Oh god. I had to fly Tiger the other day. Actually, I didn’t really have to. I chose to.

Why, I’m not quite sure. Well, for a start, the one-way fare was only $68 bucks. Less than the cost of a cab fare. So I thought I would do the right thing by the client and fly to SYD-MEL the cheapest way.

And let’s face it, the flight is only an hour and I have done this route more times than I care to remember. So what was the worst that could possibly happen? Right.

Tiger approach boarding their planes the same way I approach my parenting responsibilities on a Friday night when there’s a football game on TV. I basically say to the kids, “look, eat what you want, go to sleep when you want, just don’t annoy me for the next 3-hours”. Or something like that.

When you make the original booking online, Tiger make it clear that they can’t afford check-in staff (ie print your own boarding pass or cough up $20 if you want us to do it at the airport), don’t really want to pay some poor prick to throw your bags in the hold and even by their own admission – say that seats will be allocated whenever the hell the IT system in India come back from lunch and work out the bugs in the system.

I think the message I received was after several pushy attempts to sell me window seats, exit-row seats, aisle seats and seats towards the front, the system basically said “well screw you, good luck with getting a seat you like” and promptly allocated me a seat near the back door.

Tiger must have stolen the “how to load an Airbus manual without human intervention” from Virgin. Like sheep, you are asked to load by both the front door and the rear stairs. If only most of the passengers understood english.

As soon as the poor, lone gate agent (who looked all of 21 and like he needed a good feed) picked up the mic to announce that boarding would begin in 5-minutes, people literally started to stampede the joint. It was mayhem.

Even though I was in row 21, (courtesy of my online stoush with their booking engine), I was supposed to enter via the back door but when I saw a group of people head down the stairs and out onto the tarmac, never to be seen of or heard of again, I decided against it.

The interior was decidedly average. Looked like they held a bucks party in it about an hour ago.

Fortunately, I was allocated an aisle seat, but it made no real difference as the thing was packed to the rafters. There was a young guy right beside me and a weird looking chick in the window seat.

As we started to push back, the guy beside me started fiddling with his seat belt and starting rubbing his hands on his pants. I started to shift in my seat uneasily and prayed to god that this wasn’t some young mating ritual the guy was performing to impress the female beside him.

I casually leaned over and politely said, “Dude, what the fuck are you doing????”

“I’ve never been on a plane before and don’t know how to put this on”, he muttered, as he clutched the seat-belt clumsily.

“You’re kidding, right?” I was dumbfounded.

But he wasn’t.

That was a first for me. I don’t think I can remember ever getting on a plane where the person beside me didn’t know how to fasten a seat belt. And I’ve flown out of some pretty “basic” airports. Even people in Michigan (where my wife’s family are from) know how to do a seat belt up. But I digress.

The trolley dolleys hoofed up and down the aisles, peddling $5 Nescafe coffee, $7 VB cans and whatever other over-priced crap they can get away with. Standard Operating Procedure on a LCC. On the whole, the flight is un-eventful and everyone is relatively well behaved.

We then come into land to MEL. Tiger’s “arrivals” hall is to the left of the main airport terminal. Looks like a big shed and it’s where all the LCC start (and finish). I think our pilot must have been new because when we landed, he drove around the airfield for 10-minutes looking for a suitable place to park.

We eventually come to rest somewhere near the outskirts of the airport. The doors fly open, and we are told to grab our stuff and piss-off. Or something like this.

They crew fail to tell is that we would be exiting the plane via mobile stairs so a lot of people who don’t fly often stood at the top and waited for something to happen, unsure as of what to do next. To make matters worse, there was a torrential amount of rain.

As the sheep effect kicked in and people cautiously started following each other, we headed for the “terminal”. The walk seemed to take forever. There we no signs, no orange cones up around the plane, no warnings that said “hey, don’t walk in front of this bit here unless you want to get sucked into a spinning turbine”. Nothing like that.

In fact, I think I even saw a Dad kicking the footy with his 2 boys in front of the left engine. Kidding. The father was no-where to be seen.

The baggage belt was a joke. There was a single conveyer belt sitting all alone in a tiny make-shift shed. I kid you not. That was it. You basically prayed like hell your bag made it, and after you put all your clothes and undies back inside, and having people make fun of you while you did it, there is a turnstile type gate and that’s it, you’re out into the cheap seats of the airport terminal.

So that was my experience on Tiger. We got from point A to point B without flying into the side of a mountain. And that’s all you can expect when the cost of the fare was cheaper than the cost of the taxi ride. Would I do it again? Probably, but this time I’ll take my camera.

Frankly, I’ve never understood why on earth people would want to get on a cruise ship. Even as I get older, it has no appeal to me.

I think I would rather have a good colon cleansing than be stuck on a ship for 6-days, while it cruised around some ocean, all the while, it’s occupants doing their best to eat and drink as much as possible. And then trying to sleep with each others wives.

This video is also another reason why you wouldn’t catch me on a ship.

Have a look at their way these pricks are being tossed all over the place. It’s amazing.

At least on an aeroplane, you’re strapped in. And if you hit clear air turbulence, it’s all over quickly. And if you by chance, didn’t have your seat belt on, then more fool you.

The other thing with ships is that they are so friggin’ SLOW…

No thanks. There are much better ways to travel. And by boat is not one of them.

