Beat me to it. This is not about the error incidence rate, it's about underinvestment in service recovery.

"The worst" being, on average, about 10 minutes later.

There's not much that can really be done to solve this. Investing in interlining would really cost more than it's worth, because the incidence rate isn't that high. For every incident where B6's delays are large enough over other carriers to really make it that much less convenient, there are hundreds of satisfied, on-time customers. It's about cost management, and the trade off for not investing in interlining and adding that to the bottom line is having a few bad cases.

If we saw a huge dip in OTP vs. other carriers, or even a huge difference between average arrival delay of late flights, I could agree that the cost to interline is justified. In today's money, I can't say that it is.

Interlining could be a zero-sum game. Maybe JetBlue thinks they'd end up ticketing pax over to other carriers more than they'd receive.

When the scenario happens, it will be too late.

At the philosophical level - the idea of not interlining is standalone versus network, which provides stability and recovery when facing pressure

At the company P/L level, focusing on the cost of interlining ignores the potential revenue upside of business travelers

At the customer service level, telling customers that a certain irrops recovery solution is not cost effective goes against the "bring humanity back to air travel mantra"

At the PR/advertising level, people might interpret "happy jetting" as "happy flying if you manage to get the flights otherwise good luck"

I don't see how you can assert that without knowing what the current policy is costing you.

I live in SEA, where a cancelled B6 departure means a 24-hour delay. I can tell you for a fact the current policy is costing JetBlue roughly the average salary for one frontline employee... that is, the amount my business partner and I spend with UA/NW/DL on flights to NY and New England.

When B6 runs into operational trouble at SEA, the only two options you can give me are: go away and come back in 24 hours... or, here's your money back, go have a walk around the terminal and see if you can buy a walkup from some other airline at 3X+ the price. Neither is remotely acceptable.

How do you know how many potential high-revenue customers book away from B6 on this basis?

Cities where operations consist of one flight per day are usually given priority during IROPs, when possible. For January 1-September 30 of this year, B6 is on par with AA and DL for on-time ops and cancellations for SEA-JFK. AA and DL can interline during a cancellation, B6 can route through LGB and SAN. Or, you can go away and come back in 24 hours, or here's your money back. I never said it was the best situation, but the incidence has become so low as to not be a pressing issue right now, IMO.

Just my opinion.

The difference between us is that you seem to plan for the absolute worst situation possible. Which is fine, we just disagree.

That's true. Sorry -- it's the product of past experience.

Not to hijack, but shouldn't planning for the worst possible regarding one's schedule be something that any savvy traveler does, regardless of the airline involved?

Within reason, of course. If everyone planned for the worst case scenario (read: another 9/11-type closing of all US airspace for > 24 hrs), then no one would plan to fly anywhere. We'd all be driving, or walking.

It's all about setting one's own personal expectations of what can go wrong--I like to plan according to statistics and historical data, but everyone's mileage varies.

Earlier in this thread it was observed that a couple flying B6 from PWM to JFK to connect to an overseas longhaul had only themselves to blame when the B6 leg was badly delayed, blowing up their connection. They had allowed themselves about a four-hour layover. Given the historical data, what do you think would have been a prudent connection window? Six hours? 12? 24? Should people in that situation not fly JetBlue at all?

You seem to be saying that it is silly to plan for the worst case scenario when flying JetBlue... but when a customer takes the timetable at face value and things go wrong, it's his or her own fault. Perhaps the truth is somewhere in the middle. I no longer book B6 when I have to be at my destination within 24 hours of schedule. But if that is silly, what margin is not silly? At what point are irrops the airline's fault?

That was a fine connection window, but again, the risk is always higher when you book with multiple airlines. Given historical data, I would've booked it, as well. This isn't a typical scenario, though, and it's hard to assign blame to one entity.

It's not unreasonable to expect to be able to take the timetable at face value, but it would be very prudent to do your homework. Fault can only be assigned for specific incidents -- a WX GDP can't be blamed on B6 or the customer; a MX delay can't be blame on the customer; and a 45 min international connection on another carrier can't be blamed on B6.

It's always silly to plan for the worst case scenario. It's prudent not only in air travel, but in everyday life, to plan for the likeliest scenario. This doesn't rule out having backup plans, but it does mean being reasonable in expectations.

