I received an email which inspired me to blog again. It came from my favorite traveling rescource, Airfarewatchdog.com (That's how you know I love you. I didn't hoard the good stuff.) So this is what I received:
Hi there Jayne Marie,
Did you hear about American Airlines? Well, hot on the heels of last month's new $25 fee for checking a 2nd bag, comes news that they'll soon charge $15 for your first checked bag. And that's not all. They also plan ..ting back domestic flights, and laying off workers, all in an attempt to cover the jump in fuel costs. Will other airlines follow? Details in the blog.
So here's what I have to say about that. SELL! SELL! SELL! Sell you AA stocks if you have any, because AA is going to be out of business no later than 2011(I'm thinking as soon as 1st quarter 2010). Seriously, I no exchange expert, but I know a stupid decision when I hear one. I believe they will be out of business by 2011, if not sooner and chances are they're going to have to sell their company to another company - lol probably a foriegn one!
In fact, I have to wonder how good business must have been in order for them to feel secure in charging people more for something like this. Truly, I'd be curious to know before they announced this baggage charge, what their fees were like and how many seats did they actually fill percentage-wise.
See, if you run a monopoly you can charge whatever the heck you want... but with so many options... American Airlines simply isn't one anymore. It's not like they had the best fares to start with. So you have a company that tends to be pricey on fares, cutting back on flights and staff WHICH MEANS YOU'LL BE WAITING LONGER, you won't find as many good flights, and service will go down... Then, add to that you, now have to pay $15 - $40 additional dollars per person if you plan on taking any clothes on your vacation!
That's like ordering a soft drink at McDonalds and they tell you, "Well if you want that with a cup and straw, it's going ot be extra!"
!!!!!!!
And is there any garauntee that my baggage is going to arrive in great condition... that it arrive at all and I'm not going to have to wait in baggage claim? that nothing's going to be broken, spilled, destroyed or stolen? When I look out of the plane, and I going to see people carelessly throwing bags underneath like its nothing more than caution in the wind?
NO! Of course not!
Unless they start giving away 1-night free hotel rooms, 1-day car rentals, free gas cards, or free weekend/ week long airport parking & shuttle service, then they can't get away with charging more for baggage in poor economic times while they have so much competition and again, they're rates weren't the best to begin with.
Luxury Airlines are going out of business people, right along with SUVs and Customer Service.Speaking of which... If there is an award for worst customer service, they deserve it! In hard times, people scale back. Period!
People can't afford to drive to their destinations any longer, so they're looking to fly. But they don't have to fly American. In fact, I'm outraged that they have the name American before Airlines. That's so Un-American. It's like their taxing the people!
So what happens? They get people to start packing everything in carry-ons? That doesn't fill the seats! What about the moms who have to check strollers and car seats? What about Christmas time when kids return from visiting grandma with extra stuff. What about vacationing families who pack 1 - 2 bags per person? 12 -year old Susy's not paying $40 dollars for her 2 bags; her parents are paying for that, plus paying for their own bags. A family of 4 going on a 7 day vacation to Disney World just racked up an additional $160 for their bags. I suppose that's still cheaper than a few SUV fill-ups if they were to load up and drive there instead. Still, they still have to rent a car and pay for hotel rooms and food and park entry, etc and all of that other stuff that goes into vacationing.
I get it! This is a selfless, charitable move on their part. I suppose their suggestion is:
"You're supposed to buy clothes while on vacation and donate them to the Salvation Army before you leave." How thoughtful. Something positive to remember them by when they announce they've shut down operations.
The thing I don't get is... let's say rather than making money up on the passangers' luggage, people just start packing less or fewer people fly their airline. So even if that benefits them in other ways such as, they expend less fuel because the plane doesn't weigh as much, they'll still have fewer filled seats and will still waste fuel flying fewer people to a destination. Of course, I should suppose this means they're going to retire their larger jets and simply fly those inconveniently small ones... you know the ones you have to walk outside in the rain and up shaky stairs to board a plane and then wait for them to get a manual lift to board a wheelchaired person. I hate those planes. All of that adds more delay time and of course fewer available flights, cuts into safety, ads tons of connections, cuts down on in flight servicecs... I really don't see people being happy about this. I would love to see the data they resorted to when making this decision.
They need to take a cue from SouthWest Airlines... they advertise, they offer rates and flights that meet people's needs, and they are now top for customer satisfaction. The problem is if you want people to pay for the value of something, you need to get them believing in the value for them.
Oh well.
RIP AA