Challenging the status quo ….

On a recent work trip to san Jose, I decided to take the new Jet flight from Mumbai to San Francisco. The other reason was because not only it turned out to be cheaper but also gave me a chance to unwind with my folks in Mumbai for a day. The flight itself was very pleasant. No unearthly hours late in the night, loosing sleep etc. The aircraft is wide bodied new plane, nice big TV screens, great collection of movies and reasonably good food. Service was almost as good as singapore airlines but like 7/10, with room for improvement. Same with the food, didn’t have enough snacks/muchies or icecream which really makes a big difference on the singapore airlines. It really felt great to be on an Indian owned airline for the first time. In about 18 hours I was in SFO and I had my choice of good vegetarian food. I have been back and forth since 1996 when I first started by international sojourn. British Airways, my first international flight was pathetic – no vegetarian food and they even lost my baggage. Indians have come a long distance since then, and this is one example of how India has come of age in a global world.

But now let me come back to what happened on the way back. The flight was delayed by 2 hours, we were not informed till we reached the airport. Ofcourse they were nice enough and gave us $15 food voucher (it was 8.45pm flight so many of us had not had dinner). The boarding was ok. I didn’t get my usual quota of newspapers which I would normally pick up on my international flights. The video screens refused to work. The initial reaction from the flight attendants was it doesn’t work so we can’t do anything. On my insistence, they tried to find a seat where it worked. There was no appology or announcement about the condition of the entertainment system and only those who asked were told that it would be fixed in Shanghai.

Halt in Shanghai was again interesting. The chinese ladies managed the waiting area – just 2 of them – no jet airways staff was available. It was around 2 am local time.  When it came to boarding they just asked everyone to make a line and board. No row numbers, no preference for wheel chair assisted passengers, no preference for people with children. It was like the original order of boarding was just completely cast away. I asked the chinese lady what happened, and she had a look of cluelessness about what the hell I was saying. On board again, the entertainment screens refused to work. I asked the new set of attendants, they had no answer. We reach Mumbai at the original time of arrival, no delays. I would have thought they would atleast make an appology about the malfunction of the system, which is perhaps a very important part of the experience of a long international flight. But nah! they had nothing to say except for the usual smile on their faces while exiting the aircraft.

Here I felt that we have a long way to go when it comes to international customer service. While we have the backoffices of every major company in the world providing phone customer service, when it comes to real customer service whether its as part of an airline experience or a banking experience. We still have are not there yet. We have a lot of labor to throw at the problem, but can we really solve a problem. Could the attendants not have come up with an alternative solution of showing something on the overhead screens – I wondered. The ability to think on our feet, attention to detail, trying to make a difference in the customer experience – is still something we need to develop.

But overall, I must say, that the opportunities are there and Indians are capturing it in a global market.