US Airways Dividend Miles (Pre-FlightFund Merger) - PHX F Trip Report

Whereas I find this board extremely helpful when booking and upgrading flights, I thought I would do my part to inform those heading west of what to expect (whereas service is hardly consistent these days). I was on flight 425 on 4/5 from CLT-PHX on a 757. About 8 seats open in F. Coach was full. All in all, not a bad flight, but cutbacks were very evident.

- Champagne was chilled and ready to go for mimosas.
- No glassware
- No silverware (shocking whereas on my DCA to TPA I had silver forks and spoons and a platic knife - but on this flight, everything was plastic!)
- No tablecloth
- No cloth napkin (rather just thick paper)
- Salt and pepper in fast food packets (gone are even the plastic shakers)
- Food was pretty good, but you don't get as much as before. We got a fruit plate with strawberries, oranges and cantaloupes which was pretty good size; a Sara Lee blueberry muffin and butter; and a choice of cereal, french toast or a 2 cheese omelette. I got the omelette. It came with 2 sausages cut in half. Honestly, I though the whole thing tasted very good, but it was tiny and looked funny on the relatively large dish.
- No music, just a movie
- Plenty of gin and liquers

Again, not bad. Is this the same kind of service on flights to the far west coast? Or is this more typical of the intermountain west? By the way - the return flight was similar, except there was a beef entree and a cold chicken wrap to choose from.

This is the exact same service that I had on my PHL-LAX flight on Monday morning. The only difference is that they threw a sliced pineapple on the plate with the omelete to take uo the space formerly occupied by potatoes(the pineapple was heated with the omelete and sausage so it was all brownish and did not taste good). I actually thought the new plasticware was pretty nice. Really thick silver colored plastic. If they can't give you a metal knife, then IMO the matching high quality plasticware is better than metal spoons and forks and a really cheap looking plastic knife. I do like real glassware though (it was plastic and styrofoam on my flight).

Thought I would throw on a PIT-DEN F report from today in lieu of starting a new thread for people dying to know about DEN-specific issues ;-)

Cutbacks still evident, but F full and only 10 open in coach on a 321.

All the same things mentioned above. Unfortunately, US gets a 'pass' on meal because this was a 'trial route' for an Einstein Bros sandwich/salad plate. Admittedly, it was quite good - better than anything I have had for lunch on a flight anytime in the recent past. It had:

-Big smoked turkey sandwich with some designer mayo on the side
-Tomato/Mozarella/Artichoke Salad (small)
-Bag of kettle Chips
-Huge Chocolate cookie
-Little bottle of water (like half the size of the ones they hand out in F).

Apparently they were charging $10 in the back. It was good, but it wasnt that good (note to PineyBob, though, might be better than ACY options ;-)

It was served in a little carboard tray that said Einstein bros on it. I'm a conservationist - there was lots of paper/cardboard waste that didnt sit well with me.

There was no linen/silverware/etc but with such a meal, it would have been almost overkill. I got the sense from other people up front that they liked the meal (it was free!). But they wouldnt pay quite so much for it.

Unfortunately, no music/movie on this flight either. It was only a problem because there were 2 10-12 year old girls across from me in Row 6 who talked loudly and kept getting up to talk to their mom in row 1. First thing they asked was 'when do we get headphones' and FA told them there wasnt any music or movie they just looked stunned.

I wasnt happy to hear the FA's explanation (to 2 10-year olds mind you) that 'we are trying to save money because we're in bankruptcy'.

Despite the neysayers, I predicted that the complimentary Einstein Brothers meals served in First Class would be a vast improvement over the traditional First Class meal offering nowadays.

http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/Forum51/HTML/004582.html

Glad to hear that this is the case. I hope Einstein Brothers meals extend systemwide soon.

Though you weren't in coach, could you provide any details at all about how service was done in coach. What announcements were made, any observations about popularity, etc?

This is a little off topic but relates to the above posts on inflight meal service .

http://biz.yahoo.com/prnews/030410/dath020_1.html

Wolfgang Puck signs on with LSG Skychefs Inflight Cafe'

<font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="2">Originally posted by hscottm:
(note to PineyBob, though, might be better than ACY options ;-)

.[/B]</font>

All ACY flights are on the Beech 1900, where every seat is an Aisle AND a window! The ACY scam is that Spirit flys out of there! A PHL-LAX @ $2,215.00 becomes a $342.00 flight ACY-PHL-LAX and when I get to PHL i sit in the same F seat as the $2,215.00 ticket! And somehow B Ben thinks this is MY fault.

<font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="2">Originally posted by BizJet:
Despite the neysayers, I predicted that the complimentary Einstein Brothers meals served in First Class would be a vast improvement over the traditional First Class meal offering nowadays.

Though you weren't in coach, could you provide any details at all about how service was done in coach. What announcements were made, any observations about popularity, etc?</font>

BizJet - I was quite impressed. Like I said, for lunch it was better than anything I have had domestically in a while, if not ever. But $10?

I couldnt see coach, but heard the announcement. Sounded alot like that email that went around a few weeks ago announcing 'test, pilot, $10, still get drink service, ...' couldnt see any "reactions"

Funny thing was I think they wrote the in-flight announcement like a "mad lib". The FA making the announcement kept pausing, as if to look at the meal and describe what it was... 'Smoked Turkey... Salad ...'

Oh, one more thing - they had little meal sample displays at the gate before the flight too. Note I didnt hear any announcements, but I got there kinda late so I might have missed them.

These cutbacks are also evident on transcontinental flights. I was on #19 (PHL-LAX) and the all plastic service was used. The 'lite' lunch options were soup and a salad or soup and half of a pastrami sandwich.

We were also 'lucky' enough to have the dual language film. On our flight we had French in one ear and Spanish in the other.

<font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="2">Originally posted by BillMorrow:
On our flight we had French in one ear and Spanish in the other.</font>


LMAO! That's gotta be a first. http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/smile.gif

Funny Bill. On the way back from PHX to CLT we had Spanish. They couldn't find the emglish tape so they had to dig up a different movie................

The Spanish/French bit did get a lot of chuckles and comments in FC. They ended up showing the Eastbound movie which was available in English.

I'm going back tomorrow, so I ended up buying a DVD for the return.