Former American Airlines CEO Doug Parker co-hosted this week’s Airlines Confidential podcast and was asked for his best travel tip. He offered don’t ever check a bag.
There are no silver bullets that I know that others don’t. I can tell you though what I tell my family. Number one, don’t check a bag. Wherever we’re going, you can buy stuff when you get there. Do not check a bag. It’s not that the airlines don’t know how to get there, but it’s incredibly complex, it makes your experience much more difficult. So anyway that’s my major tip to anybody, is just figure out a way no matter where you’re going to get it into your carry-ons and don’t check a bag.
It’s long been said that there are only two kinds of bags, carry-on and lost. But not all airlines are created equal here.
American Airlines loses more bags than any other airline. They won’t invest in RFID tracking, even as other airlines are integrating with Apple AirTag.
It’s not easy to avoid checking a bag of course if you don’t board early, since everyone else is bringing bags on board to avoid checked bag fees. You may be forced to gate check through no fault of your own! And this can happen even when there’s plenty of bin space left. Fear of potentially having to gate check bags at the last minute and delaying a flight a minute or two is why agents require customers to gate check even when there’s still bin space left.
Parker though goes on to offer something much more important, “probably a better tip is just be nice to the people that are out there working. It’s not just pablum. While it’s hard for the traveler, that makes it harder on the people that are out there.”
He offers that it feels better to be nice, but host Scott McCartney notes and Parker agrees that employees will take better care of you if you’re nice to them.
There is merit in the old saying “you catch more flies with honey than you do with vinegar.” It breaks down a bit when you start thinking too hard because there’s nothing nice that you’re ever trying to do with flies when you catch them. All it means is you’re more likely to get people to do nice things for you if you’re nice to them than if you’re a jerk.
The saying dates back, as I understand it, to Torriano’s Common Place of Italian Proverbs and entered the United States via Poor Richard’s Almanac (Benjamin Franklin) in 1744.
- Whomever you’re dealing with is rarely the same person who caused the problem you’re dealing with.
- They have lots of people complaining to them all day long. You set yourself apart by treating them as a person, with their own emotions and motivations.
- If the person in front of you in the customer service line is getting upset and taking it out on the agent, the agent is all the more ready to expect you to do the same. They’re not going to want to listen to your story or spend time working every angle to find a solution. They’re going to want to move you out of their line as quickly as possible. Basic human nature.
You want to turn that on its head. Acknowledge the difficult job they have. Acknowledge even that you’re adding to it. If they ask you how you’re doing, as bad as your travel day is, it’s probably not as bad as listening to complaining passengers all day. Make them smile. Make them laugh. They’ll be happy to do more to help you.
Even if you don’t care to treat the agent as a person for its own sake (because they’re a human being and it’s what’s due them) if you want to get better treatment you should start by interacting with the person on the other end as a person. From a purely self-interested perspective it’s better not to be a jerk.
If you have a beef with the airline, take it up with executive management or the Department of Transportation. Don’t take out your frustrations on a junior employee. It’s not their fault, and they’ll be less inclined to help you if you do.
Oh, well I was disappointed when I read this article. You see, I thought the one travel rule Dougie would’ve told his family would’ve been DON’T DRINK AND DRIVE!
Yikes. Well he’s former so can tell the truth but an airline CEO saying out loud the excellent advice “don’t ever check a bag” (side note to the single fellas: put it in a prenup that there will be no bag checking). Like a chef that comes out of the kitchen saying “do not — under any circumstances — order the soup”.
“Wherever we’re going, you can buy stuff when you get there.” – says the former CEO worth about $80 million.
Also, if money even somewhat isn’t much of an object it’s so easy now to just ship your bags to wherever you’re going.
Good rule until you want to take something liquid like a special bottle of wine as a gift.
Reminds me of my trip to Orlando, Xmas 2018. Me, wife, 4 yo twin girls, and a nanny. Car seats, strollers, etc etc. 12 pieces of checked luggage and one dude. I had $200 in $5s and $10s, money well spent.
And there I thought the one rule is Avoid Canada since they won’t let him in as a convicted criminal.
How many bags have you had lost, Gary? I’m at zero after around a thousand flights although a few were delayed.
Tone deaf multi-multi-millionaire says what?
Does he throw out his private plane after every flight so the next flight is minty-fresh?
And how do you get the stuff you buy back without checking a bag on the way home?
Right, never check a bag. If you have irregular operations it will only make matters more difficult and AA in particular won’t provide your bag back if you’re force to overnight.
I thought he would say: ‘Fly private.’
It’s telling when CEOs don’t trust their own company’s products or services. Even ex-CEOs. Like, maybe, make the checked bag experience better for everyone instead of giving up. Pathetic.
Great advice – if you are going somewhere warm where you can wear shorts and t-shirts the whole time. But I’m not a college backpacker. I cannot go to Europe for more than a week without checking a bag. And I’m not going to spend a day (or a couple of days, if buying for a family of four) buying new clothes that may or may not fit. I’m not going to wear one pair of trainers the whole time.
A much better idea is to plan a long connection on a dependable airline so your bag will make the connection. AirTag it. Put the important stuff in carryon, so you are okay if it does go astray for a few days. I’ve had checked bags go astray for a couple of days, but never had one lost forever.
Why would anyone listen to Parker? Parker was the worst airline CEO.
My son worked in customer service for five years. The grief those employees get from an entitled public is incomprehensible. They are trying to help but must abide by their company rules. His experience opened my eyes and I never blame a CS worker or raise my voice to them. I politely outline my issue, suggest a reasonable solution and have almost always reached a reasonable outcome.
And if the person in front of me was a jerk, the first thing I do is tell the CS worker to take a breath and relax, that I have a few moments for them to get back to level.
What a self-absorbed jerk, saying not to use an essential part of the service which his company provides, and to buy new (to be thrown away?) things everywhere.
I am an 8.5 million-miler and I happily check my bag.
Treat them like human beings and they react like human beings. What’s so hard about that?
Bag or not? Honestly, it depends on the circumstances. The last time I had a suitcase go missing for over 24 hours was 24 years ago, for three days, on a KLM-Alitalia connection.
The point is, of course, that you shouldn’t over-pack. But yeah, saying “you can always buy stuff” is typical out-of-touch billionairese.
Avoiding checked baggage is not always possible. Last year, I went to an impoverished country where I checked in sufficient food and water to last the 5 day trip. There is no way I could have carried five days worth of food, not to mention water.
Once President Reagan went on a foreign trip where all the water needed for the trip was transported there. Local water was deemed as unsafe to drink. BTW, I do not claim to be the President.
@paul
5 people
12 pieces of checked luggage
i’m sure you had 5 carryons
what in the everlovingfork was in TWELVE pieces of luggage that you needed for a trip to orlando?
archaeological excavation equipment?
deep-sea scuba gear?
please tell me this was a trip for at least 10 days from more than 1000 miles away
please