Northwest blames pilot no-shows for cancellations

Had a couple of nights in DTW this week, and one night in the hotel shuttle there was a VERY ticked off guy who had been scheduled on NWA but the flight got canceled for lack of a crew. First thing they asked us when we got on the bus was, "You're not from Northwest are you?"

YIKES!
 
I do it all the time. When a passenger wants to vent, I let him. Then I tell him that as a pilot, we have little control over anything but a single airplane. They need to express their concerns via the comment card or an email, because our mangement gives little weight to what employees think, but major emphasis on what passengers think.
 
Velocipede said:
I do it all the time. When a passenger wants to vent, I let him. Then I tell him that as a pilot, we have little control over anything but a single airplane. They need to express their concerns via the comment card or an email, because our mangement gives little weight to what employees think, but major emphasis on what passengers think.
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Northwest doesn't care what the pax think either.
 
Velocipede said:
You should have told him you were, let him vent and then directed him to write a nastygram to HQ about understaffing
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Close. We were going to say that we WERE Northwest, and were scheduled to fly to <insert passenger's destination here--I forgot>, but just didn't feel like flying....


(Nah, j/k.... I wouldn't really do that! :)
 
Man, I was in the john today in MEM and this guy standing next to me looks at me and says "Did all you FELLAS show up for work today?" I guess since I have a uniform on, I am a Northwesat guy, but anyway.. I was like "Oh, you mean the problem with absenteeism?" Dude was like "Yeh, you guys are calling in sick all the time..."

I really had no idea what to say, so I just sorta looked at him and was like "Yeh.. umm.. you caught us..."

Idiots..
 
Tram said:
Man, I was in the john today in MEM and this guy standing next to me looks at me and says "Did all you FELLAS show up for work today?" I guess since I have a uniform on, I am a Northwesat guy, but anyway.. I was like "Oh, you mean the problem with absenteeism?" Dude was like "Yeh, you guys are calling in sick all the time..."

I really had no idea what to say, so I just sorta looked at him and was like "Yeh.. umm.. you caught us..."

Idiots..
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That was an opportunity to turn the "idiot" into someone who could go back and tell his family the real, accurate reason he was hours or days late.
 
This is complete BS. My dad was flying from Wikes-Burre Scranton PA to IAH via Cinci, OH. He was to get on a NW flight to IAH but they said the flight was cancelled due to weather (it was beautiful here in Houston and it was there in Cinci), and they couldn't get him a seat back home, so he rented a car to drive back home(10hrs.). And he's a mega frequent flyer (200+ legs a year on business). Anyone know WTF happened? My guess, say it was weather so they didn't have to refund the ticket. And I'm from Minnesota so they better start shaping up.
 
My guess is was on Delta if he was connecting through CVG. Also, it's a whole lot more then 10 hours from AVP to IAH, or even CVG to IAH so I'm not really sure what you are talking about. And finally, just because the weather where you are is nice doesn't mean the rest of the country (or where the airplane was coming from) has nice weather.
 
Well ya I'm sure it was more than 10 hour drive, but it was Cinci, or atleast that where he called me from, and he said Northwest Airlines, and he said the weather was fine where he was. And I checked the US radar at the time of the call and there were some small cells in Oklahoma and Missouri, but that's it, i know you guys can go around them. Either way they told him they couldn't divert him to IAH later, or get him a flight back. Shouldn't they have known a few hours before if weather would be an issue on the second leg, so he didn't even have to leave home and get stranded in Ohio?
 
Delta and NWA are codeshare partners, meaning you can buy the ticket on NWA.com and still be on a Delta aircraft. Outta CVG, that's pretty darn likely. Might have even been on CAL into IAH since they're part of the same codeshare.

Seeing as how we don't have a hub in CVG and don't fly direct there from Scranton, I'm betting it was Delta via codeshare. If you fly outta Scranton on NWA, you're going to DTW, MEM or MSP, not CVG.

NWA also likes to use the WX excuse b/c they don't have to pay anything since WX is technically out of their control. If a flight cancels b/c of operational issues, they're on the hook for compensation. What they've been doing is blaming WX earlier in the month for timing pilots out and getting out of compensating passengers that way. It's total BS, and I hope someone at the FAA or DOT gets wind of it and comes down on them hard.

It's getting BAD, though. I lost count of how many DC-9s were cancelled in DTW yesterday, and the 4R de-ice pad looks like a 757 parking lot. I fly DTW-MEM last night, and we were oversold. Why? We were one of the few flying that route that DIDN'T cancel. I think there was one DC-9 later than us, and it was oversold by 20 (with like 13 non-revs) b/c of the cancellations. Coming in from YXE the other day, I watched a family of 4 fall to pieces when they cleared customs to find they were gonna be stuck in DTW for the night. The rest of the flights from DTW-IND for the day had cancelled. Yeah, the rest for the DAY!

Oddly enough, PCL (to my knowledge) hasn't been cancelling as many flights as we were earlier this year. I know we're still cancelling some (and we'll probably still have to pay fines to NWA), but it's not near the way it is at mainline levels. What it boils down to is ALPA told management that this was gonna happen, and management (shocker) went with the bottom line of waiting to recall pilots and holding off on hiring. Now it's biting them in the ass. HARD. They say they wanna hire 300 pilots in the next 12 months. They should seriously re-think that figure. Unfortunately, I think NWA is banking on Compass and the -900s at Mesaba bailing them out instead of fixing the problem at mainline.

What was funny was to see half the passengers on my MSP-DLH flight reading the "how are they gonna staff the regional jets" article. I got some interesting condolences as I was saying good bye to the passengers at the door.
 
kellwolf said:
...... I fly DTW-MEM last night, and we were oversold. Why? We were one of the few flying that route that DIDN'T cancel. I think there was one DC-9 later than us, and it was oversold by 20 (with like 13 non-revs) b/c of the cancellations.....
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i just got back from MEM trying to Nonrev up to MSP. Flight I was on last night had 20 open seats still and today was oversold by 35. Girlfriend wasnt too happy when i told her i wasnt coming. I wonder if cancellations led up to that, or is that normal?
 
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