US Airways Dividend Miles - Is this website the biggest corporate screwup ever?

I ask this because I still cannot view an existing reservation, let alone make one. The fares change everytime I put in the same itin and they vary by more than $500.

This really is getting ridiculous. :confused:

June 9 ought to be very interesting!

Is this website the biggest corporate screwup ever?


No. But the competition for that title is historic and overwhelming.

Writing from the US East position, the only way I can view a reservation that was made before the transition to the new website is to enter in the booking code (PNR, record locator) and date of travel. My previously-made reservations are NOT linked to my new login on the new, US West/America West-based website. I also have to call about any seat changes or upgrades. Nothing for me is automatic or e-mailed to me.

I do not plan to try to book on the website. I will book on another website or by telephone until this site works.

I also am missing miles like most everyone else and I WILL be contacting them around June 9 about those missing miles.

I ask this because I still cannot view an existing reservation, let alone make one. The fares change everytime I put in the same itin and they vary by more than $500.

This really is getting ridiculous. :confused:

June 9 ought to be very interesting!

Yupp, unquestionably. And, all of the runner's up biggest screwups also belong to Doug and US.

2 weeks to get websites working and 8 months to get FF accounts merged is full blown idiocy. When a CP agent told me a few days ago that the entire airline is in failure mode I was not...and still am not...surprised.

Take it from many who know and who have proven it, fly any other carrier and literally all of your problems with this carrier failure are solved.

You can take this to the bank: Until there is an outright apology, in writing, from Doug with a promise to eliminate all games, deceit and consumer fraud on the part of US, nothing will improve and all customers will lose.

I'll admit the new site is a little rough, but I have not experienced any of the problems you guys (liveon777, me4yankees) have.

liveon777 are you from the "East side"?

I'm thinking in DPs desert centric view, the brunt of the issues are out East.

I bet Deborah Thompson is glad to be gone now.....
She was way too nice to deserve the bombardment of complaint letters and emails that has resulted/is resulting/will result from this continued disaster.

I bet Deborah Thompson is glad to be gone now.....
She was way too nice to deserve the bombardment of complaint letters and emails that has resulted/is resulting/will result from this continued disaster.
While the first part is true, my guess is the new approach to customer service is to simply log the complaint and process a $75 voucher. No letter, no investigation, no anything.

While I personally have found the site glitchy, I wonder if we're an idiosyncratic sample. We probably do more complex bookings and features than the average Joe.

However, if the reports are true the website couldn't recognize PHL and CLT when booking, it might be a problem :) There really is no excuse. I'm sure they're paying their IT folks market wages. They just didn't follow through. They have poor contigency planning, and the "Baghdad Bob" approach to public relations.

PS - I would rank Merck's piddling around in the wake of the Vioxx problems as a far larger screwup than this one. Worldcom and Enron are other good candidates.

PS - I would rank Merck's piddling around in the wake of the Vioxx problems as a far larger screwup than this one. Worldcom and Enron are other good candidates.

Worldcom and Enron were frauds, not screwups.

Merck fiddling while Rome burned is a good example. Likewise, the president of Dow Corning saying on national TV that the breast implants wouldn't hurt the company, because "it was only a $40 MM business". Within a year they filed Chapter 11, because while it was only a $40 MM biz, their liabilities were uncapped.

I'm thinking in DPs desert centric view, the brunt of the issues are out East.

The bulk of the revenue is out East as well.

Not smart on the Sandcastle's part.

PS - I would rank Merck's piddling around in the wake of the Vioxx problems as a far larger screwup than this one. Worldcom and Enron are other good candidates.

You ever heard of "New Coke"? :D

Is this website the biggest corporate screwup ever?


No. But the competition for that title is historic and overwhelming.

Tell me about it! You're talking to one of the walking wounded! (And I'm not referring to US.)

I bet Deborah Thompson is glad to be gone now.....
She was way too nice to deserve the bombardment of complaint letters and emails that has resulted/is resulting/will result from this continued disaster.

I personally, while not pleased with the new website, don't think it is something to go to the mats over. Every new website or new computer systems when cutover have problems. What works in theory, does not work in practice. I think you are overblowing the signifcance of a quirky website. Remember the old US website that would not let you go back and frequently had $0 flights that you couldn't book on, but had $1.49 flights that you could book on.

My real problem continues to be something that Ms. Thompson would never have put up with--total lack of communication or response to their customers.

Two responses out of eight emails and a snail mail letter is poor by any standard of customer service that I have experienced anywhere else. The only response was to a letter to Doug Parker about two non-responses to email. The response was an email and request for me to call long distance to PHX to discuss a problem caused on their end. I choose not to spend my dime. :td:

My real problem continues to be something that Ms. Thompson would never have put up with--total lack of communication or response to their customers.

