I disagree that personal greetings are not important. It is part of treating the customer as an individual rather than a number. Certainly the ritual "have a nice day" does not work but I have found that often where cabin staff or even ground staff do make the effort that very often reflects I how they then treat you on the trip and make the difference between good and excellent.

True the problem of your other halves meal can not be solved and I doubt even she would expect the plane to divert to pick up her choice but this is where airlines need to think more out of the box. MAS for example allow me to pre order from a selection of chefs specials (and very good some of them are). In the early days of Air Lanka the staff were so horrified when I complained that they had no curries they arranged for a special curry to be prepared for me on my return leg ( and this was economy). Cathay Pacific arranged for the reading material I had asked for to be given to me on the second leg personally delivered by the cabin manager apologising that it had not been available on the first leg. The Etihad Manchester lounge manager gave me her personal email and told me to email beforehand and she would get the magazines I wanted ( before they went downhill). On an Ethiad flight the cabin manager came to me and apologised for the fact that the IFEnhad not been working on the first legend told me she had personally tested the one on this flight before and that Etihad were giving me 10,000 air miles all this before I had even officially complained.

Sorry for for being long winded but This all starts with the personal recognition yes in itself it is not important but when done properly then it is just the beginning


It it is easy to pontificate here on forums but sitting back and asking yourself what made the difference between the good flight and the excellent flight is a useful exercise.