This was the worst I’ve seen. Wait until you hear this…

I flew to MEL last weekend on the regular Emirates EK404 shuttle. It wasn’t a full flight so I asked the staff at the lounge to find me a seat which had an empty seat beside me. Call me old fashioned – but I just value my space, especially flying on EK with the 3-4-3 configuration down the back.

About 10-minutes later, the lounge receptionist came running up to me like an excited school kid. She had a new boarding pass and had found me an exit row and had blocked off the other seats.

Excellent. Now I could relax. Well, as much as possible, sitting upright in an economy seat for 7-hours.

Anyway.

The loads to MEL have been up and down lately and this was one of those flights that was around 90% full. No op-up today. Bugger.

If you are a regular economy traveller on EK, you will know that some of the exit rows are slightly in front of the bulkhead seats. And it is these bulkhead  seats which are normally reserved for families. But I was happy, as I had 37H, and the seats beside me free.

I had no idea what was coming my way…

Now, I’m no stranger to kids on planes. In fact, my wife tells me we have 2 of our own. And our kids have travelled extensively since they were babies.

When I was single and used to travel frequently, I used to treat parents with kids on planes like they had the ebola virus. I thought what a nightmare it must be. And very few kids pass up the opportunity to wind up their parents completely by ensuring they have a melt-down mid flight.

It’s only when you actually become a parent yourself that you truly understand what a challenge travelling with kids can be. I can tune screaming kids out on a plane now as easy as flicking a switch. And instead of looking at the suffering parents with disdain, I normally glance a look towards the father, give him the secret “sympathetic parent nod” at which he instantly acknowledges and then thank the lord that they aren’t my kids and that isn’t me.

We travel once a year as a family to see the in-laws in the US. A few years ago, I made an executive decision and told the freeloaders who live with me that we were no longer going to travel as a group. It was simply not working out.

So now when we travel, my son and I go separately to my wife and daughter. He loves it. My daughter and wife love it. Everyone’s happy. We start out in Singapore and then all meet up at a hotel in the US and we go on from there.

Someone asked me why we did this. They thought it was because I was worried about all of us going down in the one plane crash. Hardly.

I proceeded to tell this overly inquisitive person that traveling with a family is quite possibly one of the worst things you can do if you have spent the majority of your working life as a road warrior.

Everything shits me about traveling with a family. They walk too slowly through the airport. They want to go to the toilet every 5-minutes. They have no clue how to pack a bag. They look like slobs. Their seat area looks like like a group of swingers just finished an orgy and…and I don’t know what else. The whole thing really just gets up my frock.

Anyway. Back to the point of this post.

So there I was. Minding my own business in my exit row seat in 37H, trying to psyche myself up for the 7-hr trip home to Melbourne.

Out of the corner of my eye, I saw a family board and occupy the bulkhead row with 2 young boys, who I found out later to be 18-months and 5-years old respectively. On the surface, everything appeared normal.

They had started their journey in Dubai, so this was the second leg of a very anti-social schedule, given that the flight from SIN-MEL departs at 10.30pm.

I can’t remember when it started. I think it must have been after we had taken off. It’s all a bit of a blur now.

The family as it turns out were South African. And the father was this rather short, stocky guy, dressed in shorts, sandals and a t-shirt, with a logo representing some sort of emergency services organisation. My guess was that he was either a fire fighter, paramedic or something in between.

The 5-year old then loses it completely.

I mean he implodes. I have never seen anything like it. And nor do I wish to see anything like it ever again. We’re not talking about a kid throwing a hissy fit because you took his Nintendo DS away. Or because the older brother called him gay. Or the same older brother whispered in his ear that he was adopted and his parents bought him cheap at a flea market.

Nothing like that.

I mean this kid went ballistic. Psycho violent. Eyeballs spinning around the back of his head. Spitting and foaming at the mouth. Gritting his teeth and screaming. And then trying to escape the bulkhead section to run amok and cause as much chaos as possible.

I’ve often wondered why law enforcement doesn’t use kids in hostage negotiation situations. You’d simply find 2 of these mentally unhinged kids, give them 2 redbulls, walk up to the bank, push the miscreants inside and let them do their thing.

No need for flash bang grenades, tear gas, highly trained men in black performing acts of bravery. The siege would be over in 10-mins because I would hesitate to guess that people who decided that robbing a bank and taking hostages was a good idea, probably weren’t that intelligent to work out how to actually breed. So their parenting skills would be non existent. They would have no clue and simply collapse, driven to complete despair. Surrender would be a welcome relief.

Back to the inflight saga then.

To their credit, the EK trolley dollies were performing admirably up to this point. A couple of them tried to intervene, but when the 5-year old brushed them to one side with quite possibly the scariest stare I have ever seen, they ran to their crew rest sobbing.

The father though was amazing. He didn’t raise his voice. He didn’t lose it. He never once got physical with the child, apart from gently restraining him so he wouldn’t escape or hurt someone else. He continued to speak calmly, despite some of the foulest language ever to leave the mouth of a human being and be directed towards ones own parent.

The mother just sat there trying to calmly talk to the small person she had partially created. It was to no avail.

I think the bulk of the passengers were so completely taken back and shocked by all of this, that none of them dared complain. They were too frightened that the 3 foot poltergeist might turn on them.

