American has made a ton of customer improvements over the past 15 months. They’ve been ticking off a gains like better champagne and coffee, delivering new seat products that have been in the works for years, and investing in new and refurbished club lounges. They have slightly improved coach buy on board food, but there’s a long way to go (they are not yet close to Alaska or United on this).
Not everything they’ve done has been positive. They closed airport customer service counters offering live help for passengers that are delayed or cancelled. They didn’t think through service flow on their new Airbus A321XLRs very well. I was just told at the Charlotte ‘Provisions’ that Admirals Club members can now only have one single food item.
Overall, though, it’s been impressive progress – though I’ve worried that the improvements get drowned out in the noise without an overarching vision and without selling employees on how they’re giving employees the tools to deliver a better product, that will improve customer experience, and translate into both pride in their work and more pay (flight attendants now have the same profit-sharing formula that Delta provides – they just need the profit!).
At American’s quarterly internal ‘State of the Airline’ employee meeting held right after their earnings call on Thursday (a recording of which was reviewed by View From The Wing), Chief Customer Officer Heather Garboden shared updates on how the investments they’ve made so far are being received – and some of what’s coming next – framing that they “have delivered more enhancements for our customers in the last nine or 10 months than we have in the last six or seven years combined.” That’s actually fair.
Net Promoter Score Is Up
Customer reaction to the American experience and brand matters. Garboden has said they believe that one point of net promoter score improvement yields $50 million to $100 million in revenue.
She reported that net promoter score “started the year a little rough in the first quarter.” Their operation melted down in January, leading to cancellation of nearly 10,000 flights. Scores improved in March and April.
They seperate out the analysis between scores where flights are on-time and where they’re delayed.
- On-time operations is a baseline. Delayed passengers will be unhappy passeners.
- American used to believe that was the end of the analysis.
- But on-time isn’t enough to drive a revenue premium and as a high cost airline they must do this to be profitable.
When American is on-time, net promoter scores are improving:
For on-time NPS, we are seeing numbers we have not seen before. Over the last 14 months, 13 have shown year-over-year improvement in on-time NPS. I think that is representative of all the investments and all the teams focused on our customers.
When flights are delayed that doesn’t mean there isn’t anything they can do about customer experience. And that’s all of the announcements we’ve been seeing mostly around self-service tools for customers to get rebooked, and to get meal vouchers and hotel vouchers.
We do have a lot of opportunity when things do not go as planned. We are working with frontline team members and our technology teams to deliver enhancements when IROPS events happen, and we will continue talking about those throughout the year.
They’re Starting To Evangelize With Employees
While I continue to believe that the CEO Robert Isom needs to be the one making the pitch that things really are different at the airline now for this to have credibility – much of the problem in customer experience comes even from middle managers, who have learned over the years that sweating the small details and formulating policies from the perspective of customers didn’t gain advancement – but we’re seeing some headquarters employees out and about. Garboden notes,
My team and I fly all the time. We are out there talking to team members all the time about how we can better support our customers. We are in purser classes and captain-upgrade classes every week. We also have someone visiting the hubs every week.
Much of the work needs to be done with the front line. It also needs to be done at Skyview headquarters. Wine selection needs to be more than handing a budget to the distributor and checking a box. The small details and getting the most out of every dollar is what middle managers need to be judged on, and that’s a huge shift.
More New Lounge Announcements Are Coming
American Airlines is planning new lounges (including new business class Flagship lounges) in Charlotte and Miami. Charlotte gets its first business class lounge, while Miami gets a new one, allowing the D30 Admirals Club to expand into the old space.
Washington National E Concourse Club
They’re refreshing the Chicago O’Hare Concourse L lounge and the Washington National airport D concourse lounge, and building a new lounge in Austin and in Nashville to replace the current ones there. Plus, the new terminal F at Dallas – Fort Worth will have a lounge complex.
Rendering of New Austin Club
That’s a much more robust pipeline of lounges than we’ve seen from American in a very long time, and American’s lounges that have been debuted over the past five years have been significantly nicer than the ‘modern hospital’ aesthetic they were using since 2017.
American Airlines Philadephia A West Admirals Club
Garboden added,
There are a couple of areas where I get a lot of feedback. The first is lounges: what are we doing there? We have announced more than 12 new and/or renovated lounges in the last nine or 10 months. This is more than we have ever done for our lounge network in the history of American Airlines. It is really exciting.
This will continue throughout the rest of the year, though many of these will come online in 2027 and 2028. We are working to deliver enhancements this year, but look for most of them in 2027 and 2028.
So (1) expect more lounge announcements this year, and (2) expect new improvements in the lounges as well – but don’t expect to experience either yet – there’s a long lead time for lounge projects.
