Arpey''s Turnaround Plan Announced

[Bob Owens]

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The cost of removing seats and re-configuring aircraft was not cheap. I would imagine that putting them all back isn''t going to help the balance sheets either!

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Why are they are flying them to Tulsa? Thats dumb. I can remember changing the pitch at two other carriers that I worked for on the line. One was for marketing, the other was for military charters. They could do this on an overnight and not lose the any trips.

But then again thats with motivated workers, not too much motivation out there on the line nowadays.

"Today, Arpey thanked American employees for the
contributions they have made during the past two years
to help the airline survive and to enable this new
competitive spirit of "compete versus retreat."

And to show his appreciation he is going to demand another paycut and the rest of the benifits.


3. Pull together, win together. The "people" side of things - absolutely critical in this business. AMR has employee relations that can only be described as bad. I think they are bad at most major airlines, and I''m not sure if AMR is really worse than most of its competitors in this area. But it can''t be denied that this is a people business - and there are huge intangible benefits associated with having a happy (or at least satisfied) work force. Better productivity. Better customer service. Better collective decisions due to better teamwork. Unfortunately, building better employee relations is easier said than done. Then again, if anyone can make strides in this direction, I''d say it''s Arpey.

The workers did pull together, and we lost. We lost more than those who went bankrupt. Sound bites and Bulls#!+. We have heard it all before.

As for those who say that AA has to fill seats, Have you flown lately? Our planes out of JFK are going out packed.

 

[Bob Owens]

Why? They have trucks going back and forth at least once a week with Engines, how hard would it be to pack a few rows of seats along with the engines?

 

[AirwAr]

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On 5/21/2003 8:31:59 AM eolesen wrote:

American will also be reintroducing standard seating
to 23 percent of its fleet so that it can offer
competitive fares across more seats in leisure and
vacation markets. The new pitch will ultimately be
found on all of the carrier’s 140 Boeing 757 and 34
Airbus A300 aircraft.

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My vote is that we keep MRTC and remove first class from these aircraft. If these are leisure markets, is first class really that important. Also, this would continue to provide product differentiation and help to offset JBLU''s live TV advantage.

Does anyone happen have any numbers on what type of CASM this configuration would generate? How many additional seats could be added if we ripped out first class and replaced it with MRTC seats?

 

[mrman]

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On 5/21/2003 4:24:29 PM AAmech wrote:

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On 5/21/2003 3:17:18 PM mrman wrote:

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On 5/21/2003 1:05:54 PM Wild Onion wrote:

Or upgrades, either.

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Looking at your comments about AA''s flight attendants makes me think you''ve never flown on an AA flight! I fly quite a bit and FA''s regularly ask to refill my drink or take away some trash on my tray table. I can''t say I''ve seen them lift anyone''s bag, but my mother is wheelchair bound and they are just fabulous about stopping by her seat multiple times thruout a flight to see if she needs anything or just to say hi! I''m sure there''s that bad 2%, but overall AA''s Fa''s are really good!

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Actually I fly on AA 4 times a week, I''m AA Ex Plat. This was not ment to be a knock on flight attendants. It was ment to state that for AA to be sucessful, IMHO, they need to define and distiguish their product. And I think that removing MRTC, and creating work rules that prevent/allow service to be less than the competition, then it 1) puts AA at a competative dissadvantage and 2) makes it hard to market their coach product as a premium product and make me want to pay more for it.

 

[FrugalFlyer]

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On 5/21/2003 7:53:36 PM Bob Owens wrote:


Why? They have trucks going back and forth at least once a week with Engines, how hard would it be to pack a few rows of seats along with the engines?




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Maybe there''s a union work-rule against shipping aircraft seats and engines together

 

[AAStew]

Maybe WN has changed since I last non-reved on them, but we were pretty packed in there! As for there F/A's not sitting, I think you may be wrong there. As for helping little old ladies with their bags, I will be more than happy to, if I can lift it. Have you ever tried lifting a 100 lb bag when you don't weigh much more than that yourself? And AA is infamous for telling us that lifting is not part of our job description so therefore will not be covered if we are injured. In fact AA is very devious about paying any other injury also. I broke a finger on a flight. AA refused to pay me. I filed a claim with the NY state comp Board, it went to a hearing, I won. AA than claimed they paid me (they did not), they filed for reimbursement from their insurance company (they were paid). As for me, I have given up. New YOrk won't help me, the company won't return calls, the Union is useless, and the insurance company who reimbursed them says it is not there problem! So please do not complain to F/A's when they won't lift your bag!

 

[Resman1]

I like the idea of adding seats back and using the flights in markets where fare is the main thing. Just think NYC-TPA, FLL,MCO, SJU, SDQ, PAP and everything to LAS. We may be lucky to sell one full fare seat per flight, so why not load more seats and capture more revenue? I am also encouraged by the lowering of the full fare rates on the Jblue routes we fly. I am hoping we see more sensible fares to encourage business travelers to fly, our last minute fares have to become competitive with video conferencing.

 

[j7915]

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On 5/22/2003 9:18:42 AM FrugalFlyer wrote:

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On 5/21/2003 7:53:36 PM Bob Owens wrote:



Why? They have trucks going back and forth at least once a week with Engines, how hard would it be to pack a few rows of seats along with the engines?






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Maybe there''s a union work-rule against shipping aircraft seats and engines together



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Bob next time you receive an engine from TULE, look at the trailer, it is generally an open,low and short flat bed. Not something you want to ship seats on.