I know if that was me, I would have lost it. My simple parenting skills include violence and intimidation and if I cannot get through to either of my children using reason and logic, I will quickly escalate to “fighting fire with fire”. Especially on an aircraft.

So how this poor father remained calm was beyond me. He didn’t appear to be on any medication of his own.

I don’t think for one minute that if he had have beaten his son to a pulp, that anyone would have testified against him. People would have nodded sympathetically during the hearing that in fact, he was perfectly within his rights to do so, given the homicidal behaviour.

Anyway, the kid finally calmed down. He went to sleep – but with one eye open.

There was a collective sigh of relief by the entire rear section of the plane. The staff poured everyone another round of drinks. Even a group of Jehovah’s Witnesses were doing vodka shots…

I couldn’t help it and just had to say something to the father, given that I was right across the aisle.

I can’t remember how I started the conversation – probably something along the lines of “you look like you need a drink” or something equally as corny.

He agreed.

I then politely asked “so is your son retarded or something?”

Actually, I kid.

But the father did admit that the kid had AHT. Or was it ADD. It was something that consisted of 3 letters and sounded important. Except for the fact that it’s all hogwash.

I don’t buy that “but he’s got attention deficit disorder”. No he doesn’t. What he’s got is a bad case of genes. And what he needs is a kick up the ass.

When one of the cabin attendants sat down in the jump seat opposite me, she nervously looked towards the now sleeping mutant of a child and whispered “that’s the worst I have ever seen on a flight…”

And it was for me too.

Pray for me dear readers as I am about to, once again,  jump on EK404 in about 6-hours time.

I’m clearly too old for this shit…

*Screaming kid image courtesy Empoweringkids.com and his parents. Poor bastards.

There’s a thread over on Flyertalk which talks about a United customer service email which a heap of us received recently.

The email goes like this…

Dear Wandering Salesman:

Thank you for engaging with us by responding to ualsurvey.com.  We are working to achieve industry-leading performance and reputation by focusing on: safety; on-time performance; having a clean, workable product; providing courteous and respectful service.

In 2009, we took our first significant step by being the #1 airline in on-time arrivals as compared against America’s five largest global carriers.  We know we have more to accomplish.

In your recent survey response, you answered that you “Would recommend United to a friend or acquaintance.”  What would it have taken to motivate you to respond that you “Definitely would” recommend us?  A member of our leadership team would like to discuss your assessment and understand any suggestions you might have to improve our service.  Please reply to this email with the phone number we can use to contact you and some times that are convenient for us to speak with you.  If more convenient, you can provide us feedback directly by replying to this email.

We look forward to hearing your thoughts on how best to make you a United “promoter.”

Sincerely,

Rob Bradford

Managing Director – Customer Solutions

After a healthy dose of cynicism on subsequent FT posts, we all decided that it was thinly veiled attempt by someone in IT to prove to his bosses that he had worked out how to use the mail merge function on his pc.

But a funny thing happened late this afternoon.

My phone rings and there’s a Japanese speaking woman on the other end of the phone.

“Holy shit…” I thought to myself. I was sure I paid that last bar tab in Tokyo.

The nice lady proceeded to tell me that she was A Very Important Person from Customer Service at UA in Tokyo. “Go on”, I ventured.

She then went on to tell me that she was following up from one Mr. Lobert Bladflord…

When I realised she was legit and not same scam to get me to subscribe to some dodgy porn service, I got quite excited and then proceeded to tell her to grab a coffee, pull up a chair, and cancel the rest of the day because we were going to get busy and I was about to unleash the mother of all “How I would run your airline” speech.

Or something like this.

Forty minutes later and I had told her everything from the wine they serve in Business Class is dogwash, the food barely edible, complained about Starnet blocking (even though I have never experienced this before and even though I booked a J class long haul award last month between Singapore and Vancouver and it took all of 10-mins on the phone), complained about the lack of in seat video in long haul Y, and proceeded to rant like a banshee about people who complained about their SWU’s not clearing on W class fares should be told to piss off and fly Delta.

Or something like that.

She’s probably drinking heavily by now. And wishing she hadn’t drawn the short straw in last week’s karaoke competition, which resulted in her having to call all the losers like me.

But on a somewhat serious note, I was impressed that UA had bothered to follow this up. The fact that someone from Japan called a mentally unstable Aussie who happens to live in Singapore and who was sitting at home with nothing better to do was probably not part of their grand plan.

But it was a start.

I can’t wait until the next phone call. Hopefully it will be some tool from Continental promising that it will be “business as usual” after they take over. As if.

Bravo UA. Bravo.

It truly does appear that you might be listening…

*Image courtesy Gaping Void, Hugh McLeod

So be it…

Probably the single biggest reason I continue to remain loyal to UA is as a result of receiving 6 System-Wide Upgrade certificates each and every year.

Let me explain to the uninitiated.

When you achieve 1K status on UA, these certificates are posted to your account. It’s a simple process. And the most value you can obtain from these certificates is by redeeming (or applying them) to an international itinerary.

Lets assume I book a Singapore to New York (JFK) flight. Providing that a, I book an upgradeable fare, and b, there are seats available, United will move me from the class I originally booked to the next class up. So from Economy to Business. or from Business to First.

