Xrayman

FC and now over 1 hour from takeoff and not a single service item yet.

What’s your experience

pcoll

We had 1.5 hours on our last FC flight. LAX/ SEA
Delayed takeoff due to flight hold for connecting passengers. The best reason for a delay. iMHO.

twitch76

How long is the flight?
Is there any turbulence?
Is the seatbelt sign off yet?
How close to meal time are you?
Was there boxed water at your seat?

In my mind, a longer flight is more likely to have a bit of a delay before service, especially if the flight doesn’t line up with a meal time.

Xrayman

Midcon.
No turbulence.
Routine takeoff and leveling.
No boxed water.
Mealtime looks like it will occur during descent.

Xrayman

Second hour and having to ask for a club soda with my dinner service. “Can you wait a moment I’ll be right with you” as she takes the order of person seated next to me.

1 drink at at time for the entire cabin..

Alaska listens will get some feedback upon touchdown.

PDXPremier

I had a FA in F on PVR-PDX last March that was the most disengaged and inattentive FA I've ever seen.... thankfully they are the exception on AS but do follow up with Alaska Listens.

twitch76

I had a flight crew in June (HNL-SAN) who spent excessive energy aggressively telling people NOT to use their call buttons, and no hint of a suggestion that people use the lav in their own cabin. 5 hours of a steady stream of families through FC. Alaska Listens heard about that too. Hopefully this sort of feedback gets passed along in a specific way.

Unfortunately, in my case, it took Alaska until today (almost two full months later) to respond to me… which means that the FAs didn’t get prompt and specific feedback.

Red L

On the opposite end of the spectrum, we had a new FA in FC SEA to JFK once (this was before COVID) and I swear her goal was to serve lunch and have everything picked up before we flew over Wenatchee.

azepine00

20150609 195720
an unsettling popup on CX flt..

Ghoulish

Petty service concerns shouldn't distract from the core mission of the airline.

PaperGlider

When service is slow or absent I feel better knowing that whatever is on their cellphones must be important.

olouie

I never understand why US airlines usually take an hour to do a simple drink service before turning off the seatbelt sign but European, ME3 and Asian airlines can get a drink service, full meal, and respond to call buttons in the same amount of time while letting passengers use the toilets.

Ghoulish

Because what remained of America's service culture was killed off by short sighted corporations, [and] penny pinching consumers. [...]. A disease spreading rapidly throughout most western airlines.

When my friends and family fly one of the better asian or middle eastern airlines for the first time, the first reaction is amazement at the wonderful experience. The next is anger at the shoddy service they've been getting for decades.

TLDR:

Corporations
Consumers
Culture
Unions

All contributed in the race to the bottom.

mtofell

Yeah, the time from takeoff to first drink is pretty ridiculous in many cases. I do west coast to Hawaii and quite often they distribute the agriculture form before drinks which strikes me as completely crazy. The best FAs take orders before takeoff and have the drinks out immediately at cruising altitude. This is just another in a long line of service/policy inconsistencies with AS. I mean, how hard is it to train FAs to do things a certain way at a certain time. It's been proven time and time again that consistency beats quality in many aspects of business. As we all know, McDonalds certainly doesn't have the best food but regularly mediocre works.

Does AS even have policy/procedure guidelines that address things like this? I worked in some really strict corporate customer service jobs when I was younger and things like drink and meal service timing/consistency are pretty low-hanging fruit in terms of a customer's overall experience.