Philly Bag problem

[Old PSA]

Ok now try this one.

Beginning in June the TSA has mandated that all bags entering the United States must be screened by the TSA. Therefore, a bag traveling from Europe comes off the aircraft in Philly. It goes through US Customs and Agriculture inspection and then is given back to the US Airways Rep. at re-check. Previously, the bag was transferred to the connecting gate or sent into the sort system depending on time remaining. Now the bag must sit and wait to be screened by the TSA before it is allowed to be handled by US ramp. Needless to say with all the european and carribean flights coming into Philly in the afternoon, the backup at TSA screening is something you have to see to believe. So, the bags trickle over to the domestic side and end up in the sort system since their connecting flight left long ago. Then the downline city takes a missing bag report and delivers the bag to the customer usually the next day.

The TSA is not going away, no matter how hard we wish it. Even it the TSA had sufficient equipment and personnel, the time it takes to screen bags still would make most connections impossible. So, what is the answer? Does US Airways continue to not take action and also not tell the passengers at origin or bit the bullet and make the minimum connecting time at least 3 hrs? That is 1 hour for Customs and 2 hours for security screening. Any bets?

 

[fast]

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Fast - Don''t give me that BS.  All you are doing is making excuses to fail and not providing ideas to succeed.  That accountability statement is total BS.  All it takes is for the people in the back of the airplane to tell the lead exactly what they loaded onboard before they run to their flight.  And if you are so concerned with the onload, then why can''t someone else help you offload?  Are there accountability issues there too?  Management is not goingto write you up for helping someone else, and I wasn''t suggesting that you ignore your original responsibility.     

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You know what there Ol'' Mark,
It is obvious to us who work for a living you have NEVER worked in PHL. Never thought out how the operation might work. Well, My goodness we employees at PHL could tell Management exactly how to turn PHL around. How to make things run smooth.
How to make USAIRWAYS the airline of CHOICE.
DO you think for one minute they are gonna listen to me or anyone else? Come on.
The only thing that is quite apparent to a lot of us is that you like the two letters "B&S" if we dont see it from your point of view.
You know, those that DO the work know best how to get it done.
As far as the OFF load, we DO get help with off loads however that crew has to be one that can be spared for the moment and does not have a flight landing for their gate.

AS far as the lead statement, You really show yourself there,
What, a lead? There is one lead for 4-5 gates for 4-5 flights that depart within 10 minutes.
You tell me where to find him.
Leads dont enter flight info nor do they pull up flight info. Agents do that work. Most leads in PHL ARE the 3rd guy on the team.
You seem to have ALL the answers why not come to PHL and straighten it out for us. Or will we just hear more BS.

 

[A320 Driver]

I flew a trip through PHL last week in the A321. One of the ramp guys came up to the jetway and he was completly wet from head to toe in sweat. Sweat pored from his face but he seemed to still have a great attitude. My heart went out to the guys and girls doing the loading. We ran 30 minutes late waiting for the loading process to be done. I saw a supervisor walking around looking, but he never pitched in. I checked our paperwork and saw that they were loading 16,800 lbs of bags and cargo on my A/C but I don't know how much they had to take off it first. 16,800 lbs of bags divided by let's say 50 lbs per bag would give us a bag count of 336 bags. I know that's probably low (more bags than that), but my point is that the understaffing in PHL is taking our people to the physical limit.
The bean counters have NO CLUE what is involved here trying to turn these aicraft in the hubs in less than one hour. Seems to me that if "on time" is so critical that they would give the ramp the necessary assets to get the job done.

My hat's off to you folks on the ramp. Thanks for all you do.

A320 Driver

 

[diogenes]

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On 7/3/2003 9:56:22 AM A320 Driver wrote:

I flew a trip through PHL last week in the A321. One of the ramp guys came up to the jetway and he was completly wet from head to toe in sweat. Sweat pored from his face but he seemed to still have a great attitude. My heart went out to the guys and girls doing the loading. We ran 30 minutes late waiting for the loading process to be done. I saw a supervisor walking around looking, but he never pitched in. I checked our paperwork and saw that they were loading 16,800 lbs of bags and cargo on my A/C but I don''t know how much they had to take off it first. 16,800 lbs of bags divided by let''s say 50 lbs per bag would give us a bag count of 336 bags. I know that''s probably low (more bags than that), but my point is that the understaffing in PHL is taking our people to the physical limit.
The bean counters have NO CLUE what is involved here trying to turn these aicraft in the hubs in less than one hour. Seems to me that if "on time" is so critical that they would give the ramp the necessary assets to get the job done.

My hat''s off to you folks on the ramp. Thanks for all you do.

A320 Driver



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As a ramp rat, I appreciate your words, ''Bus Driver!

From your mouth to God''s ear!

Unless there is a military movement, or the occasional football team, all bags are considered 25 lbs. per piece. You probably took on a bunch of freight, but 16,800 lbs is a massive undertaking.

One of the few good things about ramp is it is nasty, heavy, hot (or freezin''azzed cold) work. You can be sure the boss is nowhere to be found, and you are least left in peace, while the work is happening.

 

[MarkMyWords]

I was just browsing the COB's and noticed that the Ramp Manager and the Manager of Performance and Planning positions are open. Hmmmm, could this be fall out from the bag weekend from hell? Could someone in CCY have finally awaken to see that PHL is in need of some serious help? Or is it just a coincidence?


