From usairways at vision.moundalexis.com Sun Jun 17 13:55:09 2007 From: usairways at vision.moundalexis.com (Daily US Airways News) Date: Sun, 17 Jun 2007 09:55:09 -0400 (EDT) Subject: [US Airways] Forgive us, US Airways, for our skepticism Message-ID: <20070617095329.D13243-100000@vision.moundalexis.com> 17 June 2007 ; Post Gazette Forgive us, US Airways, for our skepticism http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/07168/794188-243.stm --- Recognizing the growing negative consumer response to the string of service meltdowns it has experienced since its merger with America West, the management of US Airways recently reached out to its Dividend Miles program members to tell them what the airline is doing to correct problems and improve its product. H. Travis Christ, vice president of sales and marketing, began the merger update by "apologizing for tough times we had this spring due to the migration of our reservation system." On the morning of Sunday, March 4, airport ticketing kiosks shut down when they tried to switch the complex reservation computers of the two airlines to operate a single system. That created a disruption that led to hundreds of flight delays and cancellations. Similar system snarling snafus occurred when the airline merged its various Web sites and frequent-flier programs. Mr. Krist explained that 600 new ticketing kiosks had been purchased to address the problem, with the first 100 being installed in airports this month. Acknowledging that the airline didn't "adequately replicate processes that many of our employees use to do their jobs every day," Mr. Krist offered assurances "that teams of employees and programmers have been formed to get staff what they need and are making good progress." On the positive side, the airline announced it is beginning a series of in-flight enhancements and upgrades this fall, especially on its transcontinental and transatlantic flights, as well as domestic first class. There's no mention of any betterments in the economy compartments, but they are working to make it easier for Preferred status members to get complimentary upgrades. As far as US Airways' Web site, service upgrades are being uploaded every eight weeks. Already as Mr. Krist explains in a humorously self-deprecating way, the airline is offering: * Support for Mac users. (We thought Apple was a fruit.) We now support Firefox 1.5 (and newer) for both Mac and PC, Safari 2.x+ for Mac, IE 6 and 7 for the PC and Commodore 64. * Bar codes on boarding passes to speed boarding. * Fixed Web Check-in for Firefox users. * Improved reliability of flight information for departure times, delays, etc. * Universal Air Travel Plan (UATP) cards now accepted for all tickets and purchased upgrades. * Ability to see and confirm your itinerary online when US Airways makes a schedule change that affects you. In coming weeks, usairways.com will display sold-out flights, present more options regarding its Star Alliance partner airlines and provide detailed flight status information for flights delayed or diverted during inclement weather. Soon, it will be possible to access flight information from mobile devices, and even buy tickets. They're also setting up a system to provide text message updates. Mr. Krist admits "that some of these features are standard equipment on some other airline sites, but we started in a bit of a hole at merger time and now we're quickly closing the gap. We intend to be fully caught up and more by -- well, as soon as possible." Surely even skeptical travelers will be reassured by these good-faith efforts and electronic improvements, were it not for the airline's continued tendency to drop the proverbial ball whenever the going gets tough, sending thousands of its travelers scrambling to salvage some semblance of their trips. The most recent meltdown occurred without warning on June 8, a Friday, when a Federal Aviation Administration computer system in Atlanta failed early in the morning. The system processes pilots' flight plans and sends them to air-traffic controllers. Those functions were automatically transferred to another computer in Salt Lake City, which was quickly swamped by the extra data, only magnifying the problem. Although the glitch was fixed shortly before 11 a.m., its impact rippled throughout the country and lingered throughout the next day, especially in the busy East Coast corridor. Flights arriving at New York City's La Guardia Airport early Friday evening were averaging nearly four hours late, and delays continued into Saturday. The airline most affected by the situation? According to flightstats.com, an independent Web site, US Airways operated only 47 percent of its flights on time that Friday and even fewer -- 39 percent -- on Saturday to its Philadelphia hub. In the face of a consistent inability to maintain its operating schedule, all of US Airways' service bells and whistles offer relatively little comfort. While nifty to be able to access flight information in a variety of electronic formats and platforms, far better is being confident a given flight will depart and arrive close to its scheduled time, or that the airline will be upfront with and committed to paying passengers when things go bad. Unfortunately, that faith is becoming increasingly difficult for US Airways travelers to sustain. What delays await as we head into the busiest and stormiest months of the travel year or the most difficult phase of the US Airways merger? From usairways at vision.moundalexis.com Sun Jun 17 13:56:40 2007 From: usairways at vision.moundalexis.com (Daily US Airways News) Date: Sun, 17 Jun 2007 09:56:40 -0400 (EDT) Subject: [US Airways] New Mexico To US Airways: No License, No Liquor Sales Message-ID: <20070617095632.R13243-100000@vision.moundalexis.com> 17 June 2007 ; Aero-News Network New Mexico To US Airways: No License, No Liquor Sales http://www.aero-news.net/index.cfm?ContentBlockID=4fa26b21-fd82-4155-b8f6-df1b220e89d4 --- State Refuses To Extend 90-Day Temporary License To Serve The State of New Mexico has drawn its line in the Albuquerque sand, refusing to extend a 90-day temporary liquor license to US Airways following several incidents of serving alcohol onboard to intoxicated individuals, reported the Associated Press. In November, passenger Dana Papst drove the wrong way on Interstate 25, killing himself and five members of a New Mexico family in a head-on collision. His blood alcohol level was four times the legal limit. According to reports, US Airways had served alcohol to Papst, even though witnesses said he appeared to be intoxicated. Police said Papst also bought beer at a Bernalillo, NM convenience store after disembarking from his flight in Albuquerque. Following the crash, department officials reviewed airline liquor licenses, discovering US Airways was among several airlines that lacked state licenses. Since then, five airlines have submitted applications, and one stopped serving alcohol on New Mexico flights, according to department documents. As ANN reported [1], the state cited US Airways in January in connection with the Papst accident, and prohibited the airline from serving liquor on New Mexico flights until the airline received a state liquor license. US Airways was granted a temporary 90-day license. At a hearing on Monday, the head of the state Regulation and Licensing Department sought assurances that US Airways was taking steps to avoid serving alcohol to intoxicated passengers. Said Santa Fe lawyer Michael Campbell, representing US Airways, the airline has no intentions of sending drunken people out on the roads of New Mexico. Wednesday's decision came down one day before the temporary license was set to expire. "US Airways has done little, if anything, to consider implementing the state's required alcohol server training to identify alcohol impaired or intoxicated passengers," the state Regulation and Licensing Department said in denying the extension. The airline said Wednesday it sent the department a letter explaining that it plans to incorporate aspects of New Mexico's liquor-server training program into its flight crew training program. The state, however, had yet to receive the letter. The Papst incident was not to be the only one involving US Airways serving liquor to an intoxicated passenger. The state cited the airline again last month for serving an intoxicated person after the passenger was arrested at a DWI roadblock less than half an hour after leaving Albuquerque's airport. He told authorities he had been drinking at the Phoenix airport and on his US Airways flight from Phoenix to Albuquerque. His blood-alcohol level was .16, according to police, twice New Mexico's legal limit for intoxication. Although Monday's preliminary hearing was held to determine if in fact the airline had submitted all the documentation for a permanent license, the hearing was different in that it included others in addition to the usual hearing officer and company officials, reported the Free New Mexican. In addition to department Superintendent Edward Lopez, those in attendance included Gary Tomada, head of the department's Alcohol & Gaming Division, the department's legal counsel, several relatives of the people killed in the Papst crash, news reporters, and four US Airways officials. During the hearing, Lopez asked officials whether the airline had incorporated any of New Mexico's alcohol-server training materials into the airline's training program. Lopez noted that the department had issued the airline a temporary license after the airline's attorney wrote that the airline was reviewing the state's training materials and might incorporate portions of them into the company's training materials. US Airways Vice President Michael Minerva said the company hadn't yet had a chance to incorporate any of the state's materials because the airline trains new flight attendants in September; there hasn't been a new class since the Papst crash, he said. After reading aloud the state's training handbook about how to manage intoxicated people who are intent on driving and how to identify impairment and intoxication, Lopez said he had hoped the airline would already have incorporated those sections of the handbook. To which Minerva responded: The airline is considering the state's entire training program. However, in a contrary response, US Airways attorney Campbell later said, "Our training materials are, we believe, sufficient in the recognizing and treatment of intoxicated persons." When Lopez asked if the airline had done anything differently in regard to alcohol-server training since the Papst crash, Campbell said the airline had issued a notification about the subject of intoxicated people. Ray Collins Sr., father of Renee Collins-Gonzales, who was killed in the Papst crash with her husband and three children, also spoke at the hearing, challenging US Airways to not just comply with minimal training standards for serving alcohol, but to set an industry-wide example. --- [1] http://www.aero-news.net/news/commair.cfm?ContentBlockID=DDFC23E3-5C3F-44F2-983C-316B5EE63032&Dynamic=1 From usairways at vision.moundalexis.com Sat Jun 23 14:24:35 2007 From: usairways at vision.moundalexis.com (Daily US Airways News) Date: Sat, 23 Jun 2007 10:24:35 -0400 (EDT) Subject: [US Airways] What airline passengers want most of all Message-ID: <20070623102353.E1802-100000@vision.moundalexis.com> 23 June 2007 ; Inside Tucson Business What airline passengers want most of all http://www.azbiz.com/articles/2007/06/22/news/news10.txt --- The way the CEO of US Airways sees it, airline passengers aren't looking for more legroom or better meal service. "There really are only three things passengers expect of an airline: "1. Get me there on time, 2. Get my bags there with me, and 3. Be nice to me. "These are not very high standards that