Commentary

Category Archives for Commentary.

Video: Passenger Demands Gate Agent Kneel Down and Apologize for Weather Delay

by Gary Leff

seeing airplane through window
May 29 2019

Video was posted on Chinese social media network Weibo where the delayed passenger isn’t getting much sympathy. One commenter suggests he be banned “from taking planes for the rest of his life, then get him to kneel if he wants the ban to be lifted.”

Customers certainly ‘have a choice of which airline to fly’ on this domestic hop with 16 peak daily departures offered by six different carriers. None however are likely to make staff kneel in apology when delayed by weather.

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Man Goes on Tirade After He Boarded Wrong Plane, Flew to Southern Italy

by Gary Leff

ryan air plane landing
May 26 2019

Passengers aren’t supposed to be able to board the wrong plane. Boarding passes are scanned at the gate. There’s a manifest — airlines know how many people are supposed to be onboard. When passengers are in the wrong seat, there’s usually another passenger assigned that will say something. But it happens. Occasionally one person, or a couple traveling together, wind up in the same city.

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What Working in a Spirit Airlines Customer Service Call Center is Like (Really Funny)

by Gary Leff

spirit plane
May 26 2019

Spirit Airlines has probably the worst reputation of any airline in America. The problem is that reputations lag reality. First of all Via Air is far worse. And second Spirit has made tremendous strides.

It’s easy to anchor on Spirit as the airline who believed their business model required customers thinking they offer a bad product, who refused a pregnant woman water during a two hour tarmac delay and that wouldn’t refund a Vietnam veteran cancer patient’s tickets when he became too sick to fly to see his daughter in the hospital. And that’s why this spoof video of a Spirit Airlines customer service center is so funny.

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The 737 MAX Could Be Re-Certified in June, Fly Again This Summer

by Gary Leff

plane tv
May 24 2019

The US government is ready to see the 737 MAX re-certified by the end of June — mere weeks from now, as American Airlines CEO Doug Parker predicted. Whether or not that happens may depend on getting some other world agencies to go along. They won’t likely have unanimity, and won’t hold themselves to that standard. But I imagine they’ll hold off until they get Europe and Canada, though not China, to sign off with them.

Once that happens it will take time for airlines to go through steps to bring the plane back into their schedule, which makes cancellations through mid-August taken weeks ago by US carriers seem wise — and suggests that the process to bring the MAX back to the skies is proceeding as expected.

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