Another Philly Phan Story

[Art at ISP]

OK,

I finally got home after 6 invols in 2 days at around 5PM this afternoon. Of the 6, 4 can be legitimately attributed to the storm. Also, to be fair, there is MUCH praise to be sung for many people, including club staff in ROC and PHL, as well as an agent at AVP. However, this morning's experience kinda puts a bad spin on things.

After finally getting to PHL yesterday afternoon, I spent about 3 hours in the club, anticipating my 6PM departure to ISP. As luck has it, 3774 cancelled on me about 30 min prior to departure. So much for a tease..... The club attendant booked me on the first out this morning (3701) and also went as far as to get me a hotel room at a distressed traveler rate (the Army Navy game was yesterday and there were virtually NO rooms). At around 10:30 last night I checked and found 3701 this morning was already cancelled. I called Chairmans and was told that they could only put me on the 1:30PM to LGA (turned out to be ironic). I requested to use the Chairmans' Bump to get a seat on the 8 or 9AM flight but they refused saying this is not applicable in weather situations. A supervisor finally admitted to me that since a mechanical (the windshield story 3825 Sat) was in my record, I COULD use a Chairmans Bump but Inventory Control was closed and no one could help me until 6AM. I went to sleep last night very disappointed.

When I showed up at the Terminal F ticket counter in the morning, however, the supervisor at the ticket counter (who was alone by the way), punched up my record and handed me a boarding pass for the 9:45AM, 3890, without any effort at all. Oh well....

We go to board 3890 at 9:30AM, and lo and behold, there's no flight attendant. The one assigned had deadheaded in and disappeared--wasn't answering pages, nothing. They assigned a second one who just never called in, checked in, nothing. OK I understand if a crew member doesn't make it somewhere because weather, but to not check in, and dispatch has no clue where you are to me seems a stretch. The supervisor at the gate took a defensive stance with some customers, and at 10:50, when the flight was cancelled, she disappeared.

The pilots, by the way, were very apologetic, and said that they couldn't understand how two flight attendants were missing in action, and they couldn't find another to work the flight.

Finally another agent at another gate started helping people rebook, and I believe that they FINALLY got ground transportation for those who could not be reaccommodated by the later flight. I wound up on the Chautauqua jet at 1:30, which arrived before the bus did. I got my car service to ISP and got home at 5PM.

Folks, you know me as an understanding and level headed person, who supports the heck out of you all. I do believe, however, that this story is indemic of the problem that is PHL.

I will be discussing this in great length during my layover in PHL tomorrow morning with my friends in Consumer Affairs. Please be assured that praise will be given where due--and there's alot due.

Let's hope tomorrow's trip goes better.

My best to you all...

 

[PITbull]

Art,

Was the cancellation due to no f/as? PHL is a huge base. There are over 2,000 f/as based there. We are only a little over the first week of the month.

I am sorry for all your troubles. I know htat doesn't help much since you spent your entire weekend trying to get home.

Again, all poor planning from our stand point. If it were a f/a that didn't show up, heads will roll. However to have two, is highly unusual. Something appears amiss.

 

[hack73]

Your flight is staffed by Us Airways Express,thise F/a's make about $18,000 a year.You get what you pay for.Besides,no one cares anymore,you can thank Seigle for our attitude!

 

[Light Years]

PITbull-

Not us, but one of our contract carriers- Chautauqua Airlines operating as US Airways Express.

Art-
Sorry to hear of your troubles. Like I always say, keep the company as well as us (unfortunatly they are different) updated on what thay are doing wrong and what they are doing right.

 

[AOG-N-IT]

that is such outdated thinking! Study after study has shown that there is almost NO correlation between wages and job performance. That the strongest motivator is a positive work environment and a sense of teamwork. this is one reason SWA does as well as they do.