we ought to be able to meet," Doug Parker told about 375 airport executives as the keynote speaker at the Airports Council International-North America's Marketing and Communications Conference at Loews Ventana Canyon Resort last week. But he acknowledges the industry is struggling to even meet these goals. Parker said airlines share part of the blame - especially the one that says "be nice to me" n but he said that stems from the verbal abuse employees take from passengers because the industry can't meet goal No. 1. And that one he blames on an antiquated government-run air traffic control system that cannot keep pace. Parker was called on to talk to an audience largely made up of airport officials about the merger of the old America West and US Airways into what is now a new US Airways and to forecast what he sees as the future for the industry. His vision for the future wasn't what his audience or airline passengers probably wanted to hear. There will be more consolidation of airlines, which will reduce the number of planes and only further tighten the industry's ability to serve new cities and new routes. The airline industry is too fragmented, Parker said. Seven major carriers are splitting up most of the nation's routes but the largest, American Airlines, has just less than 20 percent of the capacity. Despite most airlines reporting profits last year, "the airline industry is broken. Management hasn't fixed anything," Parker said. The profits were directly attributable to airlines' reducing capacity by about 5 percent, Parker said. This meant more seats were filled and, in the supply and demand equation, it also allowed for some fare increases. For the immediate future, Continental Airlines, which is planning to increase capacity by 3 percent to 4 percent, is the only airline among the traditional carriers saying it intends to increase capacity this year. But, in an industry that sees typical profit margins in the 3 percent to 4 percent range, Parker said an economic downturn will be the catalyst for more consolidations among airlines. Noting his failed effort to merge with Delta Air Lines while it was in bankruptcy earlier this year, Parker said future combinations will come when two airlines see it as being in their mutual best interests. He said he believes the Department of Justice "gets it" and isn't likely to stop such mergers. Federal regulators didn't prevent his company's merger with Delta. "It never got that far," Parker said. "Instead you had the dynamics of me on one side at a Senate hearing saying the merger was a good thing and Gerald Grinstein (CEO of Delta) on the other side, saying it was a bad thing. In a situation like that, the status quo will usually win out. But when two airlines see a combination as a good thing, it will happen." He cites his US Airways merger as a success. Last year, US Airways reported a $500 million on $10 billion revenue. Consultants researched back as far as the 1980s and couldn't find another instance where an airline had reported a 5 percent profit margin in a single quarter, much less an entire year, he said. Contributing to that profit, the new US Airways reduced by 15 percent the number of planes previously being flown by two airlines, along with reductions in overhead and efficiencies in management, Parker said. There are still challenges, he admits. Combining the two airlines' computer reservations systems "wasn't managed well" and produced problems, he said, that were obvious customers. In some airports passengers had to stand in lines depending on which system they had initially made their reservation. An agent using a computer terminal plugged in to the old America West system couldn't access reservations made in the old US Airways system. To this day, some of those kinks are still not worked out, especially in old US Airways airports. US Airways also still has two separate employee work groups. "That's something we would like to get worked out sooner than later but if we don't get it done this year, we can go on," Parker said. "It's not something the customer will notice." As the industry continues to change, Parker said US Airways will focus on "trying to stay in much better shape that the rest of the industry so we can control our own destiny and not being one of the ones out looking for a partner." From usairways at vision.moundalexis.com Mon Jun 25 19:50:49 2007 From: usairways at vision.moundalexis.com (Daily US Airways News) Date: Mon, 25 Jun 2007 15:50:49 -0400 (EDT) Subject: [US Airways] Pilot with most seniority at US Airways retires Message-ID: <20070625154903.F1802-100000@vision.moundalexis.com> 25 June 2007 ; KVOA 4 (Tucson) Pilot with most seniority at US Airways retires http://kvoa.com/Global/story.asp?S=6706375 --- PHOENIX -- One of the first pilots for America West Airlines and the one ranked No. 1 on the seniority list has retired. Randy McNerlin retired from the airline Friday, a day before his 60th birthday. Federal law restricts pilots age 60 and older from flying commercially. McNerlin said he's flown more than 20,500 hours in his 24-year career at America West and US Airways, the airline formed from the combination of America West and the original US Airways. During Operation Desert Storm, he flew U.S. troops into Kuwait in an America West Boeing 747. He also flew Muslims in pilgrimage from Jakarta, Indonesia, to Saudi Arabia. On the flight into Kuwait, McNerlin couldn't resist calling the president of America West. "Remember when you said we'd never go east of the Mississippi River?" McNerlin remembers saying. "Well, we just crossed the Nile." McNerlin held onto the most senior pilot number -- P0001, displayed in small type on the back of his employee badge -- for 24 years and three weeks. Pilot numbers at the airline now extend to more than 3,000. "There's something about P0001," said Elizabeth Graham, an 11-year US Airways pilot. "It's just special for us."