Comments on: United Gets Beaten Down Over PhoCusWright Presentation on Customer Experience

By: Podcast #71 – Winter Travel, Last Year’s Travel, Tatty United | TravelCommons

Sun, 31 Oct 2010 23:11:07 +0000

[...] Brett Snyder was at a travel industry conference last November where a United executive gave a talk titled Customer Experience and Flying: Not an Oxymoron and admitted that United would be “overstretching” if they tried to be as good as Singapore Air or Virgin Atlantic [...]

By: TravelCommons » Podcast #71 - Winter Travel, Last Year’s Travel, Tatty United

Mon, 09 Feb 2009 03:23:32 +0000

By: Marty

Marty — Fri, 16 Jan 2009 02:18:06 +0000

I use to fly United pretty much exclusively up till early 90′s but customer service was getting so bad that I got rid of my United MileagePlus credit cards, and United became my last choice for travel. Recently I had to book a flight to London and United was the only available carrier that met the time constraints. I would say nothing has improved and the lounge in Heathrow is a joke – shabby furniture and carpets, nothing to eat and a pool of water in the bathroom because of a plumbing problem. What made it all the worse was a month earlier I did the same trip with Virgin. Massage on flight, a lounge with free haircut and short-order cook etc. I can understand why they feel they can’t compare to overseas carriers. Anyway – I think they need to focus on the basics – good customer service in all classes and a realization that their passengers are customers and not just chattel. When they say they are going to focus on the ‘premium’ customer experience, that tells me right there that they don’t really understand their problem.

By: Sam Daams

Sam Daams — Tue, 25 Nov 2008 13:41:46 +0000

Sorry I didn’t get to meet you at Phocuswright last week! I was one of the people in the audience wondering why United was doing the presenting. Especially since I’d just come off an Air New Zealand flight which probably is my most enjoyed flight ever (well, other than the times I’ve been upgraded :)). I’ve decided to blog about it since I really feel Air NZ deserves some recognition for what they’ve done here. Won’t post the link in this comment, but click on my name above to find it.

By: 250Kflier

250Kflier — Mon, 24 Nov 2008 19:11:39 +0000

I am a UA Global Servcie 1k flier, with more than one million lifetime miles accrued on the airline.

I just shelled out $1,964 out of my own pocket for a round-trip business class ticket between SFO and JFK. My SFO-JFK aircraft was changed from the “p.s.” (premium service) 757 to a three-cabin 767-300. We were told the 767 would have the new confurguation, but it didn’t – so the expectations we had were dashed.

Worse, the inflight product was abysmal. Even though the equipment change had been made more than 12 hours before departure, the flight was miscatered, resulting in a choice of only two breakfast main courses rather than three in business class. No Champagne or sparking wine are boarded anymore in business class. No pre-arrival snack is served – they don’t even serve nuts or pretzels. Ironically, in Economy they were selling stuff. So I’m paying nearly $2,000 for what, exactly???

This flight was had nothing to do with either “premium” or service. The last straw was broken by one of its horrid JFK-based flight attendants. A passenger’s infant kept pressing the call button, and the parent immediately cancelled the call. Over the PA, one of the flight attendants yells: “Flight attendant call buttons are to be used for emergency purposes only!”

I have several other business trips coming up before the year is out. I plan to avoid United where possible.

By: Dan’s Saturday Links #20 « Aviation Buzz

Dan’s Saturday Links #20 « Aviation Buzz — Sat, 22 Nov 2008 13:05:14 +0000

[...] has a good post on a presentation by United on customer [...]

By: Saturday Links #20 at Things in the Sky

Saturday Links #20 at Things in the Sky — Sat, 22 Nov 2008 11:49:02 +0000

[...] has a good post on a presentation by United on customer experience. « The Air France Retro [...]

By: Wayno

Wayno — Sat, 22 Nov 2008 00:22:45 +0000

United a good kick up the arse or better yet stop flying out of the country. I was forced about a year ago to fly on UA from Atlanta to Sydney via O’hare and LAX and I actually got more on a flight from OHR to LAX than to Australia! On my last trip to the U.S I went out of my way to fly on Korean Air through Seoul to avoid UA

By: CF

CF — Fri, 21 Nov 2008 19:10:59 +0000

Ryanair and easyJet both fly to Prague as do some smaller guys.

By: The Traveling Optimist

The Traveling Optimist — Fri, 21 Nov 2008 18:51:05 +0000

CF – Agreed. It’s been some years since the European carriers could essentially dictate to their customer base yet they seem to have evolved their “magnetism” through global alliances and frequent flyer programs.

The new generation of airlines range from unknown venture capitalist experiments in Russia to Ryanair who has weathered the storm across the Irish Sea from both Aer Lingus and BA.

Referring to the “unknown” part, I’m planning a trip to Prague next year and literally only stumbled across SkyEurope in trying to find attractive fare options.

If you’re only in Europe a lot of these carriers are household names perhaps but I’d like to see them, perhaps, market themselves here in the US as well.