jserves

Hello all,

I am a United 1k flyer--former Continental Platinum--and I want to invite you to help start a community of fellow United customers that take in interest in the airline as a whole. I really value and appreciate great service from airlines and want to ensure that customers, like us, can become aware of issues that our ground crews, flight attendants and pilots face in their jobs. I believe this isn't just for our crews' benefit, but also for our own interest because if conditions are unsatisfactory for our crews there is no way that would not affect--or have been affecting--our own travel.

That's why I just created a Facebook Page called United Airlines Passengers CARE (Customers Advocating for Representation and Equity). You are already among the most dedicated and interested customers and I believe you would be an amazing part of this community.

I believe you already know what can make the airlines we fly great for the customer. This FlyerTalk community has strong feelings about what works in the service and products for which we pay. As customers, I believe we also care about the crews that provide us great service and assistance.

I have a feeling that there are many crew members that you can think of who have been there for you when you needed help. I think that for every critique or complaint regarding staff members of an airline, we can also think of a crew member who went above and beyond to assist or make us at home--especially when we're so far from home. Whether traveling for one the most exciting vacations of our lives, the most mundane business trip, or a tragic family event--every trip we rely on the crews of these airlines to get us safely and comfortably to our destination.

Unfortunately our United crew members are facing very challenging times. Contracts are in limbo. Livelihoods are at stake. Secure retirement might seem impossible.

This is where your experiences and your stature as a United customer can help immensely. I hope you'll consider liking this Facebook page and being a part of the community. I am no expert and we aren't experts in the inner-workings of this industry, but collectively we can become more engaged and informed through this community. Join the conversation and make a statement about how you believe your flight crews on United deserve good representation and equity in their benefits. I hope this community will be a good resource for us to educate each other and to listen to our crews' experiences.

Please take a minute to join the group on Facebook and share it with your friends and crew members that you know. I am excited to see what you can bring to this and where we can all go together.

Welcome aboard!
Jserves
United 1K Customer

http://www.facebook.com/UnitedPassengersCARE

mduell

I'll join when the crew act like they CARE about me.

MSPeconomist

"Representation" is a euphemism for union?

BayAreaPilot

I don't get it, what's the point? All UA flight crews are already represented by unions. If they're not happy with the contract their union is negotiating for them they should take it up with the union that gets a cut of their paycheck. I don't ask my clients to get involved in my salary negotiations.

allinone

This goes right with what seems to be a prevalent attitude among airline employees that the public and the airline company are actually there to serve them and watch out for their interests. I hear this over and over, maybe not in so many words, but that attitude is always there. I don't think they grasp that they are there to help transport the passengers not that the passengers are there to make their lives any better.

dimramon

Really? I thought they're primarily there for my safety, not to serve me a drink or a meal with a positive attitude.

kluau88

Actually I believe for the flight attendants they have the choice whether or not to pay the union dues. If they decide they don't want to pay the dues, while they get all the benefits of the contract the union has negotiated should they have issues arise then the union will not plead their case with United.

signothetimes53

One look at the FB page being advocated tells me that we are being asked to intervene in what amounts to union negotiations with the airline.

Frankly, a pox on both houses. Flying on UA is a necessary evil for me. It's no more appropriate for them to ask me to advocate on their behalf than it is for me to ask them to write my boss and tell them what difficult working conditions I have to endure while flying to meetings to do my job....and please give Mr. Signothetimes53 a raise and a secure retirement for all he has to endure.

Sheesh.

dergon darkhelm

The best ways for flight crews to get pax "on their side" is to make a conscious effort towards customer service to reap the benefit in the long term.

Customers do not want to see, hear or be otherwise involved in any divisive labor issues. I don't want to see FUPM stickers, I don't want to hear snide remarks about corporate leadership during boarding, and I don't want to wade a** deep into contract talks on facebook.

I recently had a nurse openly coplaining about staffing while she worked on a family member........that didn't help to generate positive feelings about the plight of the RNs in my mind. Same thing for FAs while flying.

Calling travellers attention to labor issues as part of the flying experience, however well meaning, actually harms the FA's reputation in the eyes of most fliers.

demkr

Wirelessly posted (Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; CPU iPhone OS 5_1 like Mac OS X) AppleWebKit/534.46 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/5.1 Mobile/9B176 Safari/7534.48.3)

Thanks but no thanks to this union propaganda

signothetimes53

Frankly, no, I can't think of anything remotely resembling that which you describe.

I remember the FA who spilled a drink on me intended for another passenger while I was sleeping, and who couldn't be bothered to apologize or get me an adequate cloth to dry off.

I remember the FA who took me aside and said that my seatmate had complained that I was interfering in said seatmate's "personal space", and that I needed to keep my hands and arms to myself. Only one problem: she got the wrong guy, the complainant wasn't my seatmate. I got a perfunctory apology, nothing more.

Most of all, I remember the FA who sternly ordered my visually-impaired Type 1 diabetic wife to use the toilet at the rear of the plane, 30 rows behind us, rather than the one near us, in the darkness of an overnight trans-Atlantic flight, that she didn't care what my wife's issues were...and I remember my wife's tears and legitimate fears about the difficulty of doing so without tripping and falling.

That's what I remember, pal.

dergon darkhelm

I just want to be clear here -

I am not anti-FA nor am I anti-union. I am actually a fairly strong supporter of collective bargaining in general.

It's just that unions engaging the general public tends to be a counterproductive effort unless you already enjoy very strong popular support and a great reputation. (Firefighters might be a good example of a group that can successfully enlist the public in their labor negotitations)

Flight attendents, and the airline industry as a whole, do not enjoy that level of popular support and actually, as you can easily read in posts above, suffer from a fairly negative view in the eyes of the public.

My advice to FA union: Fix your reputation with the flying public *before* trying to engage them in your disputes.

teramiles

If contracts are in limbo. Livelihoods are at stake and a Secure retirement seemingly impossible....tell them to find another job.

I liked the place better when they hated Tilton....now, all that disdain is focused on all of US!

Doc Savage

Yep....^