Plane-is-home

That part has been outsourced for a few years. I have waited 45 minutes on the jet bridge before. But many times those lazy folks there just bring the green tag luggage to baggage claim too where it arrives sometimes after the regular luggage.

trk1

Outsourced station GSP

bags will be you to the beltway

Plane-is-home

My worst bag experience with UA in YYC:
Lined up in immigration (before I had Nexus), then had to go to secondary immigration to get work permit done, then went to luggage belt and still waited another 15 minutes. Total wait over 90 minutes.

sfo

Yes, read my post above regarding the first day, it might interest you.

transportprof

My first departure from YVR since the ground staff outsourcing coincided with a day of IRROPS on all ends. Both eastbound flights to ORD and flights down the coast to SFO were delayed by more than two hours. I showed up at the premier check in desk quite early for my 3:20 pm flight to SFO that was now delayed by many hours and asked to switch to the 12:45 pm flight that was also running a couple hours late.

I was the only person at the counter, and check-in staff took 12 minutes to SDC me to the delayed earlier flight. They were very friendly, but seemed to be at about the same proficiency with SHARES as sUA staff were in April 2012. The little plastic cards around the neck lanyard were consulted repeatedly in figuring out how to do a 1:1 exchange from my flight to the delayed earlier flight to SFO. Once I got to SFO, I had to call in to the Premier desk because they had added my changed segment after my return, leading to an out of sync reservation that might well have cancelled my return.


There was lots of chit-chat during my interaction at the ticket counter: was I heading away or heading home, how long would I be away, and what a shame that I was leaving Vancouver when the weather was perfect. On a friendliness scale, the transaction was a 10 out of 10. On a competency scale, it was a 3 out of 10.

At the gate, I scored a battlefield UG from the one seasoned UA agent on duty (that I observed today). She had been brought in with 10 other colleagues to help train up the contract staff. She said this was the first day shift when extensive IRROPS were occurring and that ‘a lot of learning’ was taking place.

I asked about the UA ‘coworkers’ who’d been made redundant and she said that a few had taken positions with Air North, the Yukon airline that is handling some of UA’s below the wing operations at YVR. Others had relocated to Whitehorse (!) and most others had taken the severance package.

I'd say there are a few more IRROPS learning days ahead to get the YVR ground staff up to speed on SHARES.

Plane-is-home

Departing from YYC again today. Check In is now running quite smoothly. The contract staff is noticeably friendlier. Let's see how long that will last. Gates are still chaotic. At each gate there is now a familiar ex UA face. Unfortunately not any of the former stars.

kenn0223

Traveled though YYZ a few days ago. Staffing levels have increased significantly (l am guessing temp while they learn) but check-in and gate agents are painfully slow. I was traveling on my NEXUS card and it literally took them 15 minutes to figure out how to check my bag (I had already checked-in). I noticed they were using a GUI rather than native SHARES and I am not sure if they had access to the native version. Eventually they figured it out and all was well.

I agree with others that the contract staff, while slow, are very friendly and were apologetic about how long it was taking. A supervisor (I assume they were since they wore a suit) even met me at the gate to apologize again.

For the time being, I am going to give myself an extra 15-20 minutes for check-in (T-80 rather than T-60)

nerdbirdsjc

That's not at all true, especially in the airline business. In fact, outsourced ground staff is the norm in much of the world, and for many airlines that feature service quality rankings higher than United's.

sing-along

I agree it is the norm. And I believe you can be successful by outsourcing if one puts in proper controls.

However, with UA they do not care of about the quality of service provided. Why is it that SQ is able to charge higher fares or rarely discount them? It's because SQ provides a consistent level of high quality service. Whereas UA, is looking to meet it's $2B goal of improving financial performance through Project Quality.

On 15NOV (Friday) I flew home from DEN to YVR. There were 25 of us waiting in the jetway for our carry-on bags to be brought up. All the bags that were brought up had no tags or AC Altitude tags. My bag was third last and it was the only one that had a yellow wrap on it which is supposed to provide priority handling.

If UA really cared about the service they were providing they would ensure that their own service commitments are followed with their outsourced provider.

Cheers

Plane-is-home

Service in Calgary has gone downhill ever since.
1. When you arrive it takes the contractor GAs several attempts to get the jetway to the door. Sometimes 30 minutes, once 45.
2. Boarding starts always very late, sometimes the gate has nobody even working it yet at boarding time
3. When boarding finally starts they come up every time with a new process

Justwondering1

Well, it seems maybe the vendor that bid on the contract bit off a wee bit more than they could chew, since the vendor in question is asking for more employee sacrifices
.....
http://www.unifor2002.org/NewsRoom/a...ve-better.aspx

Wpgjetse

I fly into YYC all the time, and all I can say, their baggage service in the custom area sucks big time.

SPLITTERZ

I do as well, but I arrived Wednesday, bags were already coming out on the belt after I got through the NEXUS line. A first....probably last too. YYC is incredibly unpredictable.

SPLITTERZ

So contract employees are upset they are losing out on contracts now? ATS has been part of the problem in the whole outsourcing business, the walmartization.

Wpgjetse

Hopefully things change when the new terminal opens.