I recently got to experience two very different customer service events at two different low cost airlines. The first with Southwest the second with Air Tran.
The first involved a flight from San Jose to Los Angeles. When I first booked the flight it was SJC to LAX late in the evening. Within a day or two I had to change the flight. Since this was a fully refundable ticket I didn’t have any fee but I may have confused the agent when I said I would like to change my flight from number X to number Y. The agent said that he couldn’t find any flights by that number from SJC to LAX and I agreed that made sence since the flight I wanted to change to was from SJC to SNA but didn’t want to change anything else. The agent then said no problem. However when I got to SJC the kiosk couldn’t find my reservation so I headed to the ticket counter while booting my laptop to find the confirmation email. When I opened the two copies of the email I found that the second (for the new flight) had changed the date to the day I called rather than retaining the original date. The agent at the desk took a look and then started typing. Shortly there after as I was diging out a credit card in expectation of a fee she handed me a boarding pass and said thanks for flying Southwest. I’ve since heard from others that this sort of no question no problem solution is characteristic of Southwest
The second event involved AirTran on a flight from BWI to BOS. I arrived at the airport at 5pm for a 9pm departure hoping to stand by for either the 5:30, the 6:30, or the 7:30. I was unable to figure out how to get the kiosk to do a standby. When I found a person I was told I had to check in via kiosk before talking to anyone. Once I checked in I was told that since there were in a ground hold due to weather the couldn’t do a standby but that the gate could. The gate couldn’t because of the delays (the 4:30 hadn’t left yet) and sent me to customer service. Customer service was able to but said the chances weren’t good. At the end of a long evening I made it onto the 7:30 which left at 9:30. The notible customer service event was that over the course of the evening the number of agents in the terminal kept dropping. By about 8:30 there was a maintenance guy in reflective vest (possibly a supervisor) as the only person at the customer service desk and a gate agent supervior running both the gate for the 7:30 and 9pm flights to Boston. He was absolutely amazing (to the point that I wrote a compliment to the airline) but it was sort of odd that there was no one there to help him.
I should note that while AirTran and JetBlue seem to aim for the same staffing (one agent per active gate) at JetBlue the flight attendants staff the desk when the show up and know enough of the system to change seating assignments and do stand by boarding passes. AirTran seems to leave the single agent there along.
All that said I would still fly AirTran for sort non-stop flights on the east coast but choose just about anyone else first. Bottom line AirTran isn’t as bad as USAir but I wouldn’t trust them to not loose my luggage if I ever checked any.
I recently stayed in an amazing suite at the Holiday Inn Shanghai Pudong, I don’t think the room was quite representative of the general room, but one of my colleagues was in a normal room and said it was quite nice. I suspect that the hotel was built as either an Intercontinental or a Crown Plaza but someone decided there were already too many of each in Shanghai. Either that or Holiday Inn has gotten much nicer since I last stayed at one by the side of a highway. In either case I would certainly stay there again if I have to go back to Shanghai a city I could easily skip (expecially given the long flights involved).
The Hilton Santa Clara is a little disappointing. As one would expect from a name brand hotel the beds and fixtures are quite good, but the network connectivity is slow and the selection of on site restaurants a little limited. While all the food I have tried was quite good there were no simple options. I find that after a long day with customers or at a trade show (the Santa Clara Convention Center across the street being a prime draw for the hotel) all I want is something easy and uncomplicated. The simplest I could find was the pulled pork sandwich with seasoned fries on cibatta bread. The squid ink ravioli with some sort of complex sauce was probably second. No club sandwich in sight.
Also there is no lobby shop as such. There is an automated machine that takes credit cards an sells most of the stuff you expect (water, batteries, iPods, etc…) but its not the same.
All said I would not hesitate to go back when I need to stay in the area though at the moment I’m inclined to try the Hyatt unless it continues to be more expensive.
The Austin Renaissance is one of my favorite hotels. The rooms and service are excellent, as would be expected at a full service Marriott, and the breakfast buffet is amazing.
The rooms differ from the Marriott standard in that they have a certain TX flavour. I can’t think of any other hotel that has a cow hide (with hair) ottomon and pictures of suprs.
