Results tagged “Chris Elliott” from Intelligent Travel Blog

Jerry Costello is the co-sponsor of the FAA Reauthorization Bill of 2009, which contains several important new rules designed to help air travelers. Traveler's contributing editor Chris Elliott asked the Illinois congressman, who is also the chairman of the House Aviation Subcommittee, about passenger rights and the prospects that new rules would be adopted by the Senate and signed into law.

The latest American Customer Satisfaction Index gives the domestic airline industry an average score of 64 our of 100 -- essentially, a failing grade. What do you think needs to be done to fix the industry?

Ultimately, service will be as good as an individual airline wants it to be. The economic pressures of running an airline - which hit rock bottom after 9/11, through the boom period of the middle of the decade, to another lull currently - will always be there. It is a cyclical business. The key is to be able to focus on the customer experience at all times, and Congress can help emphasize these issues.

The FAA Reauthorization Act contains a number of provisions that could potentially help passengers. If they become law, which of the new rules do you think will improve air travel the most?

Short-term, I believe the emergency contingency plans for airlines and airports to better prepare for long tarmac delays can have an impact on the worst of these situations. We won't eliminate all of these situations, but I am hopeful the horror stories will be dramatically reduced.  Long-term, empowering the Joint Planning and
Development Office to really drive the NextGen process, and providing the funding to do it, will improve the system for everyone.

Scott McCartney writes The Wall Street Journal's "Middle Seat" column and is the author of the new book "The Wall Street Journal Guide to Power Travel: How to Arrive with Your Dignity, Sanity, and Wallet Intact." With the travel season about to take off, contributing editor Chris Elliott asked him for his thoughts on flying in the summer of 2009.

What should air travelers expect this summer?

McCartney: I think this will actually be a very good summer to travel, if you can afford it. The recession has lowered ticket prices considerably, left hotel rooms far more available at lower prices and reduced congestion at airports and in the skies so flights are running more on time. The dollar has rebounded some, and so it's a good year to venture overseas. Crowds should be smaller and merchants should be more anxious for your business. We may well look back on this year and say there was a window of opportunity when the airline system and major tourist destinations didn't bog down as much under the weight of summer crowds and travelers actually had the upper hand. I just think that if you are able to do it financially, it's a great time to go.

I really like the subtitle to your book, "How to Arrive with Your Dignity, Sanity, and Wallet Intact." What do you think is more important to travelers -- dignity, sanity or intact wallet?

Thanks. Full disclosure: It was my wife's idea. I think it depends on the traveler, but for most, the wallet is the bottom line. Travelers will endure a lot to save a few bucks -- just look at the popularity of discount European airlines and the long bus rides, infrequent service, high fees, etc. that people put up with for a cheap fare. While indignities anger them and inane experiences do make them crazy, getting gouged is what really sends people over the edge with airlines. I think to some extent it's a reflection of the animosity travelers have toward airlines. Airlines do bad things to people, and people remember. Goodwill and warm consumer feelings get ruined when a bag is lost, a flight is canceled, a traveler is bumped, a crew times out leaving a planeload stranded. What's more, airlines make the money part of the experience so difficult -- changing prices, limited availability, etc, etc. You go to a car dealer to buy a car thinking that salesman is out to take as much advantage of you as possible, and you know you likely won't get as good a deal as the guy next to you. You just assume that. And I think it's much the same with airlines. Airlines battle their customers over money -- not a good position to be in.

John Romantic is the director of customer relations and central baggage resolution at US Airways. But he'd prefer that you simply think of him as your advocate at the airline. For the last nine months, he's had the unenviable job of improving the carrier's checkered reputation for customer service. Contributing editor Christopher Elliott asked him how he's doing it.

I've been hearing a lot of buzz about some of the changes within US Airways, when it comes to handling customer service questions. And I've seen a marked decrease in reader complaints. What are you doing?

We are doing a lot, and we're glad there is a buzz starting. My goal when taking my position nine months ago was to transform customer relations from a complaint resolution center into a customer advocacy center. Better said, while we handle customer inquiries, we also need to globally understand customer sentiment and use all of that data to look at our product, policies, and processes. Our focus is to find ways to be easier to do business with.

How?

We code 100 percent of the customer responses we receive, and have created better reporting from this data. We have established an executive steering committee which meets regularly with the primary focus of understanding our customers' feedback, and finding ways to improve our customers' experience resulting in reduced complaints. The work of this team has lead to several recent changes - with some still in progress. We realize we have a little more ground to make up on customer complaint rankings, but our actions are starting to close the gap with our competitors.

How many requests does your department handle in an average week? Can you break it down by phone, fax, letter and e-mail, please?

The actual number of requests varies by time of the year, load factor, peak and off-peak times. But the current breakdown is 91 percent handled via e-mail, 5 percent via phone and 4 percent via fax or written correspondence.

International travelers know what a formidable barrier a foreign language can be. From time to time, language spills over into the headlines--as it did last week when Fidel Castro insisted his brother's comments about political reform in Cuba were "misunderstood." Tom Adams knows about language barriers and how to overcome them. He's the chief executive of Rosetta Stone. Yeah, the company with the ads featuring a hardworking farm boy and an Italian supermodel. National Geographic Traveler contributing editor Christopher Elliott spoke with him recently.

Q: Can you get along with just English when you travel internationally?

