AMALH747430 wrote:Flflyer83 wrote:AMALH747430 wrote:
First off, I want to be clear that I am not talking about situations where the cockpit crew declares serving passengers to be unsafe. The situations I talked about above, and the ones I’m going to talk about below are Southwest FA’s not wanting to serve.
Around 2016 I was flying AMA-DAL-SAT (old Southwest bread and butter routes) through flight. The BWI based crew on the AMA-DAL sector complained the whole way about how short the flight was and how it was impossible to serve everyone. I thought this odd as I grew up flying WN (first flight as an unaccompanied minor was SAT-HOU-MSY) back in 1994) and flew their intra Texas routes (SAT-DAL, DAL-LBB, DAL-AMA, LBB-AUS, SAT-HOU, DAL-HOU/IAH, DAL-AUS etc…) countless times and I’d never seen this happen though I’d been noticing the FA’s struggle to get the service done recently before that flight. At DAL there was a crew change and a local cabin crew got on. Like I’d seen many times before, the FA working my section got her pad out and took orders before we took off. She got us served with time to spare. I told her about the previous sector. She shook her had and said that their newer hire FAs, particularly the ones that are based on the coasts, are not used to working bread and butter short haul routes (intra TX, CA, etc…) and don’t take the time/effort to figure out how to make it work like the veteran DAL and HOU based FA’s do. She was very annoyed with the way those crews treat those flights.
Later on, I asked a co-worker who used to be a Southwest FA about it. He said the same thing. He said he even had a system worked out to get a service done on the short BUR-LAS flights.
I suspect that this has been exacerbated because many of the more seasoned crews took buyouts during the pandemic, leaving the more junior crews that weren’t “raised” on WN’s intra-Texas short haul flights.
The 73G’s with the slimline seats only have 6 more seats total (2 per FA) than the 737-300s did (143 vs 137) so it’s not an increased aircraft capacity issue.
WN is basically just another big airline these days. They have different marketing ploys that AA, DL, and UA, but their employees aren’t any friendlier than those at the other major airlines. It’s not like the “old days” when WN was a scrappy, eccentric regional LCC. It doesn’t have the same personality it used to, and neither do the employees. That’s to be expected when a company gets that big.
Things that WN flight attendants used to do that they shouldn’t have been doing before and aren’t supposed to do now…
— Take drink orders while on the ground after forward entry door was closed
— Get up from the jumpseats prior to reaching 10,000 feet and a safe walking attitude to take orders/start prepping the galley
— Prefill cups with ice/stage the trays with iced cups
— Have the assistance of jumpseat riders while the seatbelt sign is on
— Have a menu of mixed cocktails and drinks that passengers stare at for minutes on end and then order multiple drinks
If you have a situation that you find unsatisfactory, write a letter to southwest/submit it on their website. The flight attendants supervisor sees each one and then the crew has to file an official response to their supervisor and it is placed and in their employee file.
I did that a couple of times, they apologized profusely and sent vouchers, then I’d have trouble on the next trip (I’m not talking just about in cabin service), so I did one better, switched airlines. Voting with your wallet does more than writing in. Haven’t flown Southwest in over a year and it’s been over 3 years since I used them with any regularity. Became a happy Platinum on UA then a happy Platinum Pro on AA after moving to Dallas just over a year ago.
I’ll note that in the past while they’d frequently take orders on the ground, they were able to get the service done without taking orders on the ground too. I also don’t recall FA’s getting up before the 10,000 ft “ding.” It’s just a company getting bigger, resting on their laurels, and slipping into complacency. NBD, jut the way things go. They’re not going anywhere.
Also, with as many short haul flights as they have, I don’t know why they don’t just go to those “mini” 7.5 cans of soda and 8 oz bottles of water, that way they can just hand them out and not have to worry about pouring drinks. Better yet, do like UA did when I was flying them regularly in 2021 and hand out the whole 12 oz can. Speeds up service and makes the customer happy.
They absolutely did get up before 10,000 for years. They did this by ignoring the FAR about safety related duties only. Thankfully, they now cross-check doors as that procedure wasn't implemented until after the FL acquisition. WN lacks when it comes to industry standards.