It is easily the number one retention tool UA has in its marketing arsenal.

Now here’s the rub.

If, like me, you hang out on frequent flyer forums such as FlyerTalk (and you specifically “lurk” or participate in the UA forum) you will quickly learn that there are a lot of angry people. People who need to clearly get out more. People who clearly have unresolved issues with their parents.

Or something like that.

You see, UA has clearly made changes to the upgrade clearance window, meaning that it is taking longer and longer for System Wide upgrades to clear the upgrade list. Sometimes, it’s even coming down to “the gate”. Meaning, you don’t know if you have a bigger and better seat until you get to the airport. Apparently, UA is not alone in “holding back” upgrades until the last minute. American have been allegedly doing the same thing as well.

I couldn’t tell you though as I don’t fly AA. I reckon any airline who can’t afford to pain the outside of their planes, reeks of cheapness.

Anyway.

This upgrade “slow-down” has outraged many travellers.

In my mind, there are 2 reasons that this is occuring. The first one is physical capacity. As a result of Wall Street raping and pillaging the global economy, the airlines had to take drastic measures with the glut of capacity it had on most of its major routes. This meant sending a lot of aircraft to have a rest in the airline parking garage – better known as the Mohave Desert.

The airlines had little option. Planes were flying empty. Fuel costs were skyrocketing. And premium passengers were now driving around redeeming coupons in supermarket checkout aisles rather than working out their next exotic location to travel to.

Then there was the upgrading of United’s international fleet. For too long, UA’s long haul product languished behind that of its Asian and European counterparts.

I reckon I sat on this seat for a good 10+ years. In fact, they should name one after me. In the meantime, carriers such as SQ, QF etc were all investing heavily in their business and first class cabins.

Some carriers, such as SQ, probably upgraded their J class product TWICE in the period that UA kept this old clunker of a seat.

But UA had no where to go. The beancounters were running the show due to their bankruptcy, much of their customer base didn’t know any better (or didn’t have a choice) and there were probably many a heated argument over stale coffee and donuts about the fact that seat capacity would be reduced if the premium cabins were overhauled to include lie-flat seats in every business class cabin.

So, that was a long-winded way of essentially saying that upgrades were taking longer to clear due to a reduced physical capacity of seats (ie many routes going from 2 flights a day to 1 flight a day or less) and the fact that the new and improved premium cabins now had 30% less capacity in them.

For example, the old J class cabin on a 747-400 was configured to 73 seats. The new cabin (below) with all lie-flat seats maxes out at 52 seats. That means that each flight now has 21 less seats. That’s a lot of overweight businessmen who would now be forced to cram their fat arses into very narrow seats down the back.

The thing I find amusing in all of this “dialogue” on FT is the absolute sense of entitlement that a lot of 1K passengers have towards the redemption of their SWU’s.

Now, I don’t want to appear to be totally in United’s corner. I’m not. Yes, I’d like to think I’m a loyal customer. But I try and put my upgrade certificates in perspective.

For example, my home airport is Singapore. No other carrier I fly offers me anything remotely close to a System Wide Upgrade. When I was based out of Australia, it was the same.

Look at the choices. Look at the fare costs. Look at the value.

SQ’s belief is that if you want to sit in in J, pay for J. Either through the nose via a J-class fare or burn a shitload of miles. Upgrade capacity is on a very, very slow drip. Qantas is even worse. Don’t get me started.

I’m about to head to JFK in mid September. I’ve got a couple of options when booking on UA. I could book the cheapest economy class fare and might not be eligible for an upgrade (ie the fare class wont allow me to apply a System Wide Upgrade certificate). In this case, the cheapest fare united.com came back to me with was a V class fare for around SGD$1900. Not the cheapest by far that I’ve seen on this route, but this price range is pretty much par for the course for someone wanting to fly all the way from Singapore to New York within a 2-week booking window.

This is the chart UA uses to sort upgrades. That, and your actual status within Mileage Plus. The last criteria is the actual time added to the upgrade waitlist. In order, the process is Status, Fare Paid, and Time Added.

However, you need to understand that some fares are not eligible for an upgrade. Anything on this chart below W and you’re shit out of luck.

The thing that has many FT’ers waving their arms in dismay is that they are buying W class fares, and finding that their upgrades are still not clearing.

This has them outraged. The tirades are almost laughable.

A I said, what gets me though is the absolute sense of entitlement.

I reckon if I apply 6 System-Wides in a year and only 5 of them clear, that means I’ve scored 5 very cost effective business class seats. No other airline allows me to do this. It’s a huge benefit. And the main reason I’ve remained loyal to UA for the past 14-years.

The simple rule I apply now is that if I want to improve my chances at my upgrade clearing, I buy the highest fare I can afford. I wont stoop to buying a full Y fare, because often, I could buy a discount business (Z class) for the same money. But I have been buying B or M fares, and my clearance rate is 100%.

B fares are virtually the same as full fare Y (economy) and are at the top of the upgrade priority list. That means that I can book a B fare 2-weeks out and trump anyone on the list that is the same status as me, but has a ticket with a lower fare class.

And even if it costs me SGD$3000, where else can I buy a business class seat with a truly lie-flat seat for that amount of money. Is there a risk that my upgrade won’t clear? Yes, absolutely, But I give myself every chance by ensuring I am booking a flight thats not packed to the gills. And with a B class fare, I could always cancel at the last minute (pay the minimal $75 fee) and book again on a later flight, where loads are better and my chances for my upgrade clearing are better.