Adams: You can if you're traveling to major cities and don't plan to really engage. However if you're trying to go into the field and really discover a culture and a country, then yes, you do need another language. I think that anyone who has successfully learned another language knows that the benefits are tremendous. Those that experience success communicating in a new language often describe it as life-changing.

Q: Let me confess, I'm one of the people who makes fun the tourists who try to learn a language before they visit another country, or worse, they tote around a phrase book and read from it. Convince me of the error of my ways.

Adams: I would tend to agree, people that try to get by with a phrase book don't get very far. It's better if people can learn a language the way they learned their first language, without translation, so they have an intuition behind the language when they are actually in country. I think it is wonderful that people make the effort to try and go deeper into the cultures that they explore when they are traveling. Locals will give you points for trying and it makes life more fun.

Q: As a student of linguistics in college, I always thought total immersion -- which to me always meant dating a native speaker -- was the best way to learn another language. Was I wrong?

Adams: There is no doubt that immersion-based instruction is the way to learn a new language. In fact, I would challenge that those who try to learn any other way are highly likely to fail. Dating someone from another country is not enough to learn a language, though it is very stimulating.

The problem is that if they speak your language you're likely to stay in your comfort zone and use your native language. An instructional immersion environment forces you to use the language. If you're learning the right way with the right immersion tool or service, then having a boyfriend or girlfriend who speaks that language natively provides a great opportunity for practice - as well as motivation.

Q: Why don't more Americans speak a second language?

Adams: Fundamentally, Americans have not had the opportunity to use the right methods. Most Americans use grammar translation and classroom solutions to memorize vocabulary, translate the language and pass the test.

Learning another language works better when it's done in a natural way and you can leverage your own language learning ability. If given the opportunity to learn with the right tools, Americans - like others around the world - can learn languages with great levels of success. Of course, many Americans do not travel internationally as much as Europeans, for instance, so there is less opportunity to use the language - and that does not help.

Finnair is seriously green. How serious? It has its own vice president for sustainable development, Kati Ihamäki. Next month the carrier will begin disclosing operational details related to its environmental efforts, including recycling and waste management programs that are designed to "maximize eco-efficiency across operations," she says. Finnair also launched a blog focused largely on sustainability. Contributing editor Christopher Elliott spoke with Ihamäki about some of the myths and realities of being a "green" airline.

Finnair's commitment to the environment isn't a recent thing. Can you give us some history on the airline's environmental initiatives?

Finnair created its first environmental policy group 23 years ago. In the beginning, the focus was on new legislation and requirements, noise pollution and hazardous waste issues. Then in 1997, Finnair expanded its systematic environmental strategy work and published its first external report.

What does a vice president of sustainable development do?

My responsibilities include ensuring that Finnair's environmental goals in Finnair Group business activities are realized in such a way that Finnair is among the leading airlines in environmental activities.

How would you define sustainable development in the airline industry?

I think the most important issue is to have the best available aircraft technology. In environmental matters, it is imperative to actively seek better and more economical operational measures.

OK, what kind of development would you consider to be unsustainable?

Unsustainable development would be just to stick to old habits and operations, using dated technology. This unfortunately is true for many companies at the moment and is greatly due to their economic situations, which won't allow the companies on the brink of existence to make investments.

Should air travelers expect to pay higher prices in order to be environmentally responsible? 

The prices should not be higher, although usually advanced companies aren't competing with price as much as with quality. Sustainability is a part of quality.

The Twitosphere (is there such a thing? has it entered the lexicon yet?) was abuzz yesterday about how the microblogging application Twitter can be used when traveling. The newest word for our collective dictionary is the TwiTrip, and theory goes that you can ditch your guidebooks (or magazines for that matter) and instead cast your travel plans to the whims of the Twittering masses. Though I happen to be partial to magazine coverage (obviously), I have to admit that the concept is intriguing.

One writer for the Guardian set off on his TwiTrip, and just finished his day wandering Paris, asking his readers where to head next. So far, I can see that he went to the Jewish Museum, and tracked down readers's suggestions for pastries, bookstores, and --yum-- hot chocolate. He's just back from his trip, but you can see the reader picks at his Benjilanyado Twitter page. It's a fascinating concept.

Asking readers for help is just one way that Twitter has been changing the travel experience. Our contributing writer Chris Elliott had a great piece in his weekly MSNBC column about how airlines and other travel companies are responding to traveler queries and complaints, and even offering discounts via tweet. Gadling asked whether Twitter can change the face of travel late last month. And our contributing writer Carl Hoffman tells us he got the hang of Twitter while he was researching The Lunatic Express. (Actually, it was a Facebook status update which alerted me to his proximity to Mumbai after the recent attacks. I reached out to him, asking him to share his thoughts on the tragedy, and he ended up writing this lovely essay on the Leopold Cafe.) And Gary Arndt from Everything Everywhere noted yesterday that his two tweets while traveling through Bahrain resulted in a heap of suggestions for what to do with stinky shoes...and of course what to see while he was passing through.

Marilyn and I have both started using Twitter in the past few weeks - you can follow us and help show us the ropes: Janelle_IT_Blog and Marilyn_Res (the "Res" is for Research, as she's our chief researcher).

Do you use Twitter while your travel, or do you prefer to detach yourself from the web-world? How has it worked for you? Let us know!