Sorry for the trouble that you got in DCA. You dont have to take your shoes off if they dont alarm anything. THis means that if you walk through and they send you down because in their infinite ability to judge shoes sole height and they have not alarmed the hand wand or the ETD machine, you dont take them off. If there is a hand wand alarm because of anything; Eyelets, nails, a bump with the wand etc. You will have to have them x-rayed. IF they alarm the ETD machine, they have to x-rayed. You dont have to stand in you bare feet or your socks though. IF you decline to take them off after they alarm, you may not be allowed to continue to your gate.

When all else fails - invoke the Nazi regime, that'll show 'em. Just a hint, SirFly-, you are not gaining any points by invoking the wunderkids "go to" line.

And BTW, if it is going to be that bad in the future, you should start packing. I presume you believe what you type.

Exactly.

If they don't know the SOP, that's yet another problem with this agency and why it needs to go.

It's worth the effort to submit a written complaint, and in this case, not only to the FSD but to the United Airlines station manager at DCA.

Point out the following:
Key to this is that you state your anger and frustration but avoid inflammatory remarks in your letter. Otherwise, you only end up diluting your message.

I hope you do follow up on this. People who threaten passengers as a first resort have no business being supervisors and give the rest of us screeners a bad name.

Supervisors run screening operations and screening managers manage them. Managers are not supposed to be in the weeds. There's nothing wrong with this concept although you apparently believe in micromanagement. What should happen is that the screening manager ensures the supervisor resolves the situation professionally and competently. Should screening managers know the SOP? Well, they should be familiar with it or at least know where to look things up should there be any specific questions about a certain procedure. However, they are not nor should they be involved in the mechanics of screening operations. Problem is that we do have some who are, and it makes screening that much more frustrating for screeners, leads and supervisors because everything becomes a matter of politics and cheap PR.

If the manager of SCREENING is not supposed to know the SOP, what the hell is their function????????????????????

Bart, you've been with the government too long. You need to find employement in the real world. You have demonstrated time and again that you are far too intelligent to think that way.

I was completely out of line and offer my apologies to the forum members for my original response. I've deleted it.

There are times when the best response is to turn off the computer and walk away. I should have done that.

I think the point was made. The Holocaust was a tragedy, but it was also a hidden agenda by the administration, who at the time had the majority support of the people.

The shoe carnival is only a small part of the very big problem that's begun to develop -- with the patriot act, random road checkpoints, ID requirements, no-fly lists, etc.

Of course W isn't going to come out and say he wants to come out and turn America into a totalitarian regime. He'd never get support. But if the American people are ignorant enough to hand over their rights one by one...

While we aren't there yet, and I don't mean any disrespect for the Holocaust losses, there are many parallels between the current administration and Hitler's. As the other poster said, it does start a little bit at a time...

As a matter of fact, one of Goebbels' favorite lines was tell the people a lie often enough, and they will begin to see it as the truth. Any thinking, rational person can deduce that multiple ID checks and shoe inspections do nothing to make us safer. Yet the administration continues to bluster about a non-existent cause-and effect scenario that reasons that a lack of stateside terror attacks confirms that security "procedures" are effective.

London is a living proof that if suicide bombers want to perpetrate an attack, they will. the only thing that can stop a suicide bomber (other than decent intelligence) are complete, constant searches, which would completely cripple the nation. If it comes to that, we definitely lost the "war on terror".

No, I don't support micromanagement. However, there is a big problem if management doesn't know the SOP. It's a big problem that screeners aren't familiar with it either (or at least appear to be), as they're the ones that are supposed to be enforcing it.

I might be a relatively low person at work and haven't been working there as long as others have (well, if you go by the GS scale, I'm an 11, so not terribly low), but I for darn sure know enough of the SOP to do my job and to keep out of trouble for violating it (and yes, it can have serious consequences). If I don't know a procedure, I ask.