Two responses out of eight emails and a snail mail letter is poor by any standard of customer service that I have experienced anywhere else. The only response was to a letter to Doug Parker about two non-responses to email. The response was an email and request for me to call long distance to PHX to discuss a problem caused on their end. I choose not to spend my dime. :td:

According to Ms. Thompson, Tempe's philosophy is to give priority to complaints that are phoned in. Any emails/snail mails are handled on a first-come first-served basis. As of Feb., they were running a good month or so behind. One can only project how many months behind they now are.

I'd say any response anyone gets to a complaint is doing real well. I wouldn't bet the farm on the timeframe you get the response, however.

I know US used EDS as their IT provider. Anyone know who is doing their IT work these days?

I think that 'worse corporate screwup ever' is pretty harsh. Enron was a screw-up, Tyco was a screw-up, this is peanuts. But at the same time IT work isn't rocket science. A well managed process would rush crap into production.

I would have posted a beta site and invited flyertalk people to go out and look at their combined accounts and provide feedback. If stuff's missing, go back update the converstion routines and try again. You don't go live until it works. And your customers say it works.

For the booking stuff, that completely inexcusable. You're talking lost dollars. Everytime that site doesn't deliver, you're hoping someone sticks around and makes the booking again, but they could very well be off on another site booking there instead.

Perhaps 'penny wise, pound foolish' best describes US?

I received the following email below on June 2nd. Although they say The balances will be accurate by June 9th, they have built in an additional week since it will take that long for activity that has not posted to actually post. So.... June 9th is actually BULLS**T no matter how often they repeat it!!!!!


Dear "JOSHUA-BWI",
We're now in the process of combining the Dividend Miles and FlightFund programs into the new Dividend Miles, with many new mileage-earning opportunities and award travel benefits. As we make our final touches on the new program, please be aware of the following:

During the next 7-14 days, you may notice that miles posted to your account between April 28 and May 20, 2006 may not be reflected in your account balance. Your account balance will be accurate by June 9, 2006. We apologize for any inconvenience and appreciate your patience. If you need to make an award reservation before June 9, please contact Reservations at 800-428-4322.

Details about the new Dividend Miles including FAQ's about the program and logging in to your account, can be found at usairways.com/dm. Take a moment to check out all of the new ways you can earn miles and learn about new redemption options on US Airways and nearly 30 airline partners. In addition, the new Preferred program now offers four levels, including our new Platinum tier, as well as unlimited First Class upgrades confirmed automatically.

We appreciate your business, and thank you for earning and redeeming miles with US!

Sincerely,

John M. Reistrup
Director, Marketing Programs

I know US used EDS as their IT provider. Anyone know who is doing their IT work these days?

In house in Tempe. HP (Joe Beery) believes that they can do IT better and cheaper than anyone else. Loads of public quotes about this.

My real problem continues to be something that Ms. Thompson would never have put up with--total lack of communication or response to their customers.

Ding ding ding.....this is where the Sand Castle's real problem is. The web site problem would be more easily forgivable IF they would communicate with people about it. I just received a batch email today about how mileage balances may be inaccurate until June 9 and to call for award bookings in the meantime, etc. etc. etc. How long ago did they implement the web site with the incorrect balances posted? Why did it take so long for them to communicate this? Deborah would have never let this happen.

God, I miss Your Turn. I miss the whole Attache magazine, for that matter. Deborah would never have put up with the level of lack of response. I want to send in a commendation of a flight attendant from a flight last week, but I don't know if anyone will ever read it or acknowledge it..... :rolleyes:

God, I miss Your Turn. I miss the whole Attache magazine, for that matter. Deborah would never have put up with the level of lack of response. I want to send in a commendation of a flight attendant from a flight last week, but I don't know if anyone will ever read it or acknowledge it..... :rolleyes:
I never thought that I would miss Attache until I started looking at this drivel that they call a magazine. It's all part of the new culture. Sell to the huddled masses all day, all the time. Whether it is 100 useless pages of ads in the magazine, or PF Changs on the cocktail napkins or credit card applications on the mainline flights, it has really gone overboard, with no apparent end in sight.
If they could figure out ways to place ads on the toilet paper in the lavatories, I'm sure that would be next.
They may never figure this out, but Low Cost does not equal Low Class...

I never thought that I would miss Attache until I started looking at this drivel that they call a magazine. It's all part of the new culture. Sell to the huddled masses all day, all the time. Whether it is 100 useless pages of ads in the magazine, or PF Changs on the cocktail napkins or credit card applications on the mainline flights, it has really gone overboard, with no apparent end in sight.
If they could figure out ways to place ads on the toilet paper in the lavatories, I'm sure that would be next.
They may never figure this out, but Low Cost does not equal Low Class...

