American Airlines Don't check your bags when you fly American Airlines! Little Rock Arkansas

I checked my bag with American Airlines at 6:20 am with American Airlines in Minneapolis on Monday, June 18. When I arrived in Little Rock at about 8:30 p.m., it hadn't arrived with me. I was told at the baggage office that it would be a good idea for me to wait for the 10:30 p.m. arrival of a Southwest plane since they sometimes contract with Southwest for deliveries after their own flights have ended for the day. I waited, but the bag did not arrive. I was told it would be delivered to my destination in Batesville, 90 miles from Little Rock, on Tuesday, so I drove my rental car to Batesville, arriving at 1:00 a.m. Tuesday came and went, as did my interview with a local college in Batesville, but my bag did not arrive. It contained dress shoes, a suit, underwear, toiletries, etc. Calls to the 800# for tracking baggage didn't help much. Neither did the internet site for checking baggage status. People whom I spoke with on the phone were courteous and appeared to be trying to help, but the net result was poor. On Wednesday morning, I called again to find out what had happenned. At this point, I learned that my bag had been contracted to FedEx. FedEx has shipped my bag from Little Rock, where it had finally arrived on the evening of Tuesday, June 19, to Memphis, which is 140 miles from Little Rock, and a completely different direction from Little Rock than Batesville. From there, the bag wen to Jonesboro. I left to catch my plane in Little Rock, which left Little Rock around 12:15. By 6:00 p.m., Wednesday, June 20, I was back home in Minneapolis, but my bag had not even arrived in Batesville yet! A person working baggage at Little Rock had promised that he would intercept the FedEx delivery to Batesville and get them shipped to Minneapolis, but this didn't happen. Instead, they were delivered to Batesville sometime between 9 p.m. Wednesday and 9 a.m. Thursday. After complaining to American Airlines baggage status while using the 800#, no offer to ship it back to my home was provided. Instead, the best they could offer me was to have someone in Batesville deliver the bag to AA baggage in Little Rock. This was done on Sunday, June 24, and the bags arrived sometime after 6 p.m. on June 25. Around 7 p.m., AA baggage called to inform me that my bag would be delivered by Airport Delivery Service. Within a half-hour, Airport Delivery called to schedule delivery. I have been waiting since then, but the bag has not yet shown up. I'm expecting about 1 a.m., June 26--almost 8 full days since I originally checked the bag in! If they gave frequent flyer miles to airline baggage, I'd have a freebie by now, but I'd never use it because I'd be afraid that they would lose the bags!

Robert
Minneapolis, Minnesota
U.S.A.