Flying my bi-weekly flight home SEA-MSP today. Was UG'd to FC and was looking forward to a much needed flight home. Our aircraft was an Airbus A320. We boarded early and I observed that our Lead FA and her assistants were legacy NW FA's. As the coach PAX filed on board, it was apparent that the Lead FA and the other FA's up front were not going to give us a pre-flight drink. Okay.... I guess we can let this slide. After we are boarded, there is talk and discussion up front. FO makes an announcement that there was a "teany, tiny" computer glitch and we would be delayed for a few minutes. About 30 minutes later, FO makes another announcement that they would have to disconnect from power completely and have us sit in the dark for 7 minutes to allow the computer system to "reset". We would be failing back to a secondary system which keeps the tail wing lubricated / wet. All this time, the lead FA and the other FA's are doing NOTHING. No offer of refreshments or anything. Okay.
Very predictably... over one hour later... after "dinking" around with this problem, the FO makes another announcement that we will be switching aircraft. Great, just great. I know that the crew knew darn well at this time that our new aircraft (also an Airbus A320) had NOT been catered. Also, this was red eye time. Okay. Did the Lead FA and the other FA's offer any of the PAX on our flight pop or water out of our catered drink carts as we deplaned? Nope.
I wonder if they will take any for themselves? Hmm..
By the time we boarded our replacement aircraft, it was apparent that we were waiting on catering. I believe the Lead FA (motivated by making this delayed flight even easier for herself and the other FA's)... takes a verbal "straw poll" of the PAX up front. She pulls a 40 minute estimate to be catered out of thin air and asks the upfront PAX, "Do you want to wait 40 more minutes to be catered or do you just want to leave?" She does disclose to those of us partaking in this poll that we have NOTHING on board, including water, and that if we wanted water during the flight - we would have to get that water from the sink in the bathrooms. Predictably, everyone around me opted to just leave. I wanted to wait the extra 5 minutes it would have taken to get the carts moved over, but given the general dauer atmosphere in our plane, I wasn't going to take up that cause...
So we have the safety briefing and are waiting to back away from the gate, when, and I kid you not... I hear the lead FA crack open a couple of softdrinks for herself and the other upfront FA. WTH???
I'm going to hold out for $250 in compensation for this. Let's see what I can get out of DL.
-A