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It's well known that the American air carriers are the bottom of the barrel but wow. United has set a new low.

First I had to check myself in at the airport using a touch screen system. Two United staff behind the counter were no help at all and just pointed me to the machine.

Halfway through my flight to China they served me a styrofoam bowl of uncooked ramen and then came by to pour in hot water.

So now I have to cook my own lunch huh?

It's a sad state of affairs when I miss the warmth and high level of service found on Red Chinese carriers.

@#$# 'em. A pox on Untied on all US carriers.

Have you travelled Air Singapore KK? I've heard its the bomb, the White Star Line of airliners at the moment.

Frazzled wrote:Have you travelled Air Singapore KK? I've heard its the bomb, the White Star Line of airliners at the moment.

Does that mean it's good?

Yes until it hits an iceberg or gets sunk by a german U boat of course...

The impression we get over here is that Americans demand and generally get a pretty good level of customer service, much higher expectations than we have over here anyway. Is this a recent shift with this air service or have they always been a bit... cheap?

Increasing costs all around have forced the airlines to cut services, and the amount of flyers never really rebounded fully after 9/11, so the income is kinda spotty as well. Honestly, it's looking like the airlines need to reinvent themselves, find a new way of operating, because the old way is circling the drain.

The difference between U.S. and virtually any other major international airline is pretty astounding. My wife and I flew to Europe on Air France for our honeymoon, and that was a nice experience...wine with our meals, surprisingly good food (we're not talking fine restaurants here, but it was LIGHT YEARS better than on U.S. airlines), and attendants that were actually pleasant. Yeah, I know...and they were French! Who woulda thunk it?

So yes, my international friends, stay the heck off U.S. airlines if you can help it. Too much cost-cutting, which leads to unhappy passengers, which results in grumpy attendants. And don't forget the overloaded U.S. air traffic system, which means many delays and sometimes being held hostage in the plane for hours waiting to depart.

Yeah, I've been doing a lot of flying in the past few years. American carriers suck, and are getting worse. In general, carriers from any other locale are better. There are much worse individual airlines (JetLite, anyone?), but looking at averages...

International flighs on US carriers are nicer than their domestic flights, IME. Generally they're nicer, roomier planes, and you get stuff like free booze. Off the top of my head:

Like: Northwest, Southwest, KLM, US Airways

Passable: Bulgarian Air, British Air

Not a fan: Al Italia, United

I don't know whats more disconscerting, the fact that Bulgarian Air is passable or the fact Bulgaria has an airline...

They also have nuclear reactors, attractive women, a favorable exchange rate, and some awesome Roman ruins.

Their airline has good beer, though the planes aren't great. They've been flexible about baggage weight when I've needed them to be. And Bulgaria still believes in cute young flight attendants.

Er the wife is not around... detail more about these cute attendants

http://www.bulgaria-air.co.uk/

Top of the right hand column.

Not really my type but you wouldn't crawl over her to get to me, I think.

Another problem US carriers face is an older workforce and generous benefits and pensions that the unions won from them. Adds up to higher costs at a time everyone is seeking lower fares.

And those pesky anti-discrimination laws prevent them from hiring cute young things as stewadesses.

So I have sympathy.

But give a choice I ain't never flying United again. Making me cook my own lunch is an insult too far.

I don't call a Pot Noodle lunch.

You should try Virgin Atlantic Upper Class.

One of the better quotes I've heard went something about not going into a diner for breakfast and expecting a flight across the country, so why should it be the other way around.

I've flown business class on various airlines and Singapore is the best by far. Champagne, OJ, full reclining seats, classy attendants....



Normally, when you look out the side window during baggage loading...you see various unshaven, obese individuals giving your bags the Peoples Elbow ­™ before launching it into the plane. Singapore...the baggage guys line up (Dressed in suits) and wave bye with little white gloves. It's surreal.

My wife used to work for Virgin and there is a standard thing that if your spouse/partner is rostered to fly on Christmas or New Year's Eve they give a free ticket to you to fly along with them. The flights are usually nearly empty on those days.

So one year I flew to Japan for New Year. Flew out on New Year's Eve, spent New Year's Day in Narita (the temple there is one of the major places for New Year attendance) and flew back on Jan 2.

There were four guys on the flight all upgraded into Upper Class (the Virgin equivalent of First Class) all with Japanese girlfriends/wives. We were treated like kings.

It was like "Get away from me, woman, I can't handle another brandy, massage." and so on. My wife was hard at work at the back of the plane, of course. Ha ha.

Apparently Bill Gates flies economy because you get there just as soon. He's a [rude slang for female pudenda]. (Can I say that here?)

Nowadays Virgin have seats that turn into beds.

I flew on a domestic Virgin flight in Aus that had little headrest warmers. 6 inch or so LCDs in the back of all the seat headrests, for the viewing pleasure of the person behind you (please insert credit card). They were about 40 degrees (C) to the touch.

I had an awful experience on an italian airline a year ago. they didn't even have TV's, food was absolutely terrible (FISH! WHO MAKES FISH IN A MICROWAVE?! HONESTLY?!) and we were fed pretty much only once on an eleven hour flight (from toronto to milan). honestly, just about everything about this trip was terrible. When we got there, we thought we'd have an hour to freshen up and stuff, but no. straight to the coliseum for me and my classmates, who were SEVERELY jet lagged. I remember maybe 3 things from that day. didn't get back to the hotel until around 10 PM, too.

Feel lucky that the are only forcing you to cook your meal. Madrid´s last plane accident is shaping up as a "somebody decided to skip on manteniance is a good way to reduce costs" mess.

M.