I have flown AC for years and the one constant has been service inconsistency. I really puzzle over why this can be so prevalent?

For example, I flew to Moscow from YYJ and back last week and was on a total of 8 segments there and back. Out of the 8 two were on AC Express on 15 minute flights and on both the FA was pleasant and helpful. Four were on AC mainline, two domestic and two TATL and the other two were on LH FRA to DME. On all the AC flights I was in J.


Three out of four of the AC long haul flight crews were really blah. The fourth on flight AC161 on Monday was great. What I noticed was the attitude of the SD on each of the segments. On the flight where the SD was outgoing, in charge and providing excellent service the rest of the crew was following suit. On the three flights where the service was not great I noticed the SD was not a strong leader. On at least once flight I had no idea who the SD was until about half way through. There was no effort to greet passengers by name and generally not much service occurred before or after the meal service.

A lot of the FAs in the blah crews just don't seem to like their jobs. Everything seems like a chore and frankly asking for anything from them seems like an inconvenience.

I also contrasted this with the LH crews who were more professional in their overall approach and had strong SD's in charge.

It leads me to wonder if AC training and training refreshes are done very often and what sort of monitoring occurs with in-flight FA crews.

I would be interested in other FTers observations on this.