How to ‘executive bomb’ US Airways

by Jerry Guo on

So normally it’s not wise to utter the word “bomb” in the same breath when you’re talking about flying. But what to do if you’ve had a horrible experience with an airline, and customer service just won’t help you out?

Last week I posted about the five worst airlines in the US, which got a lot of comments. One of the readers wrote in about getting screwed on US Airways when he did them a favor and volunteered to take a later flight due to overbooking. But surprise surprise, US Airways was no help when he complained.

We have tried calling and writing to their Consumer Relations office. At this point, we have realized that our 24 hour delay was made on the basis of a false promise. Obviously, we will try to never fly on US Airways again; if we must, we will certainly never volunteer to be bumped.

So is this the end of the road? No, thanks to a technique perfected by the good folks over at Consumerist. It’s called “executive bombing,” in which you go straight pass the lowly customer service people to either senior management or the “elite” customer service desk, which takes care of the really angry customers. To do this, you’ll need to track down the contact info for these people, which I’ll talk about in a coming post. For now, here’s the number for US Airways Executive Office: 877-369-6512. Go get ’em.

The five worst US airlines

by Jerry Guo on

These rankings are straight from the US government (courtesy of the Department of Transportation), so at least they’re not entirely biased. Based off the number of complaints, the five worst US airlines are Northwest, Delta, United, American, and US Airways (being the worst).

None of this is especially surprising, other than maybe that complaints are surging–as usual. But what is surprising is that America’s most hated airline, US Airways (sadly most US travelers will agree with you hands-down on their status), is equally hated, if not more so, by its own employees. Ouch.

In a New York Times story, one worker wrote in, “… I hate to tell you but the interiors of our plans [sic] smell bad and they are filthy. As an employee I am embarrassed to admit working for US Airways.” It was also revealed how far the airline will go to cut costs–they’re currently on the lookout for a cheaper supplier of their famous pretzels. Right now, each package costs roughly 3 cents.

I’ve had several bad experiences with US Airways, though to their credit, the last time they randomly canceled my flight–and had the nerves to blame it on the weather–they ended up agreeing to send me a $250 voucher. But I generally go out of my way to avoid flying with them. And so should you!

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