I don't commute, and this is one of the reasons why.

There's no way I could do what they do. I was stuck at IAD on a mechanical delay on the Sunday after Thanksgiving. During that 5 hour delay I talked to quite a few of the pax waiting for our flight. Most were pretty mad, and with good reason. However when I explained my stance, and the fact that I had been sitting, waiting to go home (not being paid) after a four day during the holiday (my T-day dinner was a turkey sub from quiznos in ORD) they were pretty understanding.

However, in the gate agents' and CSRs' defense, when you're dealing with people in this capacity it's going to be negative every time. How often do people go to the counter to tell the agents how great their experience was?

I quit a job at Circuit City during college because of this. Working the customer service counter there after Christmas is hell. After being cussed out because I couldn't accept a TV for return without the remote for the 10298380398 time and trying to explain that if they needed a remote they should buy a $20 generic remote I came to the descision that simply clocking out and walking away was better than reaching across the counter and beating the crap of one of these idiots.

Gate agents deal with this dozens of times per day if everything is going well. When it hits the fan, it's probably thousands of times. You'd be ****ed off too. If you're professional, it will go a long way.