That was a fine connection window, but again, the risk is always higher when you book with multiple airlines. Given historical data, I would've booked it, as well. But, I'd also be aware before doing so that if the B6 flight is somehow delayed outside of historical trends, I'd be SOL.

This isn't a typical scenario, though, and it's hard to assign blame to one entity. It's an absurd suggestion that people in that situation shouldn't fly JetBlue at all, given that any airline and any aircraft can fall prey to a MX problem at any time.

It's not unreasonable to expect to be able to take the timetable at face value, but it would be very prudent to do your homework. Fault can only be assigned for specific incidents -- a WX GDP can't be blamed on B6 or the customer; a MX delay can't be blamed on the customer; and a 45 min international connection on another carrier can't be blamed on B6.

It's always silly to plan for the worst case scenario. It's prudent not only in air travel, but in everyday life, to plan for the likeliest scenario. This doesn't rule out having backup plans, but it does mean being reasonable in expectations.

Because the issue here is not the MX incidence rate but airlines' ability and willingness to offer recovery to the customer at minimum inconvenience, I just really, really disagree.

I'll give you another JetBlue irrops story. My family and I were flying BOS-JFK-SEA this August. Even though the website and concourse displays showed our BOS-JFK running on time, when we got to the gate we learned it was actually running two to three hours late (on a sunny, no-precip day; MX or other ops problem downlne). This naturally blew up many connections, including ours. My son and I were lucky to snag the last two seats on the BOS-SEA nonstop, but my wife had to stay over at the airport Hilton, fly the next day, miss a day or work, and arrived home 16 hours late.

The point is, there are about 25 other ways to fly from Boston to Seattle on a weekday afternoon, on about eight other airlines, and none of them were open to my wife. On a robust network carrier you almost always have multiple options within your own system. When an airline interlines you have many more. I can't tell you how infuriating it was to see the Alaska BOS-SEA nonstop taxi out with empty seats, while my wife retired to a $200 hotel room and resigned herself to missing a day's pay the next day, for which trouble JetBlue sent her a $50 voucher.

She represents permanently lost future businessto JetBlue -- as do, I think, the numerous business travelers at the podium in BOS who were stunned to hear the GA tell them they would be arriving in Houston or Vegas or wherever not at 1000pm tonight, but 4:45pm tomorrow... etc. All those people would no doubt readily conclude that as they really had to be at their destinations for meetings or events tomorrow, they should not have flown JetBlue at all.

And despite your post above, I think you might agree. According to your earlier post about the Perth-bound couple who missed their longhaul because of a JetBlue MX event, since they really had to be there, they had nobody to blame but themselves (for taking the published schedule at face value). Because irrops pax are at the mercy of B6 and must wait to be reaccommodated on the next available B6 flight, whenever it may be, anyone who must be somewhere has to weigh the risk of flying JetBlue very carefully.

I am off from SEA to BTV tomorrow. Because I really, really have to be in place for a Wednesday morning meeting, and can't risk getting there Wednesday night or Thursday, I am flying UA, much as I dislike the experience. That's not planning for the worst-case scenario. That's acknowledging the facts of everyday life at B6: when you are delayed, you can easily be really, really delayed.

That's not acknowledging the facts of everyday life -- not by a longshot. The situation you described, while entirely unfortunate and I do sympathize, is not an everyday occurence by any means. And it is unfortunate that the encounter turned you off to B6 completely.

But I'm pretty sure B6 realizes that it's losing some people this way. And the business decision to forego interline agreements stands. So B6 must have done the math and figured that the attrition rate is acceptable versus the cost (in dollars, effort, etc.) of interlining.

I get that you're the kind of guy who lets a bad experience turn you off to a company. But you have to acknowledge that you're not "acknowledging the facts of everyday life," when, in fact, it's not an everyday occurence.

Pushing the envelope. Sometimes this just works. TPA-JFK lands at 8:31AM,at gate 15, connect with Chicago, which pushes off gate 2 at 8:48. Whew.... Return flight cancelled due to weather in Chicago, wait two days for flight loads to allow Non-Rev travel. Land in JFK, gate 5 at 12:45, push off gate 2 to Tampa at 1:20. It's all about the numbers and weather. No-one can call the odds if a flight is going to be on time or not. If it's a huge issue, leave yourself enough time. Happy Holidays!!