My first mesa experience ;(

[fly4ever]

"What we have here is a failure to communicate...."

- The motto of every airline out there

 

[dooork]

The only explanation I can think of, and I dont know how mesa bases their people, but that the morning flight out of el paso would not have been able to go anywhere without that flight attendant, leaving 50 passengers stranded, and mesa would rather be an hour late than cancel a flight the next day because they didnt have any FAs. This is just my experiance from being a scheduler and having locations where no one lives and everyone is TDY. Still a royal ******************** up either way.

-Rob

Is that the explanation you can think of? I dont think many of the people responding to this thread know what they are talking about.....CRJ900...50 people...?...the captain does not have the final say when the flight leaves the gate...airlines are short crews almost everywhere.

 

[WSurf]

the captain does not have the final say when the flight leaves the gate...airlines are short crews almost everywhere.

Very True!!!!

 

[Filkster]

Okay guys, wanted to talk a little about my first mesa experience, which was leaving las vegas to el paso texas on sunday night at 1159pm. The crj 900 was packed to capacity and we boarded about 10 minutes late. no big deal right? well once everybody is on board, one non-rev captain jumps up front in the jumpseat, and we hear them talking about another deadhead f/a that needs to be on the plane. the flight attendent announces to all us passengers that we will be waiting a few minutes for some of their employees that needs to be on this flight. so we wait. and wait..and wait.


I motion for the f/a working this flight to come over, tell her that I am also a pilot and I was wondering why they were holding over 50 revenue passengers over an hour to solve a nonrev situation. i got the reply "sir, i am not in charge of this flight, i am just working on it" a little smile, and walked away.


This is absolutely ridiculous. i have read most people criticizing mesa on here and only believed half of what i read but for christs sake, how do these people stay in business? how do they fly under aw/us air's banner conducting business this way. i will admit, i know very little about the 121 side of things, i am a freight dog, but i do know when customers are being taking for a ride.



needless to say, i won't be flying on a mesa airlines flight anytimes soon until their management can learn to manage something. thanks for listening to me vent! (*oh, and btw, that 900 was nice, im jealous!!!*)

The FA probably had a DH on her trip but MESA scheduling failed to book a seat for her. The FA acted poorly, no surprise.

"how do these people stay in business? how do they fly under aw/us air's banner conducting business this way."

It's all about who is cheapest for US/AWA, Doug Parker doesn't care (even when sober) about the pax. Remember your charging too much and treating pax poorly only when they all stop buying tickets. It says so on every manager spreadsheet.....the only way they judge performance.

or in Parkers own words. "We have great economics with the 900's"


RF

 

[NuGuy]

That's not how we roll at ASA. If I was the one trying to deadhead on that flight and boarded only to find the airplane full, I would have simply walked off the plane, waited for it to leave and then call scheduling and ask, "WTF?"

This is how the phone call would go....

ring ring ring ring ring ring ring ring ring ring ring ring

CS: Scheduling, this is Laquishawanda, can you hold?
Me: Sure.

5 mins later

CS: scheduling, whachu need?
Me: uh....I need a hotel room because my DH left without me.
CS: Huh? Where are you?
Me: Is this a trick question? I'm at the airport in LAX.
CS: You're supposed to be DH'ing on flight xxxx.
Me: (trying to suppress my laughter) Yeah, I couldn't get on.
CS: But you were positive space.
Me: Yeah, I couldn't get on.
CS: Whachu mean?
Me: Nevermind. I'm going back to the hotel. Call me when you guys figure something out.

click

LOL,

Back in the day at PDT, we were deadheading on some bizzare pattern that took us from CLT to MIA, then we'd fly the Ocho from MIA-TPA-TLH-CLT.

We get to the gate at CLT, and the mainline agent says "we don't have seats for you", despite the fact we were "must ride", and he further goes "commuters don't get must ride".

SOOOO, I was content just to let things fall as they may, but I was flying with one of those "Captain America" types that just has to get things done. He called crew skeds, crew skeds calls the gate, and the gate tells PDT crew skeds to piss up a rope. All very amusing. In the end a supervisor showed up and we were on our way to MIA, but the whole episode was amusing to watch.

Nu

 

[v1valarob]

Is that the explanation you can think of? I dont think many of the people responding to this thread know what they are talking about.....CRJ900...50 people...?...the captain does not have the final say when the flight leaves the gate...airlines are short crews almost everywhere.

Many times at the regional I worked for we had to ask dispatch to hold a plane for 10-15 minutes otherwise they would have to cancel a flight in the morning because there wouldnt be anyone to legally work it.

1 hour on the other hand would get some people really worked up. Dispatch probably wanted to talk to the FA to figure out why she was so late, so that when the big boss asked what was up they could at least have some sort of explanation.

This is for the regional I worked for, dont know how others do business though.

-Rob

 

[John Pennekamp]

LOL,

Back in the day at PDT, we were deadheading on some bizzare pattern that took us from CLT to MIA, then we'd fly the Ocho from MIA-TPA-TLH-CLT.

We get to the gate at CLT, and the mainline agent says "we don't have seats for you", despite the fact we were "must ride", and he further goes "commuters don't get must ride".

SOOOO, I was content just to let things fall as they may, but I was flying with one of those "Captain America" types that just has to get things done. He called crew skeds, crew skeds calls the gate, and the gate tells PDT crew skeds to piss up a rope. All very amusing. In the end a supervisor showed up and we were on our way to MIA, but the whole episode was amusing to watch.

Nu

Sounds like a day in the life at ASA. Very amusing to watch. Let the system work!

 

[Burt Reynolds]

I motion for the f/a working this flight to come over, tell her that I am also a pilot and I was wondering why they were holding over 50 revenue passengers over an hour to solve a nonrev situation.

Well, it's a good thing that you let her know your status as a pilot. You never know when one of the other pilots might succumb to food poisoning.

 

[Soverytired]

What? You mean every airline doesn't operate this way? There's a shock.

The real problem in this instance is the interfacing between our crew trackers who schedule crews, and our crew trackers who book flights (yeah, they're different). Happens daily, and as a crew member, the best response (here) is just to call crew tracking, tell them you're not booked (to cya) then hang up and wait for either a seat or the plane to leave.

This F/A made a stink in front of the passengers, which was inappropriate, but when you go through this daily, well, it's very frustrating. Based on when she showed up, she probably was doing the company a favor and was in "how fast can you get to the airport" mode.

As to the captain . . . I don't know what he was doing, but what he SHOULD have done (and he may have) after a 15 min delay was pick up the phone and call the other person with "operational authority" . .. dispatch. They can get up and start wringing crew trackers necks.

And at "stupid delay +30", call dispatch and say "I'm going to deplane now, please call when you figure this out."

 

[vectorvictor]

You NEVER leave a crewmember behind. If the door is open and they get on the flight and they need to get to work...case closed. Bump revenue and tell the gate agent you ain't leaving until the FA is comfortably seated on the plane. I can't stand it when gate agents think they run the show. On time is important but you have to look at the possible flight cancellations if that crew member doesn't make their deadhead. I'd rather take a phone call for being late than a carpet dance for making a deadheader miss a show and the resulting flight cancellations.