Jaenks

This is the description of the new delayed baggage delivery enchament in co-operation with Posti.

intuition

Yeah, even without going hyperbole, these are the lines I'm thinking along too, when they recruit a CEO from another legacy company; struggling and failing to meet a new future and ends up in a cost saving spiral that of course triggers even bigger loss of revenue that requires even bigger cost savings to keep profitability...
In the talouselama interview I sense he even hints that any potential expansion will be secondary to profitability. While that on one level sounds healthy economics, expansions rarely are successful without some kind of risk taking. If the strategy is to cost reduce until there is money in the bank that can be used for expansion it might never happen. This is what Posti and PostNord is doing - increasing prices and decreasing service trying to beat the pace of wich customers are leaving.


At the press conference it was explained that despite the 5 months to recruit (excluding the 6 months waiting period for this CEO to become available) they hade plenty of highly qualified candidates. My gut feeling is quite the opposite. That, or the board was totally surprised and unprepared when Topi gave notice.

BTW, the starting date of july 11 (exactly 6 months out) indicates they only signed the new CEO hours before the press-release.

joorinainen

Ironical that he leaves for a position in Elisa. Telecoms and airline industry probably universally share the worst customer experience and service reputation in all industries.

Ed Size

You forgot to mention postal services to make the triumvirate complete

FFlash

”Välitämme / We care” is what he has on his profile in Posti’s colors.
Who cares…pun intended. In fact that välitämme-word is playful and equally means ”we deliver” which is what Posti does (and fails).

Well the profile says this new CEO has made career as consultant and then at Lindorff debt collection services. Of course we will soon get a very positive comment from AY fanboy who will tell this man will be perfect for AY and us, and opinions are free, but what I see this man is not coming from a track-record with customer-excellence operations.

WilcoRoger

Call me a doomsayer, if you want, but at this point I am happy that my Avios will become transferrable to BA soon.

Ed Size

The old CEO leaves to Elisa, the new CEO comes from Posti, with experience at Lindorff debt collection services so it looks like you need to be service driven to run an airline. Oh wait, or is it more about getting the most money for a bad product from the customer?

ffay005

These slogans are so funny. HSL, the regional transit authority in the Helsinki area, has launched a massive campaign where they promote their recent price decrease (one of Europe's most expensice single tickets now costs 15 cents less than last year, ie the decrease is as big as is the bottle deposit of a beer can, yay). Their new slogan is "Kaikki on mahdollista", "Anything is possible."

And so it indeed seems, with a video ciruclating in social media yesterday where an HSL bus driver stops in the middle of the street, exits the bus and starts a street fight with some car driver. Take the bus, and nothing is impossible

manywhere

Once the new CEO starts at AY, getting missing AY+ points will require opening a collection case to Lindorff who will return after half a year with only half of the points. The other half taken as case management fee. And Itellä-hoidat-sen-Posti will deliver the postal letter half a year later.

Jaenks

Not only, all EU261/2004 claims handling are outsourced to Lindorff too, and that half taken would be named as "ex-managment fee".
CEO Kuusisto: Rest assured, things would certainly not go " päin mäntyä"!

joorinainen

Exactly.

FFlash

Its an interesting triangle this.

Coincidentally, today I got a post from Elisa, a bill delivered sooo late they had already misrecorded my payments from a closed account and that bill had 5€ collection fee for 0€ bill. Great I had to call to rectify.
Excellent example. Involving postal service, debt collection, Elisa (incredible?) customer experience, all greatly done in vain, customer leaving, and what more.

Better that Turkasen Kuusistoista wont be reading here, he might have some motivation issue

WiVM

I think they will be the big winner on this "Adios" and CEO non-sense. I also started to focus on Air Baltic. Clean and easy product. Modern planes in 2x2 config. Customer service answers within the hour. Internet during complete flight. Ice-cream in the lounge.

If Finnair doesn't want my money, no problem, I will spend it with the neighbors. Only issue remains the domestic flights within Finland.

mpkz

Of course, I've never been on the board of a public company, so I don't know how it works, the people that I know that have been on the boards of public companies do generally agree that recruiting for Finnish gov't owned companies is particularly difficult, but in this case the choice is quite logical: You see that someone who ran a company in decline for external reasons gets hired to run another company that is suffering because of an external shock.

The big difference between AY and Posti is that AY customers, despite some resistance here, do have a choice of how to travel, and hence AY faces more competitive pressure than Posti does. It's just that while BT is often called great here, the Finnish traveling public might be less upset about a quiche being served as the second meal in long haul J (AY) than being charged 35 euros to visit a check in desk (BT).

WilcoRoger

So let me get it straight - someone unable to turn around a company that's been in decline is sufficient qualification to run another company in decline and expecting the result to be different?