Hello Everyone, (sorry this is long but have lots to say)
I just wanted to relay my flight experiences the last two days; one on US Airways the other on American Airlines. BTW, these are revenue tickets (bulk fare)since I am on a cruise ship right now.
October 31 - US Airways PIT-MIA (forgot flight number left at 8:40 PM)
The mood in the airport was lively. The spouse and I were checked in by a 20-year veteran with a funny sense of humor. Unfortunately, since we are on bulk fares we cannot get Dividened Miles, which I find stupid. Think about it; my bulk fare was more than a cheap e-fare,which is able to get miles. Anyway, that's the only negative thing I encountered. Since we were one-way tickets, we were S passengers and were stripped by TSA agents (who were nice), but the whole process is a drag. At the gate, agents again were in a good mood. One of them made a funny announcement about passenger so-and-so please return to the gate for your Barry Manilow tapes - the whole airport just burst out laughing. The flight down was terrific. Flight crew was super nice, lot's of one-on-one with the passengers. Since it was 8:40 PM I was very surprised to see a snack box offered. Very nice, flight attendants were always there to help passengers. Pilots greased the landing in MIA. Baggage was in the claim area before we got there. Overall, super experience.
Nov 1 - American Airlines (MIA-Bridgetown, Barbados) 5:00 PM
We had a very nice agent check us in at the counter, was very helpful in looking up the spouse's AAdvantage number since he forgot to carry it. AA did take the bulk fares and give us AAdvantage points. The agent offered to move us up further in the cabin, but we said we were fine where we were seated. Security (which was not TSA yet..) totally RUDE! Did not want to hand search my cameras. TSA did it in PIT the night before, no problem. I had to take out two rolls of film from inside the camera - wasted most of the frames. Being a professional photographer, and traveling a lot, this really irritated me. They kept telling me it's okay to put the film through the x-ray. High-speed professional film can NEVER be put through x-ray. Anyway, I caused a stir, but a supervisor hand-searched all my camera equipment. Okay, past security, airport is nice. Gate agents for American were nice, flight crew was a different story. The legroom on AA is excellent, that's the only good thing I can say about the airline other than taking my bulk ticket and giving me AAdavantage Miles. The flight was delayed an hour while they took off a bag since a passenger didn't show up. After take-off everyone was hoping for dinner. In fact, most of the passengers were connecting from other foodless AA flights and were hungry. Mind you, this flight is over 3:30 hours at the dinner-time hour, no food, just pretzels. Having flown AA too much this year, I figured as much. Flight attendants, snippy and surly. The guy next to me wanted a can of Pepsi for the second beverage service, the male flight attendant flying B just snapped at him: Sir we have over 150 people on this plane, we can't give everyone two cans, especially for those who consume more than most. UGH! It was awful. Poor guy. Then someone asked for a pillow, another male flight attendant said he didn't have time. The female flight attendant (a LODO) ended up getting the pillow, but wasn't happy about it. What can I say, I am just not impressed with American Airlines, never have been. They are a marketing machine, that's it.
Dave Siegel, you need to market your people. US Airways has the finest airline employees in the business. Talking with other passengers, they agree. US Airways can no longer afford to be low profile. You and management must step up to the plate and market this airline the way it should be marketed. It's a great product, where the people make all the difference in the world. This is one area that US Airways is definitely not bankrupt in.
Regards,
exjetgurl