It also boils down to a sense of pride in ones job. In other words it comes from within. One of the very BEST F/A's I have had on any flight anywhere is a lady named Victoria who works for Transtates and I know that they don't earn near what mainline does. To imply that she is an inferior worker because she doesn't earn mainline wages is an insult to EVERY worker who punches in each day and gives their best effort in return for their wages.

Also if you are going to trash Mr. Siegel perhaps you should learn to spell his name correctly. The problem with US Airways isn't with the Victoria's of the world it's with people who are so bitter that they can't see that without the tough decisions that were made the doors would not be open and Victoria's wages would look pretty good right now.

You are right on this one Piney Bob !!!

Thier is no "Correlation between wages and job performance" I work just as hard at Mainline as I did at Express.

However , while we are on the subject of correlating....why is Siegel and crew paid so handsomely for paultry to failing results....yet his counterparts at the budding and prosperous LCC's that he himself loves to draw a comparison to , make considerably less?

Siegel loves to draw comparisons....and remember 'Everything is on the table" Lets draw said comparisons across the board in that case...He takes a 50% or better decrease...and I take a 25 to 30% increase in salary. Yup that will work just famously for me !!!

 

[Art at ISP]

All,

Thanks for the comments--PIT and Light Years, the cancellation was due to the FA not showing up, and was Allegheny, not Chautauqua or main line. Unfortunately this happens regularly with them. CHQ wound up getting me home.

I don't belittle anyone, but agree totally with the pride in job (or lack thereof). More worrisome is that no one had a clue how to deal, and when the flight cancelled the supervisor disappeared.

Let's hope tomorrow's trip goes better

My best to you all...

 

[Perky Patty]

...this is one reason SWA does as well as they do.

With all due respect Piney Bob, I have some friends that work for Southwest as f/a's and have been to a few of their parties. It may surprise you to hear that they're not the happy family you think.

They are aware that they're among the lowest paid in the industry, and if I'm not mistaken, are in arbitration now due to the disparity between what they feel they're worth and what Southwest feels they're worth.

While I haven't been on any of their flights in a while, it's hard to believe that any of the customers are walking away with the "warm and fuzzies."

I wonder how long Southwest will be keeping their prized casm, now that their employees want their piece of the pie?

 

[PITbull]

Patty,

Quite the contrary. I have the pay compensation of 42 airlines, they are way way far from the bottom. They're top out is $47.77, U's top out is $40.24. If we are going to compare, plus, we are "full service" carrier; they are not.

However, I hope they keep the "bar" up. I am full support of their fight. They are paid for performance; and they sure as hell are performing exceptionally well. I believe they are in mediation, and are in Section 6 negotiations.

 

[Perky Patty]

Patty,

Quite the contrary. I have the pay compensation of 42 airlines, they are way way far from the bottom. They're top out is $47.77, U's top out is $40.24. If we are going to compare, plus, we are "full service" carrier; they are not.

However, I hope they keep the "bar" up. I am full support of their fight. They are paid for performance; and they sure as hell are performing exceptionally well.

PitBull,

Have they settled on their latest contract? If not, I suspect their top-out will be higher...

Isn't it funny how management used to tell us how profitable we'd be if we would accept Southwest wages...

 

[JonC]

I worked in PHL as a PSS for about a year and a half or so, every time it snowed - PHL turned into hell on earth. Why? Because they would still operate flight into the city - filled with people who would get stuck. I can remember getting into arguements with inventory control the day before a storm would hit asking them to allow us to block seats or at least bring flights down to actual capacity, before the people got stranded.

However, OCC and downline stations would send people in like it was a sunny day. Instead of doing the smart thing - cancel most of the flights into the city before the storm hits, we would wait until the place ground-stopped before we'd start cancelling anything. When thousands of people were stranded in PHL, with cops dragging irates from the gates, when we are out of hotel rooms and look like incomptent idiots, then we would start cancelling flights. The people should have never been routed into PHL unless that was their final destination....