;) I miss Your Turn, and I miss the Informed Sources. I still make copies of an article about fireworks from a 1999 issue of Attache available to my chemistry class. It was a great summary of how fireworks work for the lay person. Glad I saved the magazine.

And how bland a title...."US Airways Magazine". Yawn. Makes American Way look exciting.

With CAK and CLE being RJ city, I don't get much mainline CC hawking/weird napkins/tray table ads, but I'm sure that will all drip down to PSA flights soon enough. :rolleyes:

I never thought that I would miss Attache until I started looking at this drivel that they call a magazine. It's all part of the new culture.
The inflight magazine has turned from an amenity to a revenue source. From this week's (6/2/06) intracompany newsletter:

Q. I just wondered if there’s any chance you’ll add fleet listings and information in the new US Airways magazine like they used to do in the America West magazine. It was a great source of information on things like aircraft specs.

A: The new magazine, which combines the pre-merger America West magazine and US Airways’ Attache’, is produced at no cost to the airline and actually provides a monthly revenue stream to the new US Airways. Greensboro-based Pace Communications publishes the magazine and is responsible for all advertising sales. Pace is responsible for selling enough space to cover the cost of producing the magazine on top of the revenue they commit to the airline each month. And since they assume the risk, the publisher limits the amount of “non-ad” space (i.e. pages the airline authors) in the magazine. The non-revenue space itself must be further divided between “marketing” and “informational” content, so space is at a premium. Still, this is a great idea and as we continue to refine the content we’ll take a look at trying to get it back in. In the meantime, employees and customers can view our fleet information at usairways.com.

Jim

The lack of SSL encryption isn't helping, either.

See: http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/showthread.php?t=563921

While it has been very poorly executed, this doesn't approach some of the largest corporate screwups ever. Or even the largest IT system screw ups.

Hundreds of millions of dollars on a spacecraft that slams into Mars because someone forgot the metric system?

Maybe more relevant, health care professionals going out of business and citizens not receiving needed medical care. Slightly more important than accurate FF balances. But many of the causes and symptoms were the same - http://www.cio.com/archive/041506/maine.html

I had a guy teaching management 101 who basically said something on the order of:

"Never make it hard for a customer to give you money. Ever."

I actually tried (for the first time in some time) to book a ticket on US (on US metal with US ticket stock as opposed to US metal on UA ticket stock).

Tripped on the website. Now I'll take a country drive and stay on UA metal.

Dumb. I'm really waiting for deelmakur to weigh in on this. Really.

Travel related, there was the Hoover UK free trip promotion. For £100, you'd get a vacuum cleaner and two free R/T tickets to the Continent. They were hoping people would buy accessories, add-ons to the trip, or just neglect to book the tickets. They were wrong (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hoover_free_flights_promotion). Hoover lost £50 million.

Travel related, there was the Hoover UK free trip promotion. For £100, you'd get a vacuum cleaner and two free R/T tickets to the Continent. They were hoping people would buy accessories, add-ons to the trip, or just neglect to book the tickets. They were wrong (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hoover_free_flights_promotion). Hoover lost £50 million.

But just think of what Hoover gained in goodwill! US lost god-only-knows how much revenue over this, with no goodwill to offset the losses.

But just think of what Hoover gained in goodwill! US lost god-only-knows how much revenue over this, with no goodwill to offset the losses.
Did you read the story he linked?
In 1994, Jack took Hoover to Court over the free flight promotion. The BBC Watchdog programme's investigation of customer complaints about the promotion, by reporter Hilary Bell, brought the matter to even wider public attention.

The court cases went on until 1998. After the fiasco had cost the company almost £50 million, the British division of Hoover was sold to the Italian manufacturer Candy.

In 2004 a BBC documentary was made on the anniversary of Cichy and Jack's visit to Newton in 1994. Part of the Trouble At The Top series, the "Hoover Flights Fiasco" segment was produced by Angela Chan; on its first showing had a record 1.7 million viewers.
Doesn't sound like much goodwill to me.

Here's what I got when I tried to check in on-line today. If the system isn't working, then why not tell us so?

Confirmation Number
******
Here's what happened:
We were unable retrieve the information you requested.
Here's how to fix it:
Please try again. If you continue to receive this message, call our 24-hour Internet Help Desk at 1-800-327-7810.
Reference Code: 0 (1.6.70100.22020)
Occurred: 6/4/2006 11:34:12 AM

PS - I would rank Merck's piddling around in the wake of the Vioxx problems as a far larger screwup than this one. Worldcom and Enron are other good candidates.

