hey hey hey hey - be nice, because I do those too :P

No, it's Thanksgiving...

FAMILY TIME

etc.

I messed up my current work itinerary. I didn't have Thanksgiving on my mind when I booked, and totally messed it up. I'll be on a plane....flying HKG to YYZ.

:td::td:

Flew 883 today. The concierge at the gate was very nice. Called me up to board first, took my bag, walked me to my seat and put my bag in the overhead bin. Is this typical?

no .. that person was just being extra nice. or maybe you looked like you needed the help :)

From the Zone Boarding thread:

I've never had a pre-board, doesn't really matter to me, I get on in Zone 1 anyway.

I don't get a lot of interaction from the concierges, but they're helpful to me in LGA (getting me on earlier flights, helping deal with IRROPS, etc) and I was just saved by the YYC concierges me tonight, who re-routed me YYC-YEG-LHR when they got the feeling the YYC-LHR was going to get cancelled, which it later did. I'm a few hours late, but at least I'm still getting where I'm going, and I don't think I would have had that without them.

The concierge page says they can help with "Special requests, such as hotel or restaurant reservations, special in-flight meals and entertainment".

If meals have to be ordered 18 hours in advance, and concierges won't help you if you're not travelling the same day, how does that work?

And what is special in-flight entertainment?

Also, it doesn't say I need to be flying AC. If I'm flying UA out of SFO and run into trouble, can I call the concierge? I mean it would have to be an issue I think they could help with, but even having someone walk over to the UA counter and act on my behalf might be helpful.

Is each concierge individually Clefs d'Or certified, or is the concierge team itself certified? How does it work?

You'd think being a member of Clefs d'Or would be like a boutique hotel concierge where they actually assist you with things as the AC literature notes, but it seems to be not the case.

Probably a lot has to do with being handcuffed by AC SOP and not being to "bend" in several situations.

I almost find the AC concierge service to be mentioned in the same sentence as Clefs d'Or to be oxymoronic. (or moronic... or oxycontin)

I've had the concierge in LHR do a special meal request when I emailed from Ahmedabad a few days before.

morning was A for me recently. It varies I'm sure.

As far as I'm concerned, Concierge Service is for the Super Entitled. Recently on a TATL (with no status and paid J) to YYZ, delayed to gate by 30 minutes while on the ground early, J bags delayed even further 30 minutes. Original 1:35 connection was now 0:35. Get to dragon at some sort of checkpoint and was not allowed to pass, forced to "transit desk". No help there. No "black suit" to meet me, I asked. Only option was 2h delay.

No number to call while sitting on the ground looking at our empty gate. would have had time to make it if a "suit" would have intervened as every SE here claims they do. For me, it is a useless service, reduce the fare by several hundred dollars please.

It depends what you mean by morning.

The first few flights are G, the next bunch are A (starting around 1100ish), then the last few (starting around 1500) are G again. It hasn't varied much in the three years I've been flying out of SFO.

lol I saw on this board before what the Concierge typically makes, for the amount of time it would take to help 1 individual you're off by several hundred dollars.

I don't know that the concierges do any better for SEs with that kind of stuff. I was coming back from BOG earlier this year, connecting to the last flight of the day to YYC. J cabin had a bunch of SEs making the same connection as me. We were over an hour late arriving. On the plane, they said they didn't know whether or not they'd hold the YYC flight for us, we just had to run to the transit desk post-customs and they would tell us what arrangements had been made. And we better run, because if they were holding the plane, they might not hold it that long. After running to customs and to the transit desk, get told they sent the YYC flight without us and we're overnight at YYZ, first flight out.

That's a case where I would have expected a concierge to meet us at the gate and save us this idiotic race across the airport to maybe catch a plane that had already departed. And there were 5-6 of us, or more. But we got no more help than plebes who bought Tango fares.