I’m actually glad that UA are making things harder. It’s smart repositioning of their premium cabin. Now they still have a lot of work to do in the delivery of the hard product (ie the food is barely edible, the wine list the cheapest on the market, and the in-flight service is hit and miss) although I will say there seems to be a general effort across the board to lift what’s happening once the doors are closed and the flight is underway.

And I have noticed that on a lot of the premium routes where cabin staff were assigned as a result of seniority (ie Tokyo to the US), there seems to be a much younger staff population now. Maybe all of the old flying mattresses died. Whatever, all I can tell you is that the crew are younger.

So there you have it. My approach to the whole SWU argument. It’s simple. If you want to sit in J, pay for J. If you want your upgrade to clear, stop being a cheap arse and buy the highest fare you can afford. If it clears, it still will be the most cost effective way to secure a business class seat available to you.

If it doesn’t, well you will be in the minority and my guess is that if you calculate your total clearance stats over the lifetime of your 1K membership, you’ll easily be in the 90% plus window.

Wow!

Simply amazing. I’ve stayed in my fair share of hotels over the years and as someone who spends 60+ nights a year in them, I think I have become fairly blase about the quality and service you receive. For the most part, staying in a hotel is so monotonous.

Same check-in experience. Same ride up the elevator. Same damn issue with the key not working in the door. Same drab room decor. Same food. Same robotic service. Same. Same. Same.

So for a hotel to “break” that heavily entrenched view, in my mind, it would have to be remarkable.

And the W Hong Kong is just that. I was travelling with a client and he said on check-out, “that’s easily the best hotel experience I have ever had”.

This from a man, who has the patience of a 2-year old who has just inhaled a red bull and eaten a entire block of chocolate.

Or something like that…

Amazing attention to detail immediately comes to mind.

For a start, when you open the door to your room, you are instantly impressed. They door key is simply held up to the door lock and voila, open sesame. None of this swearing in the hallway, and then saying “shit, I’m going to have to cart all my crap back down to the lobby and get a new one”. Why can’t all hotels have this same technology. I mean, how hard can it possibly be?

The rooms have every conceivable amenity. iPod dock, electrical adapter, power outlets in abundance, a full set of toiletries already laid out, free bottles of water, a great sound system and flat-screen TV, a great office chair which you can comfortably work at for hours (one of my biggest gripes with hotels), bedside lighting and mood switches that make sense, a wonderful open plan and feel to them. And in my case, I had a great view of Hong Kong harbour (see top of post)

You can’t help thinking that the people who actually designed the W’s hotel rooms were actually people who had stayed in hotels before.

Even the lift lobby on each floor is different. Has a terrific homely feel.

When the W brand was first launched, I thought, wow, this is brave. It was all a bit trendy for me (maybe I was simply too old and boring). I stayed at the W in San Francisco before and it seemed to try too hard. But the W team in Hong Kong have simply nailed the customer experience. Not too over the top. But laser focused.

And the environment is first class.

It’s very unassuming. You actually walk into a very nonedescript lobby as the W is located in a high rise office complex. A W team member confidently approaches you and offers assistance. You ride an elevator to the 6th floor to check in at reception. Again, very unassuming and low-key. There’s a bar at the end and a lounge to one side. Reception is sort of tucked to one side. And at the back of that is “the kitchen”.

What a great place. And a great atmosphere. Obviously, it’s one of the main dining locations. We had breakfast there the following morning.

The gym, pool and spa are located on the rooftop. Pool has a stunning view. And the gym has all the gear. They even have Apple iPod earphones in little bags for you to use. Nice touch.

I’m a cynic when it comes to that catch-cry that hotels use on their phones or on the little placards in the room which say something like “Just pick up the phone and we’ll take care of your every whim”. It’s a service which I have rarely used, and on the odd occasion where I have asked for something slightly out of the ordinary, the staff have simply thought it “too hard”.

I couldn’t help think though that the “Anytime, Anywhere, Anything” motto of the W Hong Kong actually meant what it said. I reckon if I had have asked for the bizzare, the staff would have simply said “no problem”.

The W go out of their way to make the whole “stay” or experience a memorable one. Your room key envelope even has a statement on it which says “we’re going to do our best to remember the things you personally like and use that information when you next stay with us”.

Staying at the W Hong Kong this trip made me glad that I ditched by HHonors Diamond status. I’m looking forward to “coming home” to Starwood.

It’s clearly the hotel group of choice. And the W Hong Kong is outstanding.

This might sound silly, but the fact that the staff don’t dress formally, (ie not a tie to be seen) means that there is an air of “slick and professional” but not stuffy and pretentious. It works. For me anyway.

Next time you head to Hong Kong, give it a try…you won’t be sorry.

(I’m typing quietly, as I’m typing this post from my room at The Peninsula in Manila!). I don’t want to offend them…but this seems old fashioned compared to my experience 24-hours prior.

I would rather have a prostate exam. And I’ve had one before so I know what it’s like.

Anyway, yesterday was one of those travel days. If it wasn’t at the end of a week on the road, I would probably have said to UA, “you know what, today isn’t a good day for you. How about I go home and we start all over again tomorrow”.