Bart, you and I both know that a lot of the "security" going on now is politics and cheap PR. If it wasn't, we wouldn't have shoe carnivals, multiple ID checks, people barking at checkpoints, etc and more resources going to bigger vulnerabilities like cargo and personnel that actually have access to the plane (a la catering trucks). It's CYA mode to appear like they're doing something to protect us, but it puts undue pain and strain on folks like you and folks like the rest of us.

If I'm going to complain, I want to take my complaint to someone who knows their stuff. If the screener knows more than management, we're all screwed. That means that TSA is an inverted pyramid with the knowledge at the bottom of the heap with management on top with little knowledge. Maybe that's the case now.

I know you know a lot and that you don't fit that mold. However, the average screeners (and supervisors for that matter) fit that mold.

Super

I'd like to re-explain my original response. Screening managers should have a working knowledge of screening operations. The real experts ought to be supervisors and lead screeners. The problem is that there are some screening managers who have no knowledge of the SOP and rely too much on supervisors. Then there are others who, because they were former supervisors, forget that they are now managers and tend to get their hands on the specifics of the job and make it frustrating for everybody else. It requires true leadership to understand the difference. Like the old Kenny Rogers song, gotta know when to hold 'em and when to fold 'em.

My distaste for micromanagement comes from my military experiences. I've seen full bull colonels get into the weeds of things that should have been handled by captains. The result is that we end up losing our on-the-ground flexibility that is so crucial to successful military operations. While checkpoint operations in no way is comparable to reconnaissance patrols or combat raids, the same concept of leadership still applies.

Getting back to the basic issue here, when a passenger complains to a screening manager about the way a certain procedure was conducted, the screening manager should have a working knowledge of how it should have been conducted. A smart screening manager will mentor the supervisor in the right direction so that the matter is handled competently, professionally and decisively. Unfortunately, there are some screaming managers (no Freudian slip here) who assume the role of supervisor and begin dictating how things ought to be run. Of course, again speaking from my military background, I hold the supervisors in contempt for not having the testical fortitude to stand up to the screening managers when this happens.

I may be completely out of line with my way of thinking. I'm still a rookie in civilian government circles and am still learning about the rinky dink way decisions are carried out and the chickensh*t manner that CYA measures are implemented. For a great majority of my military career, I've worked in what could be described as elite units where competence was never in question except when dealing with the paper-pushing careerist staff pukes at headquarters. So, yes, there are things within the TSA realm that I find frustrating. When I think about it some more, I realize that perhaps that's the way things are in regular conventional military units; I just wasn't exposed to it as often because of some pretty unique assignments.

At any rate, I hope the OP submits a complaint and fries that supervisor. As passengers, you have every right to be treated with courtesy and respect. I'm a firm believer in this.

Duh, where have you been? They hang out at Starbucks and ogle women. Get with the program.

Ok, I can agree with that.

I agree here.

The bottom line comes to getting the issue resolved. I don't think a lot of us would like to bother a screening manager if at all possible. I know I wouldn't. However, it really irks people when the supervisors blindly back up the subordinate (and mind you this goes beyond screening to other employers as well). If the employee's right, then by all means, the supervisor should stick up for them. However, if the employee's wrong, there needs to be reasonable assurance that the problem's going to be fixed. We're not talking flogging the screener in our presence or anything like that, but rather a genuine promise to resolve the issue. Then we hope the next time we go back thru there that the problem doesn't arise again.

Of course, the issue is that it's perceived that TSA doesn't care about passenger complaints and only gives canned responses ... if you're fortunate enough to get one at all.

I agree here too.

No, you're not out of line with your thinking here. The federal government management is often very "Dilbert-esque." I almost have more comics on my wall at work from this year's calendar than not because it all fits so well. At least where I work, the enviornment is mixed between military and civilian and some of the management is military in those cases. While I think the military generally does a better job of having more competent person in a leadership position, I have seen many times where military leadership is just as bad as the civilian.