Then there was always the flight that ops would promise would operate. We'd keep the people in the airport for hour and hours and then they'd cancel it at 3:00 AM. I especially loved it when we'd find out by calling crew scheduling that the flight had no crew assigned or the crew had dropped dead - but ops would insist that the flight shouldn't be cancelled until they heard it was. Here we are lying to customers that the flight is going to go, when we knew it had a snowballs chance it hell that it would go. I used to be honest with them and tell them to go get a hotel and try for a flight in the morning when the weather was improved.

Anyway, everytime I hear of snow in the northeast, I have flashbacks of people sleeping in the corridors and hours of manditory overtime (which was my primary motivation for getting out of Customer Service. It should be illegal to make you work 16 hour shifts and then be back in 5 hours for more work). All of this chaos because operations was living in a never-never land where the weather in PHL was fine and we'd operate until we got stuck in the mud, thus screwing thousands of customers.

Jon C.

 

[PITbull]

Patty,

I know. This management has subsequently changed their tune, and are now looking for HP or America West. They are looking for us to come to work for basically free. They are here for a one-stop, get rich quick, type of employment. It just so happens Labor stands in their way of getting their ASAP.

 

[tadjr]

All of this chaos because operations was living in a never-never land where the weather in PHL was fine and we'd operate until we got stuck in the mud, thus screwing thousands of customers.

How come we only seem interested in trying to run the full skd in a storm?

From a customer service standpoint, I'd much rather them precancel flights and run a limited service and just deal with the cancellations and reroutes from the start. Inevitably the customer checks in fine and heads to the gate only to get caught in the creeping delay, eventual cancellations many times and/or misconx. Just canx the flights from the start, make up a new routing for the day (to try to keep the rest of the system operational since planes/crews from PHL go back into the other hubs) and deal with the outcome. Even though any cancellation is a pain to work, its much better to KNOW whats going to be cancelled from the start, have plan B in place to be able to reroute on with the new routings and crew and get it over with or offer another day. Even though the customers arent thrilled with a cancellation either, it would be better than half-@ssing it for a couple of days until the kinks are worked out. Why should a guy traveling from MIA-CLT-SEA have to be worried about a storm in BOS or PHL if we have options in place and preplan?

PS Art- Glad you made it home. Be sure to take your swimsuit to AUA since this sounds like the last time (unless you're headed south again soon) that you'll be able to enjoy some sun n fun for a while...

 

[Dont call me Shirley]

PHL was a bit of a mess last night, but not as bad as might have been expected. My flight was canceled, of course, but I was able to reroute myself. (and thereby hangs a tale....one that has been PM'ed to Art as the particulars are a bit touchy for these public pages. No, nothing really juicy. But it does not reflect very well on some of our brethren in PHL and I just didn't want to post another "Philly factor" story.

 

[AKA_trvlr64]

Art,

We all LOVE USAirways, but you wasted too much time in trying to get home on them. From PHL to your home on Long Island, even in bad weather, is really not that far. I've driven from PHL to PIT just to get home, and faced the Allegheny mountains in snowstorms.

My friend you need to quit being so nice to US. It ain't worth it. GO HOME!!

 

[av8or]

heya art, sorry to hear about the snafu, as for the schedulers not knowing where either fa was, that doesn't surprise me. there have been several instances where i'd call into scheduling during some kind of catastrophe and they'd have no idea what airport we were at when we called, one instance in particularl (ironically) i was stuck in ISP for about 6-7 hours, calling scheduling almost hourly to find out what they were gonna do with me cause my deadhead had canceled due to t-storms, at the end of that period i made another call and had them ask 'where are you?' they were trying to cab a pilot to isp to take a flight out of there when i had been sitting there all day talking to several different schedulers. in all fairness though, when things get hairy in scheduling, they get pretty frantic cause there's not enough of them and it seems when something happens, everything goes bad for them and they can't keep up/track. you can thank mgmt for that i'm sure.

when are you leaving on monday art? i'm taking out the later afternoon flight.