MitchR

AA seems to be pushing more flights to its regional carrier, Envoy, especially out of ORD. While AA seems to have abandoned customer service since the merger, Envoy is even worse. I have had an issue with delays resulting in missed connections (no reason given for the delay we just sat at the gate for over an hour), baggage issues (they couldn't find my valet bag and it turned out that they had taken it to baggage claim so of course I missed another connection), and actual safety issues. I wrote AA on several occasions and my conclusion is that the "Regional Carriers" are stepchildren, and AA could care less. On a recent flight from Chicago to Des Moines they allowed a disabled woman who could barely walk to sit on the exit row. She was using a cane and asked to pre board. She hobbled down the aisle and sat on the exit row. She was on the aisle and piled her bags up in front of the emergency door. The flight attendant never came back to check to see if passengers were seated, buckled seat belts, blocked exits, etc... I took a picture of this and sent it to AA customer service. The media containing the picture was sent back to me in a handwritten envelope that looked like a third grader had written it. No explanation or response. On another flight I obsserved baggage attendants throwing bags from the jetway to the ground. Videoed that, no response. On another flight a gate agent opened a door and lowered a ladder without looking and nearly wiped out a baggage handler below. Her supervisor went off on her which started an extended argument that the passengers were forced to watch while we were waiting to deplane. On yet another flight a passenger stood up immediately after landing, retrieved his bag from the bin and stood at the door through the entire taxi process. The FA just watched. When there is a delay they typically claim weather. On a flight this week we sat at the gate for over an hour. The Captain announced early on that we were blocked into the gate, then that we had missed our departure slot with ATC, then that we had a departure hold. The weather was fine (partly cloudy and 25 degrees). When I missed my connection they claimed that it was "weather" and left me to fend for myself. Fortunately the AA Executive Platinum desk took care of me.

ryan182

Pictures and videos of safety violations aren’t really something I’d expect AA CS to know how to handle. They should but like anything else you’re getting whatever copy/paste auto response has the closest keyword match. Now if you still have those pictures and videos the FAA might find them of interest. Especially the exit row one as that seems particularly bad and easy to notice.

Herb687

What did the flight attendant do or say when you got up to alert him/her to the fact that there was a non-qualified passenger not only sitting in the exit row but also blocking the exit with her belongings?

KBMIFlyer

Give me Envoy over Mesa any day. At least they run mostly on time. I have only had one issue with Envoy this year, I have been delayed 10 times on Mesa.

AANYC1981

This....at least Envoy are technically still AA employees and thus more accountable.

jerseytom

Not sure if you intended it to come across this way, but there are of course more regional carriers than just Envoy. Piedmont, PSA, Mesa...

I haven't had nearly the volume of flights as many on FT but I'd agree with the other comments, if there's a regional carrier I get nervous about it's Mesa. To be fair I've had great flight crews with them, but IRROPs can be pretty bad.

Uzzar

PSA through CLT is very bad about mechanical and aircraft swap delays. I haven't done Envoy as much, but they are probably about the same with regional flights.

UKtravelbear

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nancypants

Forgive me, just want to make sure I’m understanding. You didn’t send in the picture itself, you sent in something like a thumb drive or a CD with the picture file on it?

mvoight

Exactly my question. This was a hazard and OP knew it. To simply let it go would have not been the thing to do. I would have brought it to the attention of the cockpit crew if the FA refused to fix it.

Falconkidding

To defend my competitor regional brothers only the two FA issues are on envoy. The rest are on AA or ATC. At hubs groundcrew and gateside is interchangeable between all company gates IE at KORD theres no set gates for SKW Mesa Envoy PDT PSA Compass Republic they are just AAs gates. Outstations are run by contractors usually. At my outstation hub its pdt and united ground express even though 9 different express carriers operate into it.

As for WX delays its usually true granted ive only worked at a 121 operator for a year but never once have we lied about delays even though people think we do. I remember departing Newark and having to shut down in between 4l and 4R cause the entire west departure points were shutdown of course there were still a ton of people taking off with south and northbound departures and it was clear on the field. I heard so many accusations when we deplaned at destination even though we clearly explained why in updates.

As for performance metrics ive not looked at AAs side of things but i imagine Envoy is similar to AA.
On the UA side about half the UAX carriers are better than UA and half are equal or a bit worse. The only outlier is C5 who operates out of Newark where on time goes to die.

enviroian

I flew them to PNS Friday night. 1.5 hour delay. I can already see my 4 PM return is going to be delayed as the first flight of many today is delayed....in fact I used flight aware to look at a sampling of Envoy flights. ALL delayed, every day. Really?

KBMIFlyer

Are you flying to DFW? Those flights are Mesa, not Envoy. The only Envoy flights out of PNS are to MIA.

enviroian

The CR9 I flew Friday clearly had Envoy on the fuselage.

arc727

That’s impossible because Envoy doesn’t have any CR9s. Only Mesa and PSA do.