Cabin Interiors Will Start To Be Better Maintained
American Airlines seems to have more issues with broken seats than other airlines. United and Delta cabins are sometimes in disrepair, but American planes seem to fly with seats taken out of service more than other carriers. And I’ve seen this happen on the first flight of the day, and I’ve seen flights operate for days and weeks without having this addressed.
When I’ve asked the airline about it in the past I’ve been challenged: should we delay everyone on the flight to fix this? And my answer is that they should be doing proactive cabin maintenance. They should be doing overnight line maintenance. That the condition of the cabin matters:
- When passengers are sitting in duct taped seats, with broken armrests or out of service tray tables, they are not getting the product that they paid for.
- When seats are taken out of service that’s fewer passengers that can fly, it’s fewer upgrades that can clear, and that breeds resentment from loyal flyers whose upgrades don’t clear.
- And looking at that in the cabin simply is not premium. It devalues the whole experience.
I’ve been on this soap box for years. And I’m thrilled to hear that American Airlines finally gets it and plans to do something about it. Garboden explains,
I see this myself when I fly, is that we have too many broken seats. We have too many IFE systems that do not work. We have duct tape where we should not have duct tape.
I am excited that we have created a team within Tech Ops whose sole focus will be making sure our aircraft interiors look the way they should for our customers. We are just starting to build that up, and by the end of the summer I expect we will see significant improvements in our aircraft interiors.
Garboden also talked about “having a really good team member experience” as crucial to having “a good customer experience.” That was part of the next presentation.
So, this summer, they will get rid of the ” don’t spend a penny you don’t have to” management and get new management that is competent and cares about the business and not just about their year end bonuses?
“Evangelized” employees will be watching to see if it’s just more smoke and mirrors or there will really be any changes. I know because I’ve sat in too many of those meetings that were just “rah rah” sessions by management. If nothing happens, staff will just become (more?) cynical.
AA finally realized that well maintained interiors matter to customers? Seriously? Passengers judge a carrier on things like that. Some will wonder whether the state of the cabins reflects the state of the carrier’s maintenance in general…I’ve heard it myself while traveling.
I would have thought that the winter, with fewer flights, would be a better time to eat into the backlog of aircraft interior maintenance so I’m skeptical that we’ll see improvements made over the summer.
It astonished me a few years ago that AA closed its CLT lounge when the pandemic was coming to a close (rather than during the low travel period) and then did not upgrade the club — did work on duct work etc but still had the same beaten up bathroom doors and other deficiencies from another era – proactive they were not!
Ah, yes, ‘Evangelize’ …that’ll fix those seats!
Fortunately, American Airlines has upgraded to premium duct tape (now with glitter—because nothing says “safety” like sparkles!) and FAA-compliant Speed Tape, both of which are perfect for temporary aircraft repairs expected to be less than one year. For broken seats, AAdvantage passengers seated in First-class or Main Cabin Extra can now look forward to elegantly embroidered, color-coordinated “DO NOT OCCUPY” covers. These not only double as limited-edition collector’s items but also feature a special absorbent material that efficiently sops up vomit from passengers bravely flying while contagious with influenza or measles. As you lean back (in a seat that may or may not recline), you’ll agree: nothing screams luxury quite like these practical American Airlines innovations.
Good heavens! What planet have you been on for the “past 15 years?’ A once premier and proud international airline has been systematically turned into a hodge podge of mediocracy and is now even worse than the bottom feeder that took them over. It all started with zero top-down executive “attention to detail” which the clowns who run it have been oblivious to as evidenced by the horrible condition of their aircraft.
If they’re so hung-ho on fixing things “this summer” – why wait?! so they have even more to do when they finally get to it? If they were really serious, you’d think they would get on it yesterday not sometime this summer when flights are full and people are traveling far more than in winter! Has someone mentioned it looks more like a lot of smoke and mirrors and excuses as to why they never seem to “get to it… no doubt with the “we’re just so busy there’s been no time to “get to fixing all the (now) additional seats, et al that still aren’t even started as winter 2926 is here…..
Sorry about those typos…. That should be 2026 … but then again maybe I’m not too far off!
@Hashi — You sure ‘2926’ was a typo? Bah…
I don’t find the overall experience appreciably different among the big 3. But AA for sure seems to have the most maintenance issues. At least in my anecdotal experience. I’m sure they have a maintenance list a mile long. But have to start somewhere. PS – just because you are going to retrofit a plane in 1-2 years does not mean you can abandon all maintenance on that plane in the meantime.
I don’t believe a single word of these empty promises, and neither do you. Hope is not a strategy and it surely will not fix the continuing train wreck at American Airlines.
