American Airlines Crushed A Family’s Stroller — Promised To Pay, Then Rejects Claim As ‘Normal Wear And Tear’

American Airlines crushed a family’s stroller – and told them that’s normal wear and tear, they get nothing. Despite having evidence of the airline’s mistreatment, they’re being stonewalled. What should they do?

The family was flying American Airlines out of Costa Rica, and connecting in Dallas. They waited on the jetbridge for “about 15 minutes” for strollers to come up. Something was clearly wrong!

That’s when we noticed the attendants scrambling to try and wiggle free the strollers that were all smashed together. Eventually they got all of them free except for one, that’s when we noticed that the stroller seen in the video was pinned in the lift and had been smashing down everything else.

The stroller “now bounces significantly when pushed.” The wheel is deformed. An agent promised that American would cover the damage, the customer filed a baggage claim as instructed, but has been told that that’s just “normal wear and tear.”

This is video of one of the other trapped strollers from the flight:

American Airlines

I’d say that the steps here are:

1. Respond to the claim rejection with an escalation, rejecting the response and insisting that the situation be reviewed at a higher level. Claims are screened quickly, with an aim to cost-minimization. A real person with greater discretion might get a different outcome.

2. File a Department of Transportation Consumer Complaint. The current DOT isn’t aggressively engaging in enforcement actions the way the previous one did, but each complaint should get real human review at the airline.

3. Seek reimbursement in small claims court.

American Airlines is notorious for their poor handling of wheelchairs and was fined $50 million for it along with “unsafe physical assistance that at times resulted in injuries and undignified treatment of wheelchair users” last year. So poor handling of gate checked strollers shouldn’t surprise anyone.

That’s why it’s important to bring a collapsible stroller as a carry-on and bring it on board, rather than trusting American with it.

American Airlines has an official policy document that says collapsible strollers that fit in the overhead bin are permitted onboard aircraft (or checked as baggage for free). Here’s the policy to bring with you on your next flight.

However, a policy entitlement doesn’t trump what a rogue gate agent on a power trip does on the day of departure as I learned the hard way from notorious bad apple Matt in San Diego.

Indeed, an American gate agent forced a baby out of a car seat. Another insisted that children had to carry their own bags on board and parents could not help, or else the bags wouldn’t be permitted in the cabin.