Also saw that there is a COB for a Manpower Planning Specialist in CCY. Things that make you go Hmmmmm.

 

[Hope777]

Mark, whom ever should take the manpower sepcailist needs to talk with each station. The current formula is based on aircraft type, meaning the staffing is no different in say BHM or LAX. They NEED to look at each airport individually and make a formula for each city. This time of year, I can lose an agent running Interline bags for almost an hour due to the layout of the airport. Each city CANNOT be treated the same!
BusDriver, Thanks for the kind words we try.

 

[AP Tech]

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On 7/8/2003 10:06:33 AM MarkMyWords wrote:


I was just browsing the COB''s and noticed that the Ramp Manager and the Manager of Performance and Planning positions are open.  Hmmmm,  could this be fall out from the bag weekend from hell?  Could someone in CCY have finally awaken to see that PHL is in need of some serious help?  Or is it just a coincidence? 


Also saw that there is a COB for a Manpower Planning Specialist in CCY.  Things that make you go Hmmmmm.

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There lies most of the problem! Just what we need more managers, specialists and anylysts! We have enough people sitting behind desks in offices with no windows telling us how to run the day to day operations of the airline when its obvious the problem is lack of manpower! Employee''s can only be spread so thin and then you run into problems, such as Philly. Great idea, having a planning specialist based in CCY managing manpower in a city they have no clue about.

 

[MarkMyWords]

These are not newly created positions. They are vacant positions.

 

[hack73]

It seems on Sunday night Philly missed 5,000 bags according to one of the ramp agents who works in the bagroom.On monday,7/7 phl upgraded 65 agents to fulltime,and brought back 40 part-timers.They still are understaffed,and there is not enough gate space.Meanwhile,PIT sits empty with all of the space in the world,and a generic commuter operation.Makes alot of sense?Of course having genuises like Al Crellin and Jerry Glass on board will bring this company back to profitability!Good luck to all Mailine employees,we are going to need it!

 

[tadjr]

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On 7/8/2003 10:06:33 AM MarkMyWords wrote:


Also saw that there is a COB for a Manpower Planning Specialist in CCY. Things that make you go Hmmmmm.

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Also a COB came out for Yield Management in Inventory Services....... could we be having a problem in this department that needs to be addressed? Is this a new position or replacement? Maybe this is why we arent making any money. No one is working there.​

 

[PITbull]

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On 7/2/2003 8:38:24 AM MarkMyWords wrote:

 

[MarkMyWords]

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On 7/8/2003 925 PM PITbull wrote:

There is no way that anyone would write up senior mangement for chipping in.



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Don't believe me, then ask the CWA's Tim M. or Tim Y. I have first hand knowledge of CWA local officials in PIT going face to face with CCY Executives and point blank telling them if they even touched a ticket it would be grieved. And that was only when they offered to walk tickets from the door to the podium!
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[mbmbbost]

There are a few routes that just scream for point to point flying. Why don''t they just do it? Make us pax happier and lighten the load in the hubs. All that extra running around in the hubs can''t be good for anybody, if it''s not necessary.

 

[MarkMyWords]

here is a quote from USDaily regarding the PHL bag problem"

"The baggage sortation issue was addressed in a Philadelphia Inquirer article earlier this week, which gave credit to US Airways for its acknowledgment of the problem and proactive approach to finding a solution. A multi-member task force representing all key functional areas has been assembled by US Airways at the direction of Dave Siegel to identify and implement a permanent solution to the baggage belt issue within 30 to 60 days."

While I appreciate the fact that they are doing something to correct the problem with the sortation system, I do have issues with the part about a proactive approach. I am very disappointed in Mr. Crelin and Deborah Thompson for how we handled, or didn''t handle this situation. As soon as we knew the magnitude of this problem, someone should have been working on damage control and customer perception. Monday morning there should have been a plan in place to send an apology letter to each and every customer effected by the failure of the sorting system in PHL. Included in the letter should have been a token 25.00 voucher for a discount on future travel. Instead they chose to take the usual approach and not address the issue unless the customer took the time to contact us first. That attitude toward true customer service really irks me. OUR baggage system failed. WE failed to have a back up system in place to ensure minimal customer inconvenience. Why can''t we admitt that we had a service failure, apologize, offer a token of appreciation and ask the customer to give us another opportunity to serve them again in the future? Offering the 25.00 voucher would help to entice the customer to come back, thus generating additional revenue in the future. For every customer that actually takes the time to complain to us via phone, e-mail or snail mail, there are 10 that don''t but share the experience with their friends and family. Imagine the change in image that could happen if we did actually take a proactive approach!

Dave, Al and Deborah......please do what is right by the customer when we do have a service failure. Don''t be afraid to admitt that we had a problem and that we are addressing it, so that it doesn''t happen again. Contact the customer BEFORE the contact us and offer an apology. This should be our approach to situations like this. Don''t just sit there and wait for the customer to come complaining to you!

 

[PITbull]

Mark,

This is the type of "Management arrogance" I have been speaking about this past year...and is so destructive to a business.

The two most important elements to U's franchise (customer and employee), and this management does absolutely "O" to change "perception", even if it takes a little money....They can't see the "forest through the trees", that the rewards would be returned 10 fold to our business. Maybe they will see these posts and "get it"...

You are an "inspiring" employee, even if you say you are not mangement....you should be.