Or something like that.

But since I have just attended a UA Mileage Run Seminar, my fellow attendees wouldn’t be pleased if I didn’t post my UDU results.

For those not brainwashed into the Mileage Plus cult, UDU stands for Unlimited Domestic Upgrades. Which means, if you hold status (ie Premier, Premier Executive, 1K or Global Services), UA will essentially give you a little bit better seat (for free) if there’s one available. At least, that’s the theory.

They call it an upgrade into First Class. I call it “you’re arse wont be quite as sore by the end of the trip…”

So here are my stats. I booked a domestic itinerary about a month ago. It went like this.

SFO-JFK-ORD-SFO

The SFO to JFK leg was on United’s P.S service. Excellent product. The best United has in my opinion. I applied a CR-1 (regional upgrade to this leg and it cleared within a few days). 1 down, 2  to go. If ever you want an upgrade to clear – its when you are doing a transcontinental because that’s a prick of a flight. Coming back (westbound) is even worse.

My EWR to ORD sector cleared about 4-days prior to departure. Way to go UDU I said to myself.

But the last leg, ORD to SFO was stuck on a waitlist. The fucker wouldn’t budge. It was a H-class fare, which isn’t the cheapest upgradeable fare (but it aint the most expensive either).

I get to the airport very early. Much earlier than I normally would have.

It was a weird gate experience. Experienced UA flyers will know that they normally see an upgrade list on the screen. It’s where you see where you are according to the upgrade gods via UA’s departure management system.

A bit like this.

This screen is showing seat configuration of the aircraft we’re on, our flight number, destination, how many people have checked in. It then rotates through additional screens and shows how many people are on the upgrade list etc

Essentially though, what you are seeing is whatever the hell the gate agent wants you to see. Chicago is a real tough hub to clear upgrades from because it’s an elite heavy joint.

And if the flight descends into chaos, then the rules often get chucked out the window. And I’m convinced this is what happened yesterday.

Firstly, the standby list for the flight was as big as I have ever seen. They cleared about 20 people initially and the gate was full with at least another 30 wanting to get on. This was as a result of missed connections and weather related issues. Because this was a 3-class 767, there were only 80 economy seats.

And then. And then I have no friggin idea what happened. All of a sudden the screen updated with:

First Class has checked in full. Tough Shit. You’re all losers.

Or something like that.

Then, this screen came up.

No announcements about the First or Business Upgrade list. Nothing. Nada. Zip.

The Gate Agent working the desk was a little guy called Orlando. He was working like an Egyptian Slave. The funny thing was though to not see any status screen at all for upgrade processing.

Not to complain here, but I am a 1K with United. I booked the itinerary 5-weeks prior. The fare class was H as I mentioned earlier, which means it wasn’t a real rock bottom fare. It’s about mid-range.

Those of you who don’t know the upgrade process on UA, the common understanding is:

1. Mileage Plus Status

2. Fare class

3. Time on waitlist

Fair enough then. So you would think that a flight with 26 J class seats and 6 First Class seats, I might have had a chance. No way.

However, I think Orlando and the 2 additional Gate Agents who rocked up to help were just trying to deal with all the people waving their arms and saying “Do You Know Who I am?”.

To be honest, I couldn’t have given a toss. I had a good E+ seat (an emergency exit).

When I sat down, there was a guy already sitting in the aisle seat. As the plane was getting close to departure, a gate agent came on board and said to my seat mate (and the guy behind him), “Ok, grab your shit and follow me”.

Which they did.

Whenever a gate agent boards a flight, holding new boarding passes, it’s always a good sign. Always.

Except it wasn’t my lucky day. The gate agent looked at me as if I had just farted in her car. So I remained where I was.

And it turns out I had one of the most enjoyable conversations I have ever had on a flight. My new seat mate was a geeky looking 30-year old. He was on his way to SFO from Buffalo, NY. Recently married and smart as shit. Turns out he had PhD in Electrical Engineering and he worked for a seriously cool company called Moog Inc.

I couldn’t believe it when he told me that he had applied to 57 companies prior to getting his current job. Fifty fucking seven! I’m sorry, but after 9-years at college and with an IQ in the stratosphere – it seems ludicrous that a guy this smart would find it that difficult to get a job.

He told me that a lot of people he interviewed with thought that because he had a Doctorate, that he must be a smart arse and difficult to manage.

I shook my head in disbelief.

It seemed to be our lucky day though as UA were running a promotion where they were giving everyone in E+ a free alcoholic drink. So we took them up on their offer. Then I broke out a wad of free drink chits (which I have been collecting over the years and we proceeded to go through these).

In the end it was an easy trip. The flight attendants were all good, drinks flowed, and one of the best parts I find about travelling occurred. I got to meet someone I didn’t know, had a decent conversation and learned that corporate America is completely retarded when it comes to picking talent.

Ok, fair enough. The kid might have needed to get laid more, but that’s no reason not to give him a chance.

Then I thought how lucky I was to be just a simple sales guy.

Life on the road continues…

PS. And United can stick their UDU program up their ass.

I love America.

Yesterday, a career flight attendant obviously lost the will to live, burst into a tirade of abuse against a passenger and then promptly did a runner via the emergency slide, armed with his bags. And 2 beers.

