CHARLOTTE, N.C. (WBTV) – After three years of frustrating delays, a woman who uses a wheelchair at the airport spoke out about her experience at Charlotte-Douglas International Airport with American Airlines’ contracted company, Prospect Airport Services.
When a passenger books a ticket with American Airlines with a wheelchair, Prospect Airport Services often fulfills that request at Charlotte’s airport.
In 2022, Stacy Bradley started booking a wheelchair with her airline tickets.
Bradley explained, “Both of my hips and their bone on bone, excruciating, getting worse. It’s a genetic thing,”
She is a frequent flyer between New York and Charlotte for her doctor’s appointments, and she has “literal panic attacks whereas I’m booking the flight online, knowing I’m going to fly into Charlotte,” she said.
That is because of the repeated issues she has had when arriving at Charlotte’s airport, starting with the first time she booked a wheelchair.
“I got to Charlotte, and there was no wheelchair, and I waited,” she recalled. “I had the gate agent call, and no one showed.”
On that first trip, she ended up slowly walking all the way from the E Concourse to baggage claim. Six weeks later, she flew again, and the same thing happened. When she asked questions, she was told the company was “understaffed.”
The next flight she had through Charlotte, while there was a wheelchair available, there was no one there to push it. Two other times Bradley said she was pushed halfway through the concourse and then abandoned.
“I defined myself as a lawn ornament. You know, they just put you in a wheelchair and place you somewhere,” she stated.
Bradley said there were several times after waiting up to an hour she and another person in a wheelchair were pushed together by one employee.
“It’s wheelchair to wheelchair…it’s banging when you’re in pain, and your wheelchairs are just slamming against each other. It’s excruciating,” she recalled. “And [the other customer] had a cane across her lap and a walker. So she’s holding on to a lot, and I am getting kidney shotted with this cane.”
She also said there were two trips when American Airlines pilots had to step in.
“So the pilot left the plane to go to the gate agent to figure out why there was a delay in getting the wheelchair,” she explained, “He comes back in, ‘They’re coming.’ They never came. So, the flight attendant helped me walk down from the gate or to the gate from the plane, and I just sat, and I sat, and I sat.”
When WBTV reached out to Charlotte Douglas International Airport, they directed questions to American Airlines. WBTV repeatedly reached out to American Airlines asking if they are satisfied with the company and its service to their customers. However, they did not respond to any of our questions. WBTV also reached out to Prospect Airport Services through phone calls and emails asking questions and no one ever answered our questions. Prospect Airport Services is the same company WBTV previously reported did not provide a wheelchair for a passenger with a disability in 2021.
Bradley said when she flies through other airports, it is seamless and she wishes she could avoid travel through the Queen City altogether.
She said to others who require a wheelchair to fly, “Do not fly into Charlotte if you are in a wheelchair. You are invisible. You are not human. You are not worth dealing with. And they will treat you as such.”