit and vegetables from outside the US (due to potential damage to their agriculture). Am not therefore surprised they disliked the banana. you probably had to bin it.

Not really much use for travelling to the US, but we recently flew Singapore Airlines with 7 mo dd and they were absolutely lovely - couldn't have been more helpful.

I flew Virgin a couple of years ago (pre-dd) and thought they were terrible then so would never willingly use them again and certainly not now with a small person as well...

Once they are too big to sit on your lap, I think you need to book a seat, despite the rule that they can travel without a seat up to 2 years old. Then you get baggage allowance, hand luggage allocation etc, as well as the seat. From a year onwards I've always booked a seat for mine. And I never expect to have the buggy back until after all the suitcases have been unloaded, it's then a pleasant surprise if it ever reappears sooner!

Feeding babies on a flight is difficult, but at 7 months you are not far off being able to take a supply of rice cakes, biscuits and dried fruit, which will do for a long haul, supplemented by yoghurts and bread rolls from the in-flight meal. And you can always take empty bottles, milk powder and buy Evian airside to mix it with.

I think traveling with babies/toddlers is difficult, whoever you fly with, and you have be be prepared to be completely self-sufficient for the whole journey.

Hmmm, thanks ladies. I'll consider it a million times before ding it again. Although Emirates did make it seem pretty do-able. No more US airlines for sure!!