I don't agree that Merck made a screwup. The fact is, all medicines of that class have the same well-known side effects and problems. If fingers are to be pointed at Merck, then fingers should be pointed at all Cox-2 makers. All other NSAIDS are known to have their own side effects as well.

is WHAT site the biggest screwup?!? I'm new to flyertalk, and sometimes have trouble following the threads....

is WHAT site the biggest screwup?!? I'm new to flyertalk, and sometimes have trouble following the threads....

The rolled-out-by-stealth new US Airways site. FWIW, I can now see my DM account for the first time since Black Sunday. 50K miles still missing, but being able to access my account is a good first step.

:( As of this morning my account has been deleted (at least according to the web site) but the agent could access it but she now longer shows two US flights from Wednesday that were showing as of Thursday...said I'd need to fax the BP's now (Double :()

Did you read the story he linked?
.

No, I didn't. I stand corrected.

Here's what I got when I tried to check in on-line today. If the system isn't working, then why not tell us so?

Confirmation Number
******
Here's what happened:
We were unable retrieve the information you requested.
Here's how to fix it:
Please try again. If you continue to receive this message, call our 24-hour Internet Help Desk at 1-800-327-7810.
Reference Code: 0 (1.6.70100.22020)
Occurred: 6/4/2006 11:34:12 AM

I tried to check in today as well and had lots of trouble. It didn't recognize anything. Finally it let me check in using my name, flight cities, date of travel and flight number. When it printed the boarding pass, it had a completely different confirmation number AND a Dividend Miles number that is NOT MINE!

Then, I went to check my account. It made me assign a user log in name and a whole new password. My account is there, but now someone else is getting my miles for this trip.

I wrote them--we'll see if they fix it.

I tried to check in today as well and had lots of trouble. It didn't recognize anything. Finally it let me check in using my name, flight cities, date of travel and flight number. When it printed the boarding pass, it had a completely different confirmation number AND a Dividend Miles number that is NOT MINE!

Then, I went to check my account. It made me assign a user log in name and a whole new password. My account is there, but now someone else is getting my miles for this trip.

I wrote them--we'll see if they fix it.

For NO bonus miles, it is not worth it to check in on the new website until it is fixed! I saw a real person to check in today! :D

I tried to check in today as well and had lots of trouble. It didn't recognize anything. Finally it let me check in using my name, flight cities, date of travel and flight number. When it printed the boarding pass, it had a completely different confirmation number AND a Dividend Miles number that is NOT MINE!

Then, I went to check my account. It made me assign a user log in name and a whole new password. My account is there, but now someone else is getting my miles for this trip.

I wrote them--we'll see if they fix it.

For NO bonus miles, it is not worth it to check in on the new website until it is fixed! I saw a real person to check in today! :D

Exept that, at PHL, the lines are too long. I'd rather sleep in an extra few minutes than wait on line for an hour. So, checking in via on line is important to me!

I still can't log in, it keeps asking me to confirm my address and info and choose a log in name and password, but any name I choose "is already taken". I'm really surprised considering some are alphanumeric strings that would be gibberish to anyone but me..

The rolled-out-by-stealth new US Airways site. FWIW, I can now see my DM account for the first time since Black Sunday. 50K miles still missing, but being able to access my account is a good first step.

I too got into the account activity page for the first time tonight. Interestingly, my accrued mileage varies by > 100k on 3 different pages so they better hustle if they they intend to get this cleaned up in 5 days.

Also, it appears that the dedicated CP line to the IT group has been disconnected. Not the best time to stop that service but I'll wait till the 10th before I make any more calls on this issue.

Also, it appears that the dedicated CP line to the IT group has been disconnected. Not the best time to stop that service but I'll wait till the 10th before I make any more calls on this issue.

Yupp, it was amazingly disconnected last Monday. You end up on hold for 30 to 90 minutes on the main IT help line.

Ya know, in response to the thread topic quiestion I'm not sure that this is even the biggest screw-up that US has had, although it certainly has had a bigger effect on customers than most.....

There's paying about $2 Billion for PSA & Piedmont, then dismantling much of each of those airline's route structures.

There's cancelling Piedmont B767 orders because "We're going to be a narrowbody domestic carrier".

There's Business Select.

There's MetroJet.

There's single-mindedly chasing the United merger without a plan B.

There's the $2 Billion stock buy-back.

I'm sure there are others that I can't think of now.

Jim

I still can't log in, it keeps asking me to confirm my address and info and choose a log in name and password, but any name I choose "is already taken". I'm really surprised considering some are alphanumeric strings that would be gibberish to anyone but me..

I'm in the same situation. I know that many others have been here, but some of those seem to have now logged on. How have you done this? Did you speak to someone? (Not that it helps me.....1-800 numbers don't work well from this side of the pond.)