American Airlines is quietly moving to try and establish a more consistent level of service across the thousands of flights it operates domestically and internationally each day.
Sources within the ranks of American’s 27,000-plus flight attendants have reported working alongside a member of AA’s management team called a “service analyst” on flights in recent days. The job title is a new one to many veteran flight attendants at American.
The world’s largest carrier appears to be concerned that frequent customers may be experiencing very different levels of service from flight to flight depending on the experience of the crew on board — something that could affect customers' decisions about whether to keep flying American.
Furthermore, the appearance of the new service analyst on flights has rankled veteran American flight attendants who feel their presence is yet another way management is checking up on them. Flight attendants already were upset about new work rules introduced on Oct. 1 that many believe was unnecessarily punitive.
But AA looks to be concerned that new recruits to the FA rank at American aren’t closely following the service procedures spelled out in a lengthy and highly-detailed “Onboard Service Manual” provided to each flight attendant.
According to sources, AA in recent years has streamlined the training of new recruits with the expectation they would get more on-the-job training from veteran flight attendants.
But flight attendant sources say that because of how seniority factors into cabin crew staffing, a number of flights are now manned largely by relatively green flight attendants, which could impact the level of onboard service.
In a memo to crew on a recent AA flight from Raleigh/Durham, North Carolina to Dallas/Ft. Worth obtained by the Chicago Business Journal, one of the so-called “service analysts on policies and procedures” introduced himself and said he would be on that flight “performing a work along” to help with “everything from boarding to service.”
Because these new service analysts are assigned passenger seats on flights, however, they are technically not part of the official cabin crew and are technically not supposed to function as a crew member.
At least one AA pilot source said in the past he has admonished AA employees seated as passengers not to interfere with the cabin crew while they do their job.
An American spokeswoman late today had this to say of onboard service: "All of our new hire flight attendants receive onboard service training when they begin. Additionally, we've put them through two rounds of company-wide customer service training we initiated last year — Elevate the Everyday Experience. Safety is our top priority, but after that, nothing is more important to us than improving the customer experience."
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