aisle-guy

From the 80s onward for many years I used to enjoy and look forward to my UA trips between US and AU, albeit in economy class. The flight attendants, generally youngish, were immaculately groomed and as you boarded the aircraft you'd get a warm welcome from those standing at the door. Others would be positioned at various points around the aircraft to welcome you with a cheerful smile and offer any assistance they could. Meals were served at a pleasant leisurely pace, with enough time allowed to interact meaningfully and respectfully with each passenger on their food and beverage choices. During the flight you could approach any flight attendant if you needed a mid-flight drink or whatever; if they were huddled at the back conversing with one another one of them would spring up when you appeared and cheerfully serve you. I'm not certain of this but I seem to recall that they used to clean the lavatories periodically during the flight.

Not so these days, if my flights over the last few years are anything to go by. The flight attendants, generally much older (not that that should mean anything), seem to have one and only objective, viz., to get their chores over and done with as quickly as possible and to get through the flight with a minimum of personal interaction with their customers. Meals are served at breakneck pace, especially breakfast, which incongruously is left to an excessively late stage of the flight, meaning that they have to rush that part of their service to an unreasonable degree. Sometimes the tray is shoved in front of you with barely any time to say thank you to the flight attendant, and some of the flight attendants aren't above expressing impatience with a slowish passenger. During the quiet parts of the flight, when they're huddled at the back of the aircraft, they seem less than disposed to having you ask them for a coffee or whatever. And the lavatories are a disgusting mess by the end of the flight.

Someone is bound to say that they had a beautiful transpacific flight on United recently, and I'd have no reason to doubt them. However, I haven't, and I travel often enough to say with some confidence that something has changed in recent years, and for the worse. It's a real shame, as apart from the pleasant experience I described above the airline was immensely good to me during the long-gone "golden era" of frequent-flying, and as a Million Miler I still get excellent benefits that I really appreciate.

But the fact is that on a long, tedious, uncomfortable, overnight transpacific economy-class flight, in-flight service is a much bigger deal than it is on a relatively short domestic flight, where one doesn't really look for anything special. Friendly, attentive flight attendants can (and did) make all the difference between a 14-hour flight that's barely tolerable and one that's somewhat enjoyable. Unfortunately the airline seems to have forgotten this basic fact of air travel.

I want to ask United, what has happened to cause this deterioration in their service? I wonder what the answer would be.

IADFlyer123

I think this forum's 500 pages hold the answers to your questions....

sfozrhfco

Being honest, the 90s were not all that great in economy to Australia either and the planes were pretty tired looking then so it is probably looking back more with nostalgia rather than a demonstrably precipitous decline in service.

rubbernyc

+1

Not sure where you've been with regards to keeping up with this site, but get a snack and sit awhile. You will find plenty to commiserate with.

aisle-guy

I think it was in the second half of the 80s that UA took over PA's US-AU routes and not long afterwards introduced the 747-400 on those routes. They were beautiful new aircraft and the years beginning then and continuing into the early 00s were the sweet spot on that route, where the in-flight service was as I described it (nostalgically, yes).

LaserSailor

You did. You are paying far less for travel than you did in the 80s. You can get that experience if you are willing to pay for it, but most of your fellow pax won't.

critten

UA is clearly targeting business class plus travelers. Thus there must be an incentive to make economy so bad that they opt to pay more for business class :P. Heck they barely care you flew 100k miles in a year anymore.

notquiteaff

Well, a lot of the things the OP mentioned aren't actually causing the airline any significant extra expense.

SamuelS

But UA is currently putting their FA's through a shiny new "customer service training". If the FA's would just smile more, UA can get the same financial results as DL - the current "customer airline of choice"... Oh, the merry japes.

Silver Fox

Don't make me laugh, I think I have a hernia !

nikolastojsin

You are referring to the training channa announced in another thread, right? The DPRK one?

Seriously, OP, you are exactly right. However, it can be argued that a very successful global airline can be run on what UA recently forgot...

SamuelS

Actually I didn't see that. But my friends in UA SW are regaling me with their tales.

aisle-guy

It's a sad situation but again I'm not sure if they know what they're doing. There's no way in the world I would pay to travel business class on their transpacific 777s (8 across when there are only 9 in economy!!!). The 2-2-2 configuration on the 787-9 looks a whole lot nicer, though if I were to travel business class again I'd probably opt for AC, which was superb the one time I took it.

Surftel

Not that much less.

In 1985 the average round trip US airfare was $450. In 2014 it was $396. These prices are adjusted for inflation

There was a big drop in fares in the late 70's/early 80's followed by a slower decline. The last 4 years have seen a steady increase in fares and fees.

The average round-trip international journey price fell from $1,029.84 in 1990 to $890.27 in 2013, again adjusted for inflation. Fares/fees continue to increase. 2015 will bring us even closer to 1990 fares

critten

100% agreed, 8 across is horrible (have two trips coming up on them), they are aiming for high value customers while offering low value product!