"Next time: Our trip to Seattle and Hawaiian Airlines good and bad. "
That was the end of my last post. Time to fulfill that promise.
Bunny and I flew Hawaiian Airlines redeye on an Airbus 330 to Honolulu. Landed minutes after 11am and collected our bags to pass through Customs. Surprised to find Customs easy and the Customs officer friendly. She smiled the whole time.
Got lost in the airport. Finally made it to our next plane to fly to Seattle. TSA was not fun.
Landed at SeaTac airport after 10pm. Found the courtesy phone at curbside. Takes a genius to figure out the hotel courtesy phone. Fortunately I am a genius. Dialed up Embassy Suites SeaTac and their shuttle bus came for us.
The Good:
M, our flight attendant, was the best thing about our flight from Honolulu to Seattle. Only my stewardess on a Korean Air flight was equal to M.
M was attentive, helpful (suggested a way for me to get my bag into the overhead bin), and cheerful (always smiled). We flew economy class, and a good attendant makes a big difference.
It is the people who make an experience good or bad. M made my experience on that flight good.
The Bad:
I do not like Airbus planes. The passenger space feels cheap to me. I had trouble finding the earphone jack. Some A330s have it in the arm rest. Some have it below the screen. When I got plugged in, I had to turn the jack in the socket to get a connection. At Airbus, quality is job four hundred eighty-seven.
The light switches and the call switch are not intuitive. Any rational person – that is, not a Frenchman – would place the switch next to the device. So where did Airbus put 'em?
In the screen.
That's right. Along with the list of movies and cartoons available, there is an icon to bring up the switches. In a previous life, I worked man-machine interface design. I am qualified to judge this design.
This is a FAIL.
Hawaiian Airlines in-flight food gets a C. Not a C+. I got a drink with the meal. When I asked for water later, the attendant (not M) brought me a bottle and said, "That will be four dollars."
Look, Hawaiian Air, rather than charge your customers for water, fire some executives. If your executives are okay with the nickel and dime treatment, you need to get rid of 'em anyway.
Hawaiian Airlines has in-flight video documentaries and in-flight magazine articles about the lives of their employees doing good deeds in Hawaii. Hawaiian Airlines has in-flight video documentaries about native Hawaiian life.
That is all well and good.
But it is wrong.
Seems to me that Hawaiian Air is in the business of selling Hawaii. That is stupid. People have already bought Hawaii. Hawaii is on my list of places to go and visit for a while. How to get there? That is the question.
The head of Hawaiian Air needs a two-by-four counseling session to remind him that he is in the business of selling transportation. Seats on flights. Nothing else.
When I flew Hawaiian Air, the attendants had the last row of seats screened off. These seats were for use of the attendants. By my reckoning that was $4,200 lost. Woulda paid for my water.
The Ugly:
No real ugly but asking four bucks for a bottle of water comes close.
In the end, the question is this:
Will I choose to fly Hawaiian Air again?
Maybe, but you can bet and give odds that I will shop around.
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