Good for him.

Yesterday wasn’t a good day to travel. There were misconnections all over the place, weather related delays up the wazoo and I have no idea why, but more people than I have ever seen travelling on a Monday.

I’m not sure though if “just a busy day on the job” warrants a full blown melt-down.

The blogosphere salivated while it lit up with the news. The rogue flight attendant in question even has his own Facebook fan pages already running. Don’t you just love the internet.

Maybe JetBlue wanted the publicity. Maybe it was a slow news day and one of the big networks wanted a lead story. Who knows.

Apparently, the entire chain of events was started by an impatient passenger, who wanted to retrieve her bag from the overhead bin while the plane was still taxiing to the gate. Silly cow.

Steven Slater, the now infamous ex-flight attendant, apparently pleaded with the woman to sit her ass back down and to wait until the plane came to a stop. A reasonable request you would have thought. She persisted. And during the verbal exchange, the bag in question fell onto Slaters head. He demanded an apology. She refused.

He then went ape-shit. The rest you can see plastered all over the web.

Or something like that. (Actually, upon reading several additional stories, the passenger turns out to be a guy, not a girl. Same difference. You get the idea).

As I was watching this mornings news channels lead with the story, I couldn’t help wonder what would happen if an SQ or QF flight attendant did the same thing.

Well for one, it would be unlikely to happen on a Qantas flight. Mainly because there aren’t any straight males left working in the cabin. If a bag fell on one of them, they would most likely burst into tears, and run away. However, if it fell on a Qantas trolley dolley (ie angry lesbian), they would probably just beat the shit out of you.

And SQ would be the same. Not because their onboard crew are all homosexuals or girls with short hair who hate men. But because the consequence of doing this would be so extreme, it wouldn’t be worth it.

Apparently, Mr. Slater is looking at a possible 7-year jail sentence. That’s after his speaking tour, book deal and countless interviews on Larry, Oprah and Letterman.

When you think about it, he’s a smart bastard. A genius in fact. Ok, so he might have to watch himself in the shower for a few months while he takes a break from reality in a minimum security federal penitentiary. But after that, he’s set.

Every flight attendant still in employment is probably silently cheering for him. Every downtrodden hospitality worker is quietly poking him on Facebook. And every TV network executive or agent are lining up to give him money.

You watch. Only in America…

I reckon people who fly Low Cost Carriers for work are either self employed idiots like me or have sort of masochistic tendencies.It was my first time at the Mandarin. The Pen was booked up the wazoo.

Now before you all jump to conclusions that I live the life of riley and am a wanker and only stay at 5-star hotels, I will have you know that in Manila, hotels such as the Peninsula can be be booked for around A$150 a night.

Anyway, the Mandarin wasn’t a bad hotel. Wasn’t that good either. Probably not worth the money though even though the rate was a respectable US$170 per night and included breakfast and internet access.

I thought that there must have been some sort of transvestite function on in town or ladyboy event. There were no rooms to be had anywhere. (ok, I made that bit up about the transvestite function. The ladyboy gig, well, I’m not so sure).

Anyway, back to the Mandarin Hotel.

Rooms were large though, and the restaurants were quite good. Service I will say was excellent.

But the layout was funny. I mean they put the gym in the basement, the pool on the second floor (which you have to access via what I would regard is an outside fire escape) and the health spa was located on the 18th floor.

You spend half your time walking around naked between the basement, the 2nd and 18th floors. Or was that just me.

Moving on then.

The part of travel I dislike the most is having to fly in and out of shitty airports. And the old terminal at Manila makes shitty look good. In fact, I’m being generous.

And another thing I hate. The Low cost carriers check in-process. Thankfully I don’t fly them too often. But my heart sank when I arrived at Ninoy Aquino International Airport.

The place is always busier than shit. But it’s more controlled chaos than anything else. The first thing they do is x-ray your bags before you step a foot in the place.

Then you’re confronted with a scene like this.

Initially I was disorientated because I was looking for where the line started to check in for my Jetstar flight. I knew where the counter was as I had unfortunately flown on Jetstar out of Manila before.

Then my eyes wandered down the line of people snaking their way from the front of the queue all the way virtually back to Makati.

Or something like that.

I mean look at this video. Its 57 seconds long. And thats how long it took me to walk the entire length of the check-in line.

The thing that gets is me is that when I’m actually onboard, the flight turns out to not be completely full. I did though manage to get lucky. I asked for a exit row and was even prepared to pay for the space (Jetstar normally charge S$30). I think the check-in agent was having a bad day and couldn’t quite work out how to take the money for the “premium seat” so just gave it to me.

I’m sort of guessing thats as close to an “op-up” on Jetstar as possible.

Anyway, back to the line. It wasn’t so bad – took around 30-mins and I had the fortune of talking to a nice person in front of me for the entire time. Ok, yes she was female. That helped. And she was exceptionally pretty. Which helped even more.

She was telling me that she while she was Filipino, she actually lived in Singapore. And 7-months ago, she had an accident rollerblading and smashed up her elbow pretty badly. She decided to go back to the Philippines for the treatment and what sounds like a plethora of operations.

Now, I’m sorry but if I smashed up a major body part, the Philippines isn’t exactly the first country I would choose in Asia to get it repaired. I’ve seen how they drive. And if this is the way they rig up their electricity poles, then the last thing I want to do is be operated on.

