The Cranky Flier made this post to his blog last week. In short, CF decried a woman’s New York Times Op-Ed on the demise of the glory days of travel which she apparently experienced as a flight attendant for TWA.   The Cranky Flier reckons that the changes that deregulation has brought on are what has made air travel affordable and to bring back the high service given in the 50’s, 60’s and early 70’s would deny that access to most of us.   Quite honestly, I do agree with him but I think a point was missed in Ann Hood’s Op Ed as well.

 

I’m pretty sure that Ms. Hood was decrying the loss of the great meals, comforting flight attendants and more correct behaviour but I think what prompted her Op Ed was actually a perceived lack of service on *any* level by airlines today.  I don’t think anyone realistically expects air travel to include 3 choices of meals, pillows and blankets and free cocktails anymore.  However, what causes people to continue to get upset is the generally poor nature of any service provided by most airlines.

 

I experienced that service as an airline brat from the late 1960’s to the early 1980’s and it really was pretty remarkable in many respects.  However, I don’t miss the Chateau Briand on Braniff flights between Dallas and Portland and I really don’t seem to miss the first class seat or the pillows or drinks.  OK, I do miss the seats but that is because I’m a 6’2″ man weighing 260lbs with long legs. 

 

What drives this perceived lack of service is airlines not keeping promises made when you buy a ticket.  Those promises are outlined by airline advertising which is quite good at showing a relaxing customer on an airplane enjoying a drink as he or she flies to their destination with the expectation that the airplane will be kept at comfortable temperature and will arrive on time.

 

Let’s look at what an airline passenger might enjoy from the time they decide to book a flight to the time they arrive back home from their trip.   First, they must book their flight online.  Most people not only don’t mind this, they prefer it these days.  However, none of us are amused when we attempt to book a flight online only to find the website overloaded from a fare sale or network disruption caused by weather.   If the customer tries to phone the airline to book they’ll be faced with long phone queues, surly reservations agents and the threat that their airline ticket is now going to cost them a bit more for booking via phone.

 

The customer is gratified at being able to check in early through the web but when they arrive at the airport they discover that checking in their suitcase requires them to stand in another long line in order that they might essentially check-in a second time so they can check a bag.  Even if they only have one bag, they’ll have to pay a fee to check it unless they are a road warrior with some sort of privileged status with the airlines’ frequent flier clubs.   Then they get to stand in yet another line while watching those same privileged fliers go through an express line with the TSA. 

 

Once at the gate, they’ll have to work to find an open seat to sit in while waiting for boarding call because aircraft are flying much more full these days and most gates at most airports aren’t designed to accommodate the loads that many airlines serve on their narrowbody aircraft.   At the boarding call, they get to watch those same privileged fliers board first onto the aircraft (even if they aren’t flying first class that day with their free upgrades they still get to board first) and then wait for their group to be called while some fellow passengers cheat and just board early anyway.  Since most customer service agents at the gate are unwilling to enforce the rules in many cases, these cheaters get away with that move.

 

If the passenger has a boarding call in the last 1 or 2 groups, they get to discover that all the other passengers have apparently carried their life’s possessions with them and occupied all the overhead luggage space.  If they say anything about the lack of space, some flight attendant will inform them that they might have to gate check their bag or put it under the seat in front of them.  Putting a bag under the seat in front of you hasn’t really been possible for adults since the early 80’s when airlines reduced seat pitch in coach from an accommodating 34 to 38 inches of space down to a tight 30 to 32 inches of space.   So, they put their coat in a crammed overhead bin and hand over their luggage to a surly flight attendant who is annoyed that they now have to catch the attention of ground personnel so the bag can be loaded in the luggage compartment.

 

Once seated, the passenger waits and waits for departure from the gate which is delayed a few minutes.  Finally after watching their watch for an additional 13 minutes, someone hurriedly closes the door and the pilots get a pushback.  Technically, the flight has left on time at this point.  Only the pushback results in them taxiiing slowly towards the runway where they run into a traffic jam of aircraft waiting to take off because most airports are woefully lacking in the infrastructure to accomodate the number of flights trying to depart at the same time. 

