News and notes from around the interweb:
- Another day, another customer who deserves a full refund.
Hey @AmericanAir I paid for a 1st class seat so i could comfortably get work done and this is what i got! No space to work to even eat. Not great service. Think I deserve a credit or partial refund. pic.twitter.com/tnQl0f2RiK
— cathleen R (@cathleen13) May 7, 2025
And another.
Nothing more luxurious than flying American on the a319 by
byu/JohnnyHorseRacing inamericanairlines - “Service animal” The size of that thing!
- Association of American Railroads seeks repeal of 2024 Biden administration rule requiring a minimum of two crewmembers to operate trains which was a campaign promise that, they say, had no data to back up safety improvements to justify its cost.
- Bernie Sanders flies private because United Airlines is so inefficient: “When you run a campaign and you do 3, or 4 or 5 rallies in a week, the only way you can get around to talk to 30,000 people – think I’m going to be sitting on a waiting line at United waiting while 30,000 people are waiting? That’s the only way you can get around.”
The truth is that Sanders should be doing something about how long it takes to fly commercial. The need to show up hours in advance of a flight, go through long security lines and run the gauntlet of shopping malls to take what’s supposed to be the most efficient mode of transportation is a failure of epic proportions. Getting to, through and out of airports is taking longer and longer. He can avoid it – the rest of us cannot.
WATCH: @BretBaier challenges Bernie Sanders on why he spent $221k using private jets during his ‘fighting oligarchy’ tour pic.twitter.com/lMii8D4HC1
— TV News Now (@TVNewsNow) May 7, 2025
- Surprised this doesn’t happen more often, honestly.
Flying today from DCA… a guy is asleep at [Delta Sky Club] bar. Bartenders (the two usual ones there) try to wake him. Then he gets up and yaks, and sits down again. They offer to call paramedics and he declines. Soon a red coat arrives, w a wheel chair and assistant. They wheel guy to gate. I arrive at my gate two hours later to see he is on my flight.
Bar tender and red coat are both there. The guy claims he is sober now and had bad fruit earlier. The red coat was excellent. She calmly said his options were to fly tomorrow, or refund ticket, or paramedics, or police. She said w bar tenders input on drinks and gate agent attesting to the guys smell, he could not fly on the same day of intoxication regardless of how sober he may be now (note: she was not buying it). If he got sick in air it risked plane being diverted so gate agent had right to deny boarding.
Ok… best part… he was D1 and I was first on upgrade list.
- An airline that could fix this would be truly ‘premium’ and win so much loyalty:
American Airlines $AAL – HAS to be one of the worst airlines to travel with. Why would staff tell customers to check their carry-on when there is space available to put in the overhead? (Proof provided). The Stock is a true reflection of the failure AA is #americanairlines #aal pic.twitter.com/RmXXHEVTg2
— Tommy Aggelos (@AggelosTommy) May 8, 2025
- Special.
A beautiful moment on @AmericanAir flight from DC-Toronto. A woman was very anxious and not feeling well with turbulence so flight attendant jumped in next to her and consoled her for most of the flight, got her tissues and water. Just a great moment of humanity & caring.❤️ pic.twitter.com/7rSXxKbpzU
— Randy Clarke (@wmataGM) May 7, 2025
DeltaDCA regarding an apparently intoxicated D1 passenger writes on Reddit, “Flying today from DCA… a guy is asleep at [Delta Sky Club] bar. Bartenders (the two usual ones there) try to wake him. Then he gets up and yaks, and sits down again. They offer to call paramedics and he declines. Soon a red coat arrives, with a wheelchair and an assistant. They wheel guy to gate. I arrive at my gate two hours later to see he is on my flight. Bar tender and red coat are both there. The guy claims he is sober now and had bad fruit earlier. The red coat was excellent. She calmly said his options were to fly tomorrow, or refund ticket, or paramedics, or police. She said w bar tenders input on drinks and gate agent attesting to the guys smell, he could not fly on the same day of intoxication regardless of how sober he may be now (note: she was not buying it). If he got sick in air it risked plane being diverted so gate agent had right to deny boarding.
Ok… best part… he was D1 and I was first on upgrade list.”
I am surprised this intoxicated Delta Air Lines D1 elite passenger didn’t choose the “fifth” option: emulating Mr. Creosote from Monty Python’s movie The Meaning of Life. If I were a Delta Air Lines red coat offering best-in-class customer service, I would provide this elite passenger with a complimentary vomit bucket and a wafer-thin mint.
For inquiring minds that want to know, Mr. Creosote is a fictional character who appears in Monty Python’s The Meaning of Life. He is a monstrously obese and vulgar restaurant patron who the restaurant served a vast amount of food and alcohol. Mr. Creosote vomits repeatedly, but not in the luxurious surroundings of a Delta Sky Club. After Mr. Creosote is persuaded to eat an after-dinner mint – “It’s wafer-thin” – he graphically explodes.
I’ll repeat it: Maintain and clean your planes. And hire, properly train, support, pay, and invest in your teams that do the maintenance and cleaning and more. And the people that are already in these roles are trying their best, and they need more help, too. Yes, it’s company culture. Yes, it’s leadership (or lack thereof). Yes, we can and should do more and better. We deserve it. C’mon!
AI could easily analyze a video feed from the jetbridge, calculate volume of carry-on bags that have passed (with a safety factor), and alert the gate agent when no more space is left.
I had no tray table flying PHX/MIA a few months back. Put the tray on my lap. Was doable the FA was very good at removing it as soon as I was done. Worst things that could happen while flying.
Except the most likely fix (namely, requiring a separate paid pass for each carry-on, based on aircraft capacity) would infuriate the majority of fliers.
What exactly do you expect a senator from the MINORITY party to be able to do about long waits and poor customer service etc. in the airline industry ? I don’t agree with all of Bernie’s stances but other than yelling in hearings, he is pretty powerless. And I’m glad the R’s have “said” they’ll fund upgrades to the FAA that should have happened a couple of decades ago. It’s just a shame that they fought tooth and nail against every funding increase for the FAA while Biden and Obama were in office because that would be a “win” for the Libs…