1) Ear splitting announcements in the bathrooms. Seriously? Turn the volume down.

2) The same 8 song playlist on repeat. It's literally 8 songs. Feel blessed when you hear Luis Capaldi twice within 45 mins!

3) Gate agents thumping the mic before every PA. Yes, your mic still works just like it did 3 minutes ago . I promise the wire hasn't disconnected in the mean time. Which leads me to...

4) Gate agents who think they are funny yet come across as patronizing and even rude on the PA. The scripts are all unique and all over the place.



We can do better.

 

I'm having flashbacks to White Plains airport that I used to frequent back in the day. The PA microphones had touchtone keypads, and for some reason all the agents for all the airlines thought it was necessary to blast touchtones half a dozen times at full volume before making every announcement. The thought of it still makes me twitch.

I agree with everything you wrote. I'd sum it all up as "STOP YELLING." That goes for the ops agents, CSAs, and especially our flight attendants. Yelling at people to "step out of the aisle" when they're still trying to hoist their bag into the overhead is not helping. It's adding stress to an experience that's already stressful for normal people, and we're making it ten times worse.

And there's a special place in hell for pilots who point out landmarks on the PA on a 5am flight.

 

Better yet, can American airports go the way of some silent European and Asian airports? Minimal gate announcements only.

Agreed on the patronizing fashion of the csa’s and FA’s announcements. It’s not funny, it’s quite embarrassing.

 

Completely agree. Maybe the “hurry up and sit down” BS was important when this company did 10 minute turns. They can barely manage hour turns now. Let people get on and sit down in peace.

And my biggest complaint about Love field is that they built this brand new terminal with bathrooms that are WAY too small! If you have to wait in line for urinals, you didn’t build enough of them. For Pete’s sake each gate might handle 350 people per turn. That’s 175 who want to pee before they board and 175 who want to pee as soon as they get off. 4 urinals and 3 stalls just doesn’t cut it.

But yeah, the PA announcements are a close second.

 

We don’t have “gate agents” 😉

 

had a flight today that I told the FAs we had a RLS for departure and its be a bit after boarding.
[tried to time it right] nevertheless; nonstop announcements to hurry up and find a seat etc. Then sat for 20 min before taxi.
I'd be okay with no announcements until boarding complete and stop with the " you'll delay the flight if you don't..." its not the pax problem. It's the ops agent who waits till 30 prior to walk down and ask of we're ready, then walk up make 5 min of announcements (of which they've heard or are about to hear) then board 12 wheelchairs, 2 UM, a service dog, and 167 pax. And yell at the pax they need to look left, look right, and sit down and ****.
I ride a lot of other airlines and I've never been so harrassed as at WN.
It's time to start telling our group training escapades that all the PAs aren't doing anything and to stop.

 

Every single time I travel on a paid ticket, or my wife does for work, the company sends a survey afterwards and every single time that's what I write in the survey. I'm hoping someday the right person reads it.

If you're going to upgrade, talk to the higher ups during the management lunch. Maybe they'll listen. I just wish they would fly on other airlines and take notes. It's a much more pleasant experience.

 

The amount of harassing and embarrassing PAs by our ops agents and FAs incenses me more than words can say. Our airplanes are painted just the right funky colors to represent just what an unprofessional and embarrassing clown-show of a product we have.

 

Outside opinion here. I think the reason SWA does so many announcements is because the "open seating" is so different than how every other airline boards. It's literally like herding cattle onto the plane. Even the die hard SWA passengers seem to find the line up and herd onto the plane and find a seat you like and look at all the "spinners" at the end a little overwhelming. The only thing more chaotic than a southwest boarding gate where everyone trying to figure out where to line up and then trying to figure out where they want to sit on the plane is a Frontier greyhound station gate where they call for boarding and every passenger bum rushes the boarding door at the same time and starts pushing and shoving.

 

exactly, assigned seats would fix so many problems, but I’m sure there’s not a software platform in the world that could manage to do it efficiently.