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The Ad Hoc Traveler
Marc D. Meredith
May 24, 2000
So which is it? United or Untied?
You may remember the renewed pledge of customer service that the airlines came out with this past winter. In an effort to stem the tide of angry travelers, who were becoming increasingly vocal in their discontent with airline service, the major carriers developed a passenger's bill of rights and rededicated their efforts to providing a quality experience for the leisure flyer and business flyer alike.
A couple of weeks ago the first major study of airline customer satisfaction came out and the results were anything but good for the industry. With the exception of a slight improvement in baggage handling, the major airlines were rated with either the same or poorer marks than before their improvement pledge was delivered. In addition to overall ratings for the industry, the major carriers were individually ranked and I was worried to find that United came in dead last.
Folks that know me have heard me remark only half jokingly on more than one occasion that, "if I can't get there on United, then I can't get there at all". So the fact that my carrier of choice was rated the poorest of a group that all received less than flattering ratings was no small issue. My own experience has been for the most part rather positive. The "bad" things have been pretty minor and some of the good things have been quite nice.
One thing that the WWW has done is created an easy forum for individuals and groups to very publicly state their opinions good and bad about virtually any topic you can imagine. Remembering that there was an anti-United site out there, I looked it up to see what it had to say and how the experiences cited in its pages compared with my own on the world's largest carrier.
I found Untied Airlines to be a very polished and easy to navigate site. Its look and feel has been modeled very closely to United's old web site design. When I read through the accounts of people's experience with the airline I found the stories to be rather brutal. They recounted experiences that made me cringe and cross my fingers that nothing like them would ever occur in my travels. The most common thread I found in the stories was poor customer service. I was a Communications/Public Relations major in college and kept thinking of the lessons I learned in class- a happy customer tells two people, an unhappy customer tells 10. The Untied site multiplies that concept exponentially.
After visiting the Untied site and finding most of its stories to be in contrast to my own experiences, I decided to keep a running list of good and bad contacts I had with United over a short period of time. Since I travel a fair bit I realized I had more opportunities for both types of experiences and was curious to see on balance how they came out. I had a day trip to San Francisco approaching so the timing was good. Here's how things shook out over roughly 48 hours:
United
Checked the United web site before leaving the house and found my flight to be delayed (no surprise, this is SFO we are talking about). The flight-tracking tool is very easy to use and it saved me from leaving the house too early. Secured an exit row window seat (no seat in front so great legroom). Arranged for better seating (including exit row assignment) on upcoming flight to Honolulu by calling customer service number.
Arranged for replacement upgrade certificates to be issued after they failed to arrive with my quarterly mileage statement. After initially being told I'd have to stand by for earlier flight back to LAX since my flight was canceled, the customer service agent found me a seat and got me home 30 minutes before my scheduled return time.
Untied
Arrived at LAX to find my flight delayed an additional 90 minutes. Gate changed on flight but no announcement. Not five minutes after an announcement that our plane had arrived at LAX and boarding would begin shortly, the flight listing vanished completely off monitor. When I went to the SFO stand by desk I was told that the flight had left five minutes prior and I was apparently the only one no on it! When I pressed the agent for an explanation, she told me that I should go check with the gate agent as "they had more information" (the flight had not left and the gate agent called the other desk and cleared things up).
Had return flight to LAX canceled with no explanation.
On this very unscientific set of examples, United treated me well more often than poorly. Given that I was flying to SFO (my personal nightmare) it actually could have been worse. Other examples of really good service I've received from them-being given an upgraded seat without asking, being greeted by name both on and off of their planes and having a non-refundable flight changed immediately for me when I had to get back home across country because my uncle was dying.
A few more negative examples include having my bag lost on a trip to Portland (turned out it never left LAX but it took about five different people to figure that out) and being run all over Chicago O'Hare between American and United because of a canceled flight getting a different story each place I went. It took the better part of 10 hours to get home instead of the usual three and a half.
So while being the biggest airline in the world is no excuse of poor service, on balance I've had good experiences and count myself lucky that I haven't had an experience worthy of the Untied site. What can you do when faced with potentially negative circumstances while flying?
Stay calm. I know it sounds like lame advice when you're in the midst of a bad situation but I've found that
clear but calmly stated requests for service or information get better results than yelling. Get names when dealing with people. This helps in both good and bad situations. When it's negative you have a specific person to point to and likewise when it's positive you have someone to commend. Be prepared both in advance of and during travel. Check on flight status before leaving for the airport. Give yourself extra time to get there (I'd much rather spend an extra 30 minutes in the terminal than running to catch my flight because I was stuck in traffic). Know the quirks and challenges of the airports you travel in and out of. Knowing that I have spent more time stuck at SFO than any other airport, I booked by flights up and back with "time", so even though I was very late getting up there, I wasn't late for my meeting.
Keep things in perspective. A bad day of flying is often (for me anyway) still not as challenging as typical way of commuting on Los Angeles freeways.
I'd be interested to know what you think. What your experiences have been and how they compare to my own. Feel free to drop me a line at mdm@johnnyjet.com. I also welcome topic suggestions. Next time- "How to tell a 737 from a 777 and why you should care".
Marc Meredith
email@johnnyjet.com
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