Weblog
01/01: New Year, New Ride
I am abandoning the bus! Last week, during the holiday slowdown I tried the train and oh boy, it's a world of difference. For one, it's ON TIME! Go figure. It's always on time and never late. Service is frequent, quiet, convenient (mostly) and comfortable. I still have to take 2 trains to get to work and walk about 4 (long) city blocks but I am gaining back almost 40 minutes of my life EACH WAY. I like that.Here is a picture of what my train looks like:
and on the inside (I don't know any of these people. In fact, I didn't take this photo):
I love the train (for now). It costs more (~$70 more a month) but since Carrie and the girls drive me to/from the train station during the cold winter months, I'm saving another $60/month in parking fees which makes it almost tolerable to spend this kind of money commuting.
When Spring comes, I'll ride my bike to the train station. Ah, Spring.
Happy New Year.
[Jeff]
P.S. - Full holiday recap, photos and commentary coming soon. We have to head out to my Mom's annual New Year's Day Brunch in about 15 minutes.
23/09: Jet Blue - How to do it right
We recently flew JetBlue across the country and back. This is a budget airline that flies primarily domestically with some international destinations in the Carribean, I think. This airline is so far ahead of every other airline in the US that it would come as no surprise if the others just crumbled in its wake -- especially as they add more destinations.First of all, let's discuss the price. Non-stop cross-country flights usually run anywhere from $350 - 500. JetBlue's price from PDX to JFK was $289. Total. Nice.
Next, everything is electronic. No paper what so ever. In addition, they have alerting options and systems telling you if your flight is delayed -- which ours was not. Also, nice.
DirecTV in *every* seat for personal tv viewing of more than 40 channels. How you say...eh...NICE! Nothing helps pass the time than TV -- also an added bonus for the kids traveling with you.
Drink and snack service twice during the flight -- once at the beginning and once at the end. Guess what? No giant bulky cart to drag down the aisles and knock into people's elbows or tie up the aisle for an hour. They come down, take your drink order and come back with it. Man, that's nice. But wait! There's more! Should you desire an additional drink or snack (these were not .25oz bags of pretzels either -- good gourmet chips, trail mix, etc) just get up, go to the galley (either one) and get one or two or three.
Finally, it's all coach class. No class hierarchy here. Want to pee in the lavatory in the front of plane? Knock yourself out. Back of the plane? Party time.
And the crew was so nice. The flight was smooth and the captain communicated with the passengers a lot. That was reassuring and gave the company a personal touch that many other airlines lack.
If you they go where you need to go, fly JetBlue. It's just the right way to do things for coach class.
[Jeff]
22/07: Delta Airlines Part 1
With the girls traveling late last week, it gave us a chance to experience Delta Airlines (note: the NEW Delta as they are quick to remind you over and over) and their customer service. The flight we had booked was a red-eye due to depart at 11:30pm. Around 7:30pm I started checking online to see what the flight status was. Naturally, Delta's web site was either down, loading and just not working or not loading at all. I had to switch to a different site, flightstats.com, to get info on the flight.As it turned out, the flight was listed as delayed on that site. And so began the torturous couple of hours in trying to contact Delta to figure out what was going on. So, the web site is not working. Online check-in provides you with a message telling you the service "is down" (very convenient). The 800# gave me a busy signal. The local Atlanta phone number also gave a busy signal. At this point, there is no way (zero!) to contact Delta to find out what's up with the flight as we are traveling with children.
After an hour, the Atlanta phone # frees up and it starts to ring. I go through the 5 to 7 step voice menu struggling to make the voice recognition software "understand" my responses to its questions. Then I'm on hold...........and on hold.......and on hold......until 25 minutes later (do you have any idea what 25 minutes feels like on hold?).
Then, "Rosemary" answers the phone. Is English her native tongue? No. That's ok, it's not mine either. Does she have enough of a mastery of English to work as a *customer facing phone representative*?! No. And so the negotiation began of me trying to speak to her in such a way that she understands what exactly it is I'm trying to find out.
After a bit of a back and forth about reservation numbers and spelling my last name she confirms that the flight is delayed -- due to "equipment not being there." Did Delta bother to tell us that the flight was delayed? Oh there were thunderstorms over the Midwest all day (gee, that never happens) and tons of flights were delayed or cancelled today. Again, why didn't they tell me? They have my email address and multiple phone numbers. United Airlines does it. It's not that big of a deal.
40 minutes on the phone later and we achieved nothing more than confirming the flight was delayed. After some discussions with our travel agent we had to *call back* and make some changes. 30 minutes later another rep answered the phone who definitely had mastered the English language but apparently was having a bad day because her snipped responses coupled with her lack of attention to detail pointed to her having a "bad day." You know what? You're in a customer-facing position. You may be having a bad day but you are not allowed to share that with me or let it show. Your job is to be nice to me and fix my problem. Delta failed here too.
Long story longer, 2.5 hours on the phone later the tickets were rebooked to another flight and this was only the first half of the trip.
Overall review so far for Delta Airlines: one fork in the eye (out of two forks in the eye and a nostril full of hot sauce).
[Jeff]