But that’s for another post. (actually this photo is from the recent floods in Manila).

I think I’m done with flying Jetstar for a while. It’s back to SQ and even though the SQ lounge is fairly average, its better than nothing.

At least there’s never a queue like the one I experienced.

Maybe it’s just me and the fact that I’m getting old…

Flight Report: EWR-ORD Sat 7th August UA651

If Newark Airport was a person, it would be fat, ugly and most likely have a mildly annoying case of herpes.

Or something like that.

In the 14-years of regular travel to the US and to the East Coast, I don’t think Newark has changed in that time. And if it has, I cant see where.

According to the Newark website, the Port Authority has spent more than US$3.9 billion on the place. If that’s true, then a lot of contractors, architects, engineers etc must be living in villa’s in the south of France, snorting cocaine every minute and driving Bugatti Veyrons.

I reckon it has the same shitty terminals as it has always had. The same shitty decor. And the place looks like it could do with a good wash.

Maybe when Continental and United complete “the merger of equals”, they’ll do something about it. Maybe they’ll decide they don’t need it anymore. I’ve actually never quite figured out why the greater New York area has 3 airports anyway.

Newark makes JFK look trendy. And that’s saying something.

Anyway, it’s a weird flight today. The plane is packed and I was actually thinking about trying to get bumped, but then I decided I couldn’t be stuffed. I admire guys like Lucky. He’s got far more patience than me. Especially when shit happens.

So, today was the first of my UDU’s. I don’t travel domestically on UA very much, and normally when I do, its a part of an international itinerary, so I’ve had the benefit of a SWU or a CR1.

This time was different though. The UA website told me about a week ago that my domestic flight between EWR and ORD had been upgraded – as per the new UDU system. Nice. In fact, much better.

Although, when you really stop and think about it, domestic First Class in the US is nothing to write home about. To be honest, I cant see what all the fuss is about.

Ok, you get a bit bigger seat. And its covered in something which resembles leather. But there’s still fuck all leg room and too bad if you’re hungry because all you’ll get on a 2-hr flight is a bag of corn chips and a couple of drinks. Admittedly you don’t have to pay for these alcoholic beverages…but the whole F experience in the US is hardly worth it.

I’m on a 757. There are 24 seats in the First Class section and every one is full. To the horror of a few of the First Class passengers, there are 6 kids, spread throughout the cabin.

I felt like I was in a flying creche.

Now I know that as a parent, I should be more understanding, but it is after all a Saturday and I was looking forward to some peace and quiet. Sadly, I discover that my seat mate is no more than 7 or 8 years old.

As soon as he sits down, he rips out some video game thing and starts playing the most  horrifically violent and senseless movie I have ever seen.

One of the flying mattresses goes through the “juice or water” routine (in plastic cups). She is clearly unimpressed about having to serve small humans in the premium cabin.

More kids continue to arrive. I discover that my new friend has a father and another brother – but they’re sitting down the back.

A lady rushes forward and spills into first class with 2 more kids, The UA gate agents must have been working like Egyptian slaves getting everyone onboard at the last minute because there were kids sitting all over the place, and frazzled parents pleading to other First passengers to switch seats.

The guy opposite me wouldn’t shift, so I offered my seat to the clearly stressed woman so she could sit opposite her 2 brats and beside my seat mate, who I had decided was a precocious little shit.

As soon as he sat down, he motioned to the flight attendant and asked,

“Excuse me, but how do I order something?”

“Like what?” she said, almost speechless at the kids’ petulance.

“Um, I don’t know….” the kid stuttered…I think he thought he could order filet mignon with home made bernaise sauce.

“Like juice, water, soda…?” the flight attendant ventured.

“Um, yes”…the kid said sheepishly.

I could feel the FA’s stare burning a hole in the back of the kids head. He decided to not antagonize the staff member any further and promptly returned to his video game.

It was a wise move.

This flight attendant was clearly not to be screwed with. I mean, she had an apron on and instead of her first and last name sewn onto it (like all the others in the cabin), hers said “Ms. Smith”. Or whatever the hell or name was.

Which says to me she is a man hating lesbian. She probably regards kids as nothing more than annoying plankton.

Or something like that.

If that was my kid, I would have said stop being a pain in the arse and then given him a clip over the ear.

Thankfully, I was reading probably the funniest book I have read in years – called “Shit My Dad Says” by Justin Halpern. If you haven’t read it, go buy it. Or download it to your iPad or Kindle thingy. At the very least, follow him on Twitter here with the other 1.5 million people. Just amazing.

But I’m pleased to say it was an uneventful flight.

I must say, UA is improving. Priority bag tags aren’t window dressing anymore. They actually work. And that’s no mean feat at an airport the size of ORD.

Grabbed my bags and headed for the shuttle area to head to the Holiday Inn, Elk Grove. I thought the shuttle driver was taking us to an abandoned warehouse in the industrial area of Chicago until I realized it was actually the back of the hotel.

Sadly, we didn’t get mugged or held up.

It should be an interesting day. Here for the ORD UA  seminar…

And already met some other FT’ers. One of them had brought along her significant other. We met in the bar. I’m sure he was there to see if his partner had joined a cult…

More to come.