Great thread!

I've never gone off on a GA and rarely had even minor problems with GA's on US. I have to say that the GA's where I fly tend to keep me flying US. I have been amazed at some of the GA's who are able to explain some of the ridiculous policies that they often HAVE to enforce to an irate passenger in a way that the passenger cools off and at least understands.

I was delayed waiting for the FULL 330 for the PHL-SJU run about 2 months ago. We were MX delayed for about 3 hours. My connection got shot and the GA politely asked us to have a seat while she worked on connections. She was so professional. When she called me up she had everything ready to go, it was much better than waiting in line. I then watched her supervisor explain to a pax who was going to miss their connection on Vieque's airlink why US couldn't reimburse him for hotel (as they were reimbursing me). I was connecting on Caribbean Sun codeshare and because it was US's responsibility to get me to STX they had to put me up in a hotel. Since he was on a separate reservation US had done their responsibility to get him to SJU, albeit a bit late, and they couldn't shell out for a hotel when as far as they were concerned they got him where he was going. The pax wasn't particularly happy but he walked away understanding. I spoke with him shortly after his encounter and he even had good things to say about the way the GA handled it!

I started chatting with the GA who helped me after she had gotten her work done getting missed connections straightened out. She said she was staying on her own time at that point to make sure we actually got out as she was genuinely concerned with us pax. In the end we made friends and she asked me to swing back by to see her when I was making my PHL-SJU run again. About a month later I was heading out that way and brought her a little gift to thank her for doing such a fine job.

Empathy is the most important aspect I think a CSR of any type (GA, TA, FA) can have. Putting yourself in someone elses shoes and thinking "how would I like to be treated if I was just delayed 3 hours" is very important. In this instance the GA's did such a good job at this it amazed me. After years of paycuts I was just amazed to see that this woman still took pride in herself and her work and cared enough about us to do whatever it took to get the job done.

Sean