On April 1, 2011, 9 of us arrived at the San Diego Airport, ready to embark on our Caribbean Cruise vacation. We were scheduled to depart on USAirflight 154 at 10:10PM bound for arrival in Miami at 10:41 AM. Boarding the plane was delayed until 10:30PM at which time we were seated and prepared to take off. While we were getting settled on the aircraft, we were informed that the air conditioning needed to be checked. This issue was quickly remedied. The plane was on the runway, waiting for takeoff, when we were informed that due to Federal Aviation Administration regulations FAA AC36-1E and FAA AC36-2C, flights are restricted from departing after 11:30 PM. Refer to SDCRAA Code 9.40, Airport Use Restrictions. We returned to the gate and our flight was canceled. Once we realized that it was impossible to leave that night, we went into overdrive in order to reschedule our flight and get to Miami to board our ship. According to the terms of our Access America policy, we immediately contacted them and explained the facts of our situation and each of our families was assigned a claim number and instructions for accessing claim forms and submitting them for reimbursement. At no time did the Access America agent offer assistance in getting us to our destination. We also contacted our travel agent who went to her office in the middle of the night to help us, spending hours on the phone and Internet trying to find alternative flight arrangements. We were willing to drive 3 hours to Los Angeles and even 6 hours to Pheonix, Arizona if we could have gotten on a flight. We availed ourselves of every resource and did everything humanly possible to meet up with our cruise. This included going to the extremes of attempting to intercept the cruise at various ports so as not to lose the entire vacation. Unfortunately, it was the start of Spring Break and there were no flights available. We were devastated by the cancellation. The only thing that comforted us was knowing that we had the protection of our travel insurance. Boy, were we in for a big surprise. Even though our policy clearly states that cancellations mandated by the FAA are a covered benefit, they are denying our claims. At the time, we had no idea that this was typical of Access America. Now, after reading hundreds of reviews we are aware that we are fighting an uphill battle. We are at our wits end. We need help. If you would like, I can provide you with all of our supporting documentation, just let me know. Access America denied our appeal stating that "there was no verification that the next available flight would have been greater than half your trip length". We gave them all of our phone records, our cellular phone data log showing the amount of time we spent on the internet, a letter from our Travel Agent, letters from US Airways stating that we could not be reaccomodated on another flight. We don't know what else to provide them. There was no way we could reach our cruise. Our policy says that all services must be stopped for 24 consecutive hours due to a FAA mandate. Our airline cancelled all services aboard that aircraft for 24 consecutive hours (if services had been reinstated at any time, we would have been on the flight). And we were most certainly not offered an alternate itinerary although US Airways tried like crazy to get us to our destination. When US Airways could not get us on another flight, they reimbursed us the amount of our tickets and the cost for our baggage. We also just realized the other day that Norwegian Cruise Lines reimbursed us for the taxes we paid. But they did not reimburse us for any of our cruise costs. Our insurance claim is just for the amount of the cruise. Each of our family's cruises cost around $8, 000. Please, if there is anything you can do, let us know I know that Access America does not want to pay, but it's just wrong. My email address is
[email protected]. Thank you. Sincerely, The Cotta and Winslow families.