 

After another delay of 20 minutes, the aircraft takes off.  As it levels off, the surly flight attendants go to work immediately to serve their one beverage service during the 2 hour flight.  Now, the passenger knows that soft drinks (and virtually any other beverage) now costs money so they ask for water when it is their turn and find a surly flight attendant telling them that will be $3 for the half litre bottle of water they offer.   The passengers declines the water and tries to recline their seat only to discover that while the seat may recline, it reclines right into the knees of the passenger behind them who objects loudly. 

 

Upon arrival at their destination, the passenger collects their things and moves slowly towards the door.  In some cases, they now must wait on the airbridge for their gate checked luggage to be brought up to them and in other instances they must now trudge off to find the baggage carousel to collect their things.  Because these aircraft are flying so full, this amounts to another delay of 20 minutes or more. 

 

Once they have their baggage, they make their way to the curbside and take out their cell phone to call the person picking them up to tell them they are at the curbside now.  They have to do this because security no longer allows anyone inside the terminal and the airport management is now charging $7 to park in the parking structure for less than an hour to pick up their party.  

 

Go through that kind of experience each way and it is no wonder that passengers are decrying service from airlines left and right.  If you only experienced half of what I’ve described just now, you’ll loathe and hate the airline you just flew.  Not because you weren’t served a 3 course meal but because the airline who implicitly promised you a safe, relatively pleasant and on time experience didn’t even really pretend to try to deliver that promise. 

 

What people want is for an airline to be honest in what they’ll provide and to honestly deliver it with the possible exception of extraordinary circumstances.  Oh, there are a few airlines who do deliver on such things and they quite rightly also make a profit.  Southwest, jetBlue and Continental all come to mind as airlines that really do delivery almost every time.  However, for much of the US traveling public, those three airlines aren’t an option nearly as often as they would like. 

 

Indeed, the situation I just described is almost precisely what I experienced flying Airtran last year from Dallas to New York City.   It’s disappointing at the least and offensive in most respects.   Did I like the ticket price?  Sure.  But if you accurately described the more likely service scenario and then asked if I wanted to pay $50 more to just get where I wanted to go without that scene playing out, I’d happily dive into my wallet and hand over the cash.  

 

The problem isn’t that we’re addicted to the lowest fares possible.  We’re not.  We, the passengers, are too stupid to realize that the airlines aren’t really going to deliver on those implicit promises.  Like the co-dependent wife who keeps taking back her alcoholic husband, we keep going back to the airlines and expecting a different experience.  The truth is, if we would examine our last service experiences with various airlines and seek a different choice until we found an airline that treated us well, airlines would pay attention. 

 

Why?  Because it quite literally costs nothing extra to deliver what an airline generally promises today.  jetBlue, in particular, gets that concept and that is the biggest reason why they have succeeded flying from JFK airport in spite of all the known obstacles to flying from that airport.  So does Continental as they have huge hubs at weather delayed airports too but they understand that giving the customer the implicitly promised service leads to greater success on their part.  Southwest promises less service than either of those two airlines but has some of the highest customer satisfaction of any airline because they DO DELIVER ON WHAT THEY DO PROMISE. 

 

It isn’t the glory days of service that we miss.  It’s the constant disappointment we experience on airlines today that causes us to lament a lack of service.  It simply doesn’t exist for most passengers.  We are treated better, on average, at an inexpensive restaurant where we spend about $9 for for a meal than we are on an airline where we spend $200 or more for a flight.  Most airlines’ attitude is to chastise the passenger for complaining.  That’s the motivator for the glory days.   In the glory days, airlines didn’t act like you should be grateful just to have a seat on their aircraft.  They acted grateful that you chose them to make you trip on.

Filed under: Airline Service, Deregulation by ajax