heatsink

This is not about rational things we might disagree with. For example, if the food is bad, it has clearly saved the airline money. This thread is about things that should just be done differently.

Needlessly creating a less than ideal customer experience is not the sign of a healthy company. You shouldn't do even small things "vasemmalla kädellä" if it doesn't save you any money.


Example 1: Drink service during meals

In economy class, the drink cart often lags behind the food cart so much that you sit there waiting for over ten minutes (I timed it once). Observing other passengers, I've noticed many simply start eating regardless, because they get tired of waiting. This is a great way to make the food taste worse for no reason, and even those who wait are primed with a negative mood.

The only reason this happens is that the carts are loaded with an unbalanced workload. If tasks were distributed properly, the second cart wouldn't lag behind.

Maybe someone figured out that meal service as a whole completes two minutes faster when done with the current method, but how does that help anyone?


Example 2: The quality of recorded announcements

Finnair has actually done an excellent job staffing locals on Asian routes, but when you're preparing prerecorded announcements that will be heard by tens of thousands of customers per day, would you choose a voice actor who:

1. has a mild speech impediment
2. has a non-neutral accent even in Swedish
3. says things like "Seatbelt can be..." instead of "The/your seatbelt can be..."

Yet this is exactly the case on Embraer flights. Some might think this is no big deal, but would you let your neighbor's teenager design the website for a multimillion euro company? Would you send out company newsletters full of spelling errors? This is the audio equivalent, and it creates a less than professional atmosphere.

There are virtually no savings to be had here by doing this poorly. A professional voice actor with a mid-atlantic accent costs nothing when spread out over the lifetime of the recording.


So, do you think I'm complaining about nothing, or have you also noticed strange things that are done poorly for seemingly no reason?

Personally, I think consistency is extremely important in creating a good customer experience, regardless of the quality level you're aiming for. If you're selling a four star product, but some aspects would get two stars and some five, customers will be slightly on edge. You want them to be relaxed and consider your service predictable.

TTL

Agree especially regarding the ATR-ERJ safety announcements by the faulty-S, wannabe Riksvenskan, wannabe fluent in English, poor guy. Have complained about it onboard and sent complaints to the HQ:s (FinnComm, Finnair, and Flybe Nordic), but so far no effect.

remymartin

OP, I had to look up what a mid-Atlantic accent meant. You write about consistency but how consistent would that be with the ever-so-charming rally English that the captains etc spit out? "Kabin croo, preepere forr approch"

Flythe96flag

My favourite to listen out for is "cabin crew, take your door poshishons"

heatsink

It's not really part of the captain's job to speak perfect english. It is part of the job for people who write newsletters and record announcements.

But you do have a point in that they should minimize the need for these. It gets annoying to have to hear we're at 30 000 feet in three or four broken languages when I just want to watch the movie

remymartin

OP, seriously - four broken languages? They only do 3

Atcoholic

One thing that reminds me of the -80s: CC announcements are calling Economy class "Tourist class" in Finnish and Swedish but it's "Economy" in English language... Go figure!

Flythe96flag

Personally I think the English of the captains is fine, more humorous sometimes than anything.

The FlyBe ATR safety brief is absolutely horrendous however, in all languages. Thank god for noise cancelling headsets, though on my last BE flight I was told one isn't allowed to use bluetooth headsets at all during the flight. Why? Because, and I quote, "they send that signal". Oh how naughty I have been on the countless previous flights.

unvested

While were on the topic of AY in flights announcements, on TATL it's usually the captain first in two languages. Reaallly slow... The the FA repeats the same damn thing that were at 30k feet. Very annoying....

remymartin

All this FA PA bashing is starting to sound like mandraskim all over again. Noooooooooo

WilcoRoger

Weird, our beloved lady of Ozzy came also to my mind.

heatsink

Huh?

intuition

I very much agree with you, but has no examples to add as I stopped to notice the different issues a while ago. Not that I couldn't find issues if I tried, but as a coping mechanism - It drives me crazy seeing a bad performance when there really is no reason for it (not even cost saving).

I do disagree with the mid-atlantic voice overs though. Yes, the current ones are really bad, but if they should look for anything in an accent it should be something that caters to asians.
As for ths scripts, it has been a steep decline. When I first started to fly AY, I was amazed over the well though through announcements. I was then comparing to SK, which had long sentences riddled with gramatic errors. Even in swedish. As a swede I always felt "Yeah I know what you meant to say, but that sentence actually means something completely different". AY announcements were always calm, correct and to the point.
Not anymore. Now, when AY's annonucements are mostly about "amaaazing offers" and "huge selection" (laughable) I just stopped listening to any AY annonucement. I know the drill and don't care much about what any AY staff has to say, recorded or not.


Consistency is the number one factor and anyone in marketing will tell you - everything you cummincate in all channels must convey one image of your brand.
Well, on skytrash you will get an weighed averge, but in real life, a really nice winelist will not save your score in peoples mind if you screw up the timing of serving it.

Cupart

Who cares if the pronunciation is not 100% perfect? Maybe this is a way to tell the general public, that this is not an English speaking carrier and who cares as long as one understands what they are talking about?

Yes I know that our friend mandraskim, bless her heart, had difficulties understanding the gibberish that came out of the speakers (we never found out if it was English or Finnish or just sounds and I still don't know what the H happened over in that thread) but then again who cares? My partner is Finnish and she speaks English with a broad Finnish accent and tbh I would not have it any other way...

I think it's good that they have a Finnish native speaker to speak English through the pre-recorded announcements and same for the Swedish version.

I think it's charming...

intuition

May I ask what announcements you are talking about here? I agree it should, but I can't remember hearing a recorded announcement (other than the onboard sales videos) being made by native Finnish speaker for a long time.

AFAIK the recorded annonucements on longhaul is only made in American English. On shorthaul (BE) I believe it is british english. None of the messages are recorded by native Finnish.