“self-service tools for customers to get rebooked, and to get meal vouchers and hotel vouchers”
BA, for all its faults, handles IRROPS correctly. Twice last year I was already in the plane when a technical issue grounded it overnight. BA stationed employees at the end of the jetway handing out hotel reservations and meal vouchers for every passenger as we re-entered the airport. No stupid lines or phone calls or whatever.
@OtherSteve — Because they have UK261 regulations… we need an equivalent in the US.
@ TW
“What planet have you been on for the “past 15 years?'”
Gary meant 15 months.
The man desperately needs a proofreader, which I’ve offered to be multiple times lol.
@1990: “Ah, yes, ‘Evangelize’ …that’ll fix those seats!”
Ah yes, indeed. I may be off the mark here, but the amount of loot recently paid to the AA Kobi beef level management was a strange way to emphasize evangelizing. Gary mentioned all the ways AA was improving, or not improving, but didn’t mention the real home run move: dump Isom! He did mention that lower-level management was afraid of being fired for using one’s brain. That tell you something.
On to other things. Made it to Argentina, only nine hours late (paperwork all filed this AM after getting home. When all said and done, between EU261, hotel night, dinner, will be getting back about E1,500.
Some LH news: got my Senator status upon landing in FRA. Earned it in three months. It previously took four months to earn Frequent Flyer status. Long haul does the trick. Before the flight from EZE, we took some time in the Star Alliance Lounge: sucks, big time. (But the beef empanadas were boss.
For all the neigh sayers on senior FA’s, a good attitude by the neigh sayers will find that the senior ones are the best. Don’t find them sitting down on the job. They are very proactive, eliciting responses to the questions they pose to the flyers. They REALLY do care about doing a great job. The purser told us that when Ben Smith and Tim Clark trashed LH, it really hit the head office like a ton of bricks. This particular purser was also privy to the latest negotiations and says LH has now really started to negotiate.
One downer I found out. Effective with the day we landed, they have eliminated the personalized greeters who meet all first-class passengers disembarking. What good are they, you ask? Ever try clearing immigration in FRA now that EES has been implemented. Not a pretty sight. The greeters would just lead you to an end row of immigration police and just lead you right through it! With them, it saved us about 45 minutes each time. (Now we get sneaky and flag down golf cart drivers, and sob story them into taking us through the morass.)
FC remains spotlessly clean. Seats are still sucko, but still work if tired. The food level has gone up a couple of notches. Instead of choosing a main course, you can choose two or three options, in smaller portions. The wine has gotten even better. Highly recommend two of their reds:2020 Spatburgunder Kaiserberg (Pinot Noir) and the 2020 Brunello di Montalcino Pelagrilli.(After all the Malbec in Mendoza, I took a time out on it.)
But, I guess I will have to wait until Christmas for some more goose.
I’ll believe it when I see it.
One service improvement needed is returning premium beverage coupons to stations with Flagship flights but not Flagship lounges (SNA, CLT, BOS). Currently, there is no mechanism for a Flagship J or F passenger to obtain a premium beverage in these lounges without having to pay for it. That is just plain wrong. And an easy fix.
I can’t believe they didn’t have a tech ops team to take care of cabin maintenance till now.
So what is their NPS score? (For those not sure, Net Promoter Score is the % of customers who give a score of 9 or 10, vs. the % of those who give a score of 0 – 6, on a range of 0-10.)
You can have a score of +100 (everyone gave you a 9 or 10!!!.. OR… two people gave you a 9 and the other 998 people gave you a 7), and you can have negative NPS scores too.
A really good NPS score is in the 40’s. But typically, commodity/mass market products are lucky to be even positive.
What are the airlines NPS scores?
Finally, NPS scores are actually easy to manipulate. Want to increase your company’s NPS score? Offer a prize or giveaway. Or only survey customers who have lots of social connections. Yes, this is a thing.
Overall, I have no faith in NPS scores because they are so easily manipulated, and when they dramatically rise or fall, it’s mostly because of an external factor no one has considered yet (like adding or taking away a prize incentive, which happened to me for the business division I ran and marketing decided to remove a prize incentive that was always there, and NPS scores tanked. We put it back in and BAM! NPS scores went up… leading me to believe I should have personally added even more money to the prize pool since my own incentives (worth several 5 figures annually) were tied to NPS scores, lol).
Terminal 3 at ORD is joke. If AA is serious, do something.
Maybe a different brand of duct tape…one that color matches the interior? Yeah, that’s the ticket!
@AlanZ — Congrats, Senator! Glad you returned safely from Argentina (I have a visit planned for later this year.) And, an epic EU261 example; hope all goes well with recovery. (Excellent uses of ‘boss’ and ‘sucko,’ by the way.) And, helpful update on EES (didn’t that just start earlier this month?) That roast goose is worth the wait!
Simple solution
Premium duct tape purchased through fake premium Delta