Originally Posted by
sullim4
I agree with the later part of your post about recovery, but I don't agree with the first part, at least with respect to AS. Their entire system from ticketing to mileage credit after a flight is just... terrible.
I haven't flown a ton of AS (or 027 tickets) this year but I looked back at my mileage history to document the problems I've encountered:
- LA 602/603 (AS Partner ticket): Struggled with phantom availability during booking, partner EQMs never posted. Had to request manual credit.
- FJ award booking in mid-May: Again, phantom partner issues prevented me from booking anything to NZ. Paid cash on AC/UA instead.
- AS720/AS523 (SEA-FAT/RNO-SEA): No issues
- PD 482/483 on 027 stock (YVR-YHM): Had to use old site to work around the "can't sell tickets between two foreign countries" error. After flight, mileage posted incorrectly, had to call and wait over an hour to get it corrected.
- AS 1422 (SEA-LIH): Baggage systems down, kiosk didn't work due to Azure outage. Had to wait in line for over an hour to check a bag despite being fifth in the line. Barely made flight. Extra seat mileage doesn't post automatically, wrote in over 4 weeks ago to mileage.plan with no response yet. Repinged them yesterday.
- AS 8308 (LIH-HNL): Kiosks down in LIH. Had to manually check bag.
- HA 822 (HNL-SEA): No issues
So out of 7 actual/attempted segments/trips - only 2 didn't suffer from some kind of IT problem. To give some perspective, I had zero IT issues with LATAM or even Aerolineas Argentinas this year, neither of which are exactly known for quality IT. I don't expect a 1.000 batting average, but I also think they're delusional if they really believe their IT systems are "OK".
They're not OK by any stretch of the imagination. Talk to your customers instead of a company that has financial incentive to tell you what you want to hear.
newsflash: every airline struggles with partner booking and availability. It's part systems not talking to each other it’s part gamesmanship.
no US airline can sell you a ticket from one Canadian city to another.
How is an azure outage that impacted thousands of companies worldwide an Alaska issue?
None of this is unique to Alaska and there’s no right person or people or team that can fix any of it.