Working in Ithaca makes it difficult to avoid US Airways: I have a choice between Northwest's two turboprop flights per day via Detroit, US Airways' consistently poor service via Philadelphia, and US Airways' somewhat less poor turboprop service via New York La Guardia. Here's what's happened to me on US Airways recently:
- March 2007: very lengthy flight delay, incorrect flight status information, use of airport police to deter passenger complaints
Response: a $150 discount voucher valid for one year, but usable only at a US Airways ticket counter, not online — as though I have time to get to a ticket office, or desire to use their crappy airline again.
- July 2007: flight delay, lengthy baggage delay, hostility to requests for information
(At least it was a Dividend Miles reward flight; this time I didn't actually give them any money.)
Response: Two ‘Air Check Plus’ coupons for $25 off a return ticket of $150-$249, $50 off a return ticket of $250-399, $75 off a return ticket of $400-499, or $100 off a return ticket of $500 or more — again valid for one year and usable only at a US Airways ticket counter or a travel agency.
- September 2007: booking problems, lengthy flight delay
(Again I avoided giving them a significant amount of money: I was trying to use the voucher that I'd received as compensation for the March 2007 incident (see above) — and therein lay the problem!)
Response: Another $150 discount voucher valid for one year (although at least this one can be redeemed by telephone instead of requiring a trip to the airport ticket counter).
- March 2008: flight delay
Alas, Boston-Maine Airways' direct flights between Bedford, Massachusetts (BED) and Elmira, New York (ELM) are now a thing of the past; Boston-Maine have exited the scheduled flights business and are now exclusively a charter company. So once again there is no good alternative to US Airways. I cringed, and used the aforementioned $150 voucher. This time, although it wasn't good, it was at least not as bad. (Nevertheless, they seem still to be at it: a colleague of mine coming in from LGA a few days later was delayed for so many hours that he ended up driving, and this past month US Airways' repeated cancellations and delays cut short one of our faculty candidate interviews by more than a day.)
Response: “It was a pleasure to receive your correspondence and learn that our efforts to improve our service or facilities are being noticed by our valued customers.” Ha.
US Airways are a company in dire need of business competition that will either drive them to improve or else mercifully drive them out of business and put them out of our misery; it seems to me that the only reason they survive is that their route network allows them to dominate local markets in which there isn't much choice of airline.
Evidently I'm not alone in this opinion; follow this link to hear from many other people on the net who think that US Airways sucks.