Besides do you have the parts up there in the NE to do a conversion? Have you thought that there may be more checks to be accomplished while the cabin is reworked?

 

[j7915]

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On 5/22/2003 10:17:57 AM Resman1 wrote:

I like the idea of adding seats back and using the flights in markets where fare is the main thing. Just think NYC-TPA, FLL,MCO, SJU, SDQ, PAP and everything to LAS. We may be lucky to sell one full fare seat per flight, so why not load more seats and capture more revenue? I am also encouraged by the lowering of the full fare rates on the Jblue routes we fly. I am hoping we see more sensible fares to encourage business travelers to fly, our last minute fares have to become competitive with video conferencing.

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Are the reduced fares really an incentive, if they are restricted to limited, i.e. JB routes only?

As for eliminating MRTC on the 757/A300, that seems to be a sign of things to come. If the leisure market is flying full, how many deep discount tickets are we selling that could be eliminated instead?

The really cheap fare hunters are opportunists and will go with who ever gives them a buck off, in the meantime the routes that use the 757, St Louis to NYC for example are going to be miserable.

 

[DFWCC]

It seems to me that MRTC is a great idea. I am wondering how AA would now advertise MRTC. "YOU CAN HAVE THAT HIGH DOLLAR FEELING BY BOOKING ON AA, WHICH OFFERS MRTC" Read fine print to say available on selected flights. Need that disclaimer you know.

 

[Bob Owens]

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On 5/22/2003 11:42:11 AM j7915 wrote:

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Bob next time you receive an engine from TULE, look at the trailer, it is generally an open,low and short flat bed. Not something you want to ship seats on.

Thats what they make boxes for.

Besides do you have the parts up there in the NE to do a conversion? Have you thought that there may be more checks to be accomplished while the cabin is reworked?

Well we did the A-300 cable jobs at JFK, and Cockpit door mods in Boston. If time is of the essence and they want to get the fleet put back to the high density configuration wouldnt it make more sense to do it on the line where the whole thing could be done in a matter of weeks instead of waiting till the other checks are due? It would likely be cheaper to pay OT at the lines than fly it to Tulsa. Plus you have the aircraft available for service.


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[Oliver Stone''s Apprentice]

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On 5/22/2003 3:00:47 PM kirkpatrick wrote:

In fact, I'd be surprised if there aren't quite a few changes of equipment around the system as a result of this decision.

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Think back ten years to the initial DC10 retirements (for the TW folks, the L10 and 747 retirements)... A lot of that was backfilled with wingtip (almost simultaneous) departures or increasing frequencies in the markets where the DC10s were pulled out of. A lot of those were backfilled with narrowbodies and 757s (midbody?...).

It wouldn't surprise me to see current 757 flying backfilled with 738's or MD80s on wingtip departures, and also with 763s where there is enough demand or on transcon markets.

If you start swapping 738s out of the Caribbean and Central America, and 763s out of West Coast-Hawaii, you free up quite a bit of equipment that could be used to backfill for domestic 757 flying...

One example:

We currently fly LAX-HNL 2x with 76C's and 1x with 75ERs.

If you replaced the 76C with 757 on a one for one basis, you lose 32 coach seats and 24 F seats (almost all of them awards or upgrades...) in the process, but gain two widebodies. If you add a third trip you have almost the same number of F seats, and gain another 130 or so to sell.

That widebody flying on a MIA-LAX trip is worth a whole lot more than it is on LAX-HNL, just on cargo revenue alone...

I'm sure there are markets out of MIA and SJU where we operate 76C today that could just as easily be flown with either a 757 or A300, again freeing up another 76C that can be used for Dom48 flying.

 

[kirkpatrick]

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On 5/22/2003 11:48:32 AM j7915 wrote:

The really cheap fare hunters are opportunists and will go with who ever gives them a buck off, in the meantime the routes that use the 757, St Louis to NYC for example are going to be miserable.



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As a commuter on the LGA-STL run, that's the first thing I thought of. However, nothing obligates AA to continue to use the 757 on that route. In fact, I'd be surprised if there aren't quite a few changes of equipment around the system as a result of this decision.

MK

 

[NewHampshire Black Bears]

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On 5/22/2003 10:08:21 AM AAStew wrote:

Maybe WN has changed since I last non-reved on them, but we were pretty packed in there! As for there F/A''s not sitting, I think you may be wrong there. As for helping little old ladies with their bags, I will be more than happy to, if I can lift it. Have you ever tried lifting a 100 lb bag when you don''t weigh much more than that yourself? And AA is infamous for telling us that lifting is not part of our job description so therefore will not be covered if we are injured. In fact AA is very devious about paying any other injury also. I broke a finger on a flight. AA refused to pay me. I filed a claim with the NY state comp Board, it went to a hearing, I won. AA than claimed they paid me (they did not), they filed for reimbursement from their insurance company (they were paid). As for me, I have given up. New YOrk won''t help me, the company won''t return calls, the Union is useless, and the insurance company who reimbursed them says it is not there problem! So please do not complain to F/A''s when they won''t lift your bag!

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AAStew;
I''m not going to doubt your (IOD) experience, but I''ll assume you had/have a cracker jack "PI" Attorney ?

If you do/did, it should''nt be hard to "follow the money", that you were screwed out of.
I could see AA getting away with crap like that in (unfortunately) most states, but in a state like NY, I know a ton of lawyers who would have a field day with a claim like your''s.

NH/BB''s

I''ll also assume you had a witness ??