ServiceAir excell themselves, again.
 

Oh looks like fun this-morning on KL1540 from LBA-AMS... :confused:

As normal.. I arrive in good time and have to wait for the girls to finish their conversation before checking me in :td: just rude, Serviceair, it's not as if they don't have time to chat in the staff-room, in the gate, while boarding, while on their break etc... :rolleyes:

And this is where it gets good..

Boarding is on time.. Then suddenly, the airbridge lurches forward and the door bounces upwards with a nasty screech.. *muffled swearing from outside* followed by *loud swearing from the captain*

Serviceair personnel wander up stairs looking a little sheepish and one older guy who looks like the boss tells a younger guy to "disappear" loudly :D

...well.. no-way I will make my connection at hamster-jam.. wish me luck!

The adventure continues...

They retracted the airbridge and the door fell off, completely detached from the aircraft..

The flight is delayed until 13:00 but I managed to get re-booked on an in-between flight arriving at my final destination at 16.10.. a little later than the planned 11.30..

Mixed feelings about the handling of the incident which was a little chaotic as there was no announcement about our options after the captain spoke to us to inform us that the flight would not be leaving; this meant that everyone was queuing to speak with two gate agents and all asking the same question..

The result was a full flight of passengers getting pissed off and giving the agents a pretty hard time, which, in turn made them turn defensive, abrupt and unhelpful :rolleyes:

Mad dash for the ticket desk, but ST elites were given priority :eek: ^

There was only one person on the ticket desk, and 2-3 Serviceair ladies supervising/standing around, which was just fueling people's tensions and this was being directed at staff, which is not really fair on them personally - it is the organization that is at fault for poor training and contingency planning.

Because we were all 'boarded' re-booking was taking some time (10-15min per person) to make re-bookings, especially since almost everyone has connections to re-book. More angry DYKWIA's...

Some points for Serviceair to address:

1.) Urgent, serious retraining for ground crew - seriously, how do you remove an aircraft door with an airbridge??? :confused:

2.) Customer service training, simple stuff like a smile, welcome and attention (i.e. no personal chatting!!) would make a huge difference to what is an important first interaction between airline and pax.

3.) Clear communication with pax, a simple "ladies, gentlemen, we have two options for you: xxx" would have prevented a swamping and badgering of the GA's, sped the process up immensely and would have relieved peoples frustrations.

4.) Get supervisors to get their hands dirty: I cannot believe that there is only one guy in the airport who is capable of re-booking if there are three ladies who are capable of supervising him.. Jump behind the desk, even if you can only serve a few people, because each one you serve will reduce the queue time by 15min.

/rant

It's a race to the bottom, and I'm not sure who has the edge: Servisair or Aviance.

My own solution was to give up flying regularly, it's just become a miserable experience.

Apart from the inevitably non-functioning "priority luggage", I've never had any problems with Aviance ground handling. They seem reasonably competent and acceptably courteous (but it's true that they're a bit more focused when an AF supervisor is around ;) ). And AFAIK they went as far as developing a lounge with their airline customers at BHX; this truly is something Servisair would never dream of!
On the other hand, out of my 12 last encounters with Servisair, I had problems no fewer than 11 times. The problems with Servisair seem systemic; I don't think there is a major attitude issue with their front-line staff- they often look more desperate and anxious than the customers asking them for assistance. To me, it looks like a case of consistently poor training (e.g. jetbridges) and infrastructure (lounges, IT systems).

Obviously you've never had to deal with GroundForce (LIS, among others). The worst in Europe, IMO.

Hmm.. right - I don't know what's happening here..

The broken door flight (KL1540 / 5th Dec 07) is showing on the KLM website as departed 10.25 arr 12.33 which is rubbish because it was parked on the tarmac when I departed on KL1546 (which is posted as dep 10.42 arr 13.00)

:confused:

If they did infact cancel this flight then I have some recourse for compensation, however if they just delayed it, then i don't.. But one thing is for sure - that flight did not leave LBA at 10.25..

Any ideas?

I certainly hope the name that bears this carrier is what they excel in. ;)