Well, summer is closing which means a couple things at the airport ticket counter and airline gates.  Vacation travelers are fewer and disruptive weather is waning (though not gone yet).  At my airline and airport typical summer travelers are a small party or a couple headed for Europe.  Of course we see some variations:

• Travelers to Asia
• Groups
• Families
• Unaccompanied minors

The challenges we face in airport customer service are primarily due to flight delays causing missed connections.  I’m pretty good at finding alternate routes to get people to their destination.  One of the best ways to avoid finding yourself in need of this help is to give yourself as much time to connect as possible.  It’s one of the things I recommend to travelers every day.  While an hour or less can be a “legal connect time”, it’s way too short for comfort.  Personally, I try to give myself at least three hours at the gateway airport.  This past winter I went to Paris and had over six hours at the connecting airport.  By departure time, it was snowing, inbound flights were delayed and a mostly full flight went out with many empty seats, even in Business Class.  I can’t stress it enough, if you’re connecting to your international gateway, don’t risk a tight connection!

We have a few ways to re-accommodate travelers and there are different lengths to which we’ll go.

• Reroute on the same airline the same day
• Reroute on the same airline another day
• Rebook on an alliance partner (Star Alliance, One World, etc.) airline
• Reroute on a non-partner competitor

Tools at our disposal

If the delay reason is out of our control (weather, Air Traffic Control, etc.) we may not go past the second bullet, though there may be other circumstances such as frequent flier status or availability on later flights.  If our flights are full for days, which often happens, I’ll send you to another airline.  If the delay is our fault, like a mechanical or crew issue, we’ll do whatever we can to get you moving.  Travelers are entitled to much more if the delay or cancellation is “controllable”.

So, the airports are not as crowded, the flights are not quite as full and the weather delays are not as frequent.  We get a little rest after Labor Day from the craziness of summer travel…until the holidays!

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