I think we all agree some regionals are better than others. Unfortunately, mother U is still outsourcing to some of the cheaper and crappier service providers. Outsourcing ground handling to a third party seems to make for the worst customer service encounters in my opinion. Even worse, use a competitor's outsourced ground handling. Think years ago when American Eagle was around, their gate agents were working some of the United Express flights I was flying. I was so embarrassed by the quality of customer service. Leaving a dog in a crate on the ramp in minus -30 degrees in Minot, ticket/gate agents speaking Ebonics, etc.

I always wondered about the reasoning behind outsourcing to your competitors. Yeah, I know they're cheap, but does anyone in the Ivory tower out in Chicago have any common sense? MOT was bad, I remember waiting over 30 minutes for handlers to deplane us there. I think AEX was Eagle, and having the entire ground crew completely disappear on us after their own flight came in from DFW. 'Tis a strange industry, indeed!

IIRC LFT and SHV were AE also.

2-3 XJT planes on the ground, god awful early show, 1 jetway and 2 hard stands. Never failed, whatever plane you're taking out isn't the one they've got the stairs on and the belt loader pulled up to.

Haha... Not much has changed! As bad as they were, they don't hold a candle to the illegal Nigerians working for Simplicity when we had our DEN base! I'd say more than 80% of them couldn't pass the background check to gain SIDA access, so they had to work while being "escorted" by their supervisors. Fun times were had by all when you'd have to challenge one wandering the ramp without a SIDA badge. But hey, United saved a few cents, right? Who needs security, anyway?

RE: Outsourcing to your competitors.

(Hopefully until recently) UAL leadership has engaged in double-think with regards to UAX. They sell it as United Express, passengers think it's United and they don't allow the operators to differentiate or brand or even say the name of the company operating the flight!!

BUT!

All the negatives that come from running the cheapest POS operation are placed upon the carriers and outsourced service companies when complaints come in or are pointed out by the express carriers or public.

At SkyWest they were paying like $12 an hour for rampers in SoCal, UAL thought this was too much so they outsourced to Eagle. Totally bumblfked the operation for months. Why didn't United care? SkyWest performance is reported separately from United's. Except, of course, we shat all over a few hundred thousand passengers to save 1-5 bucks an hour for entry-level wages. Now those passengers probably fly the other two airlines that generally serve the same markets. (on-time because the Eagle rampers head over to the Eagle plane first, go figure)

All this delusion seems great to the people up top; isolation from poor performance, expanded service and connections, reducing headcount, etc etc etc except it results in a crummy airline and ****es off our passengers (some of whom are willing to shell out significantly more money for better service) and in the end damages us as a whole.

Luckily, for myself, I was able to see that United itself was a functional entity and was able to land a job here, but UAX is a mess, and that mess is intentionally inflicted by those in the Willis Tower.

The OP's point is well made by Commutair in CHO. They cancel the Dash 8 flight on many mornings. The UA passengers are then put on a Delta Mainline 717 to ATL. They don't fly UA again if they don't have to.

Actually, according to our FOM we're supposed to say "operated by Expressjet" on announcements for United flights. I always make sure to say it on the descent announcement. The safety info cards also always display the name of the contract operator. Our FOM says for Delta and American flights we're not allowed to mention Xjet.

Interesting. Maybe the SGU braintrust didn't trust our brains to differentiate. One trip I flew -200/700/900 for UAL, DAL and AirTran, maybe the name of the company I worked for would have been too much!

They outsource because of accident liability. Half the passengers who buy a UAL ticket fly an outsourced carrier for which UAL has no legal liability. If UAL was responsible for that flying the liability insurance would skyrocket. UAL would then have to get deeply involved in the safety of that carrier with hiring, training, evaluating, etc. It would be so expensive that it would be cheaper just to bring it all in house, with a mature contract that has costly pay scales and work rules. And that costs too much. As long as the legacy does not have legal liability for accidents, there will always be outsourcing.