The downside is the frequent overpricing, though I have frequently found discount (corporate and weekend rates) that bring the price below that of the local Courtyards.
The buffet is a little more than Marriott standard price, though the selection is also greater. Be sure to get to breakfast on the early side as the staff trys to clear the place by about 8:30am. The lobby coffee shop is good though the selection is odd, no standard bottled water but several types of designer water in glass bottles.
For a number of reasons I tried the Fairfield SJC rather than the Marriott Courtyard SJC I usually stay at when visiting SJC.
The fixtures in the room were quite new and included a flat panel TV, free internet (wired and possibly wireless), small fridge and microwave. The bed was Fairfield standard, firm supportive and comfortable, but a bit on the bouncy side, thus not a nice as the courtyard/Marriott bed but in no way detrimental to a good night’s sleep (it is a bit springy but not an issue once lying down, though it can be distracting if your partner isn’t sleeping well).
The complimentary breakfast was one of the best I’ve seen of the class. The class being free, self-serve, hotel breakfasts. The main reason was that the breakfast room was about twice as large as usual and they had to fill the larger space with something.
The treadmills, stationary bike, and stair master in exercise room were all in working order.
Bottom line: if the courtyard or double tree are available for a reasonable price I’d go there but in cases where they are either unavailable or > $250 I wouldn’t hesitate to fall back to the Fairfield.
It seems my travel season (normally between 8 and 11 months a year) has started and given recent changes in airline alliances I’ve had to reevaluate my preferred route between favorite points A and B. (For those not paying attention Delta bought NorthWest and there is a strong rumor that Continental will leave SkyTeam in the near future, this is relevant because it affects which routs get upgraded and which don’t.)
My current set of point A and B are Boston and SJC (San Jose, CA). Last year my choices were to change planes in: MSP, or IAH unless I wanted to stop more than once (non stop just doesn’t happen on SkyTeam and 6+ hours in coach on a 757 just isn’t fun no matter how often you do it). Now with the addition of Delta we also have the options of ATL and SLC. If we add in SFO as a reasonable approximation of SJC we also add EWR, CVG, JFK, and DTW so lets look at what this means: (when different aircraft schedule different time the longer is shown) (for reverse directions remove 30min to an hour)
Point A
Point C
time
Point B
time
total
BOS
MSP
3h30m
SJC
4h02m
time
BOS
IAH
4h40m
SJC
4h20m
time
BOS
ATL
3h00m
SJC
5h29m
time
BOS
SLC
5h40m
SJC
2h04m
time
BOS
EWR
1h15m
SFO
6h13m
time
BOS
CVG
2h34m
SFO
5h10m
time
BOS
DTW
2h20m
SFO
5h13m
time
BOS
JFK
1h30m
SFO
7h10m
time
from this it becomes clear that JFK is almost completely useless and EWR should only be used eastbound. SLC and ATL are both marginal at best and both CVG and DTW are questionable westbound, though all four are reasonable eastbound. This leave us with … MSP and IAH, though if IAH goes away I’m not sure what my second choice becomes, I’ll have to try the routes and decide which planes I dislike more. Ahh the magic, wonder, and elegance of modern travel.
I recently returned for a trip to Austin with my family to discover that the check bag containing the car seats for my children had been lost in transit. I had somewhat expected something to happen as I hadn’t seen the bag on the luggage cart full of bags to be loaded onto the plane while our other bags were clearly visible. I was looking because when we went to check-in in Austin they told me to take the car seats to the TSA Oversized Luggage screening area (and berated me for putting car seats in a bag rather than bringing them unwrapped to be put in the complimentary clear plastic bag they provide). The single TSA agent was already talking to three adults and a pile of kids while checking their luggage, two large coolers and two rifle cases. He told me that “since your bag isn’t fire arms I don’t need you to wait” and assured me that there would be plenty of time to get the bag on my flight.
Getting back to the story after waiting for all the bags to show up I talked to the luggage office who not only filled out the lost luggage form but also provide me with relatively new (< 3 months) loaner car seats of the appropriate sizes and offered an apology.
The bag was delivered the next afternoon and exchanged for the loaners. I think its important to recognize this sort of customer service and planning (having the car seats to loan) as it happens far to infrequently.