Tag Archives: Customer Experience

Well, US Airways is still my favorite airline and I refuse to give up on them. Today, I am traveling from Charlotte to Jacksonville and of course I am flying US Airways. The flight number is 1251. I was looking forward to this flight being the beginning of a good streak. No luck on that front.

It’s 10:22 as I sit on the plane in seat 14D. Unfortunately, it should be 10:07 but this is not a Hot Tub Time Machine. This is US Air and we were late boarding by 15 minutes. This may not seem like a big deal but I have a packed schedule in Jacksonville. I am eager to get there and get started. Kudos to US Air for announcing the late boarding and then following up with a notification at exactly the time they said they would provide an update. Any way you look at it, we boarded late.

So, we boarded late because of a “maintenance issue”. I am very happy that they chose to fix it first because I don’t think the technology to do maintenance in the air exists yet. The slightly worrisome thing about the flight is that after I was seated and before the captain announced his greeting there was an alarm that lasted around 5 – 10 seconds. What the heck was that and was it related to the maintenance issue? I guess I will never know.

The captain reinforced that we should listen to the flight attendants so I decided to do so. His exact words were “… No

matter how many times you have flown, it is always good to listen to their important information …” Uh, ok. In my mind, I was thinking they would do the normal “1L 1R” and “Fasten your belt tight around the waist by pulling the end” talks. Guess what? They did! Then, I got a chuckle out of it. The attendant then did the emergency lights exit row part and pointed to the ground to the “lights”. Well, I didn’t see any lights but I did see a string (see pic below). I poltilely asked the attendant, “That?” He chuckled. Needless to say, a chuckle was not the response I was expecting. I still wonder to myself at 10:35 if he will pick it up or is he in the back laughing with the other attendants about it the smarty pants passenger in 14D. What I do know is that if the plane crashes, I will pick up the string and be safe. Phew …

The ambience has greatly improved. The intermittent 1-3 second long beeping noise has stopped. Thankfully, when I get fixated on something I count, catalog, and generally obsess even more on it. So, at 10:41, we have experienced sixteen 1-3 second beeps. I have got to listen to music at this point so I don’t hear the beep anymore.

Oh my! We have an update in the safety features of the plane! We now have a cap of some sort to guide us to the exit. Perhaps, I can create a tool of some sort from the string and the cap to bale water out of the plane if we crash in the water. That might take a while. Oh, I know … I will use the cap as a thimble as I repair the inevitable hole in my shirt that will occur after we crash and the string / cap combo guides me to the exit. Of course, first, I will tie the string around my finger to remember to follow it to the exit because the singular aisle in the plane is sure to be confusing in case of an accident. String and Cap Safety Friends – I love you for making me feel safe.

Ironically, “Signs” just came on my iPhone. I think a sign on the floor like an arrow might provide more guidance than the string. But what do I know?

Ok. Time to land. I wonder if my luggage is ok. We’ll see.

- Dana

This past week I had the pleasure of traveling to Dallas, TX for work to visit with my team. I am pretty sure that it is true that everything is bigger in Texas.

As usual, I very dedicated to US Air and I took US Air out and back from Dallas. I am beginning to wonder why I maintain loyalty to US Airways due to the miss rate for customer service issues. That said, I am bit stubborn and wont give up on them. What I will do is start making these issues more publics for everyone to read. Hopefully US Air will read it and address this for everyone else and my future trips.

My US Air story starts last year. In years past I flew much more and likely had similar stories but now that I fly less it is easier for good and bad experiences to stand out. My tracking of experiences starts 3 flights ago when I was flying from Minnesota to Charlotte. If you follow me on Facebook or Twitter, you will remember this as the “Thanks, Wendy” Experience. See pictures or my Facebook page for details. The picture to the far left is her at work for the flight after the flight I was supposed to take. This particular flight was headed to Philadelphia. I wonder to this day if I could have flown to Philadelphia and then caught a flight to Charlotte. If I was “Wendy”, I would have at least offered this to the aggravated flier – in this case, me. The second picture is her doing something with the flight I was supposed to take. I couldn’t hear what she was saying but nonetheless she was working on the flight I was supposed to take. Did I mention yet that alot of this story occured while the plane was still just sitting there? If I didnt, here is picture of it just sitting there. It sure looks nice, doesn’t it?

My Dallas to Charlotte experience was minor compared to being instructed by Wendy incorrectly as to when / where to be for my flight. Nonetheless, it was annoying and should have never happened.

The experience starts with the boarding process. As many of my family and readers know, I have very bad leg and back issues. We experienced multiple delays in beginning the boarding process and we were never told why. As we sat on the plane, there were four people who were double booked for their seats and that made for some interesting sub-experiences. A couple of people were borderline hostile. I can’t say that I blame them after waiting a bit to get on the place only to find that I didn’t have a seat would have made me upset too. While we were waiting for the boarding mess to be sorted out, we were greeted with an extreme heat which made many people sweat and complain about it. I was able to will myself through it but I can tell you that I wasn’t particularly happy when the individual next to me dripped sweat on me. Eventually, the air came on but it was after a good 20-30 minutes of not fun heat.

The funnest event of Dallas to Charlotte Flight 1015 was with the drinks. While it is minor, it was annoying and just showed me that the attendant didn’t really care about her customers. She came by and asked me what I wanted. My reply was clear, “A cup of ice please.” If you know me, you know that it was loud, clear and in no uncertain terms but polite. The waitress came back with a cup of water. I asked politely for a cup of ice to which she responded, “Oh yes, my apologies…I will be right back with that.” She took the water back and I was hopeful for a cup of ice. What occurred next was a bit bizarre, she brought drinks for everyone else all around me and never came back to ask me about anything. After we began experiencing turbulence, I realized that it would never come. Oh well. Like always, here are my pictures…first one is my neighbor’s glass which is used and empty and the next two are pics of the offending attendant.

I know I know … some of you might be saying that it is minor and I should ignore it. I think the important part is that 2 of 3 flights for which I expected a reasonable value exchange – money for service – didn’t go so well.

I’d love to hear your comments and stories. I fly to Jacksonville, FL on Tuesday the 20th and I will update the post accordingly or perhaps start a whole new one.

- Dana