Yup, it's becoming a bit of a hobby horse. I am beginning to wonder if large swathes of the airline industry actualy have the term "customer" let alone "customer service" in their vocabularies. Today at Gatwicj "Speedy Boarding Plus" for two people both ways representing an additional cost of almost 30% of the original ticket price got us access to a slightly shorter queue than the one for the mere mortals. About an hour shorter admittedly but "Speedy"? no, not at all. First they split the queue and let the people well behind us into a new shorter queue and then the people four ahead of us were trying to check in 10 minutes before their flight opened. So, I hear you ask, what?? Well, the Easy jet staff waited for the checkin time without asking the people to move aside. So we all waited. Poetically the people in the new short queue didn't move either as there was a cretin with most of his passport missing trying to persuade the checkin staff that what was left was enough to allow him to take himself and his multiple piercings and tattoos to the beach somewhere. Four staff stood there looking at this sorry document before concluding that none of them had the authority to accept it. So they sent a fifth person to find the manager from upstairs. All four of them and the cretin stood there trying to look as if he wasn't causing a huge queue.
Throughout this whole joyous farrago there was a man walking up and down with a clipboard periodically shouting "Anyone for Barcelona?" I don't know why. No-one answered.
So, why couldn't they have moved the cretin or the queue jumpers to one side and checked a few others in? Good question. No answer from them.
Through security, to the lounge.No gate for the flight. Hang around waiting. Gate announced, miles and miles away. Go to gate. By the time I was moving to the gate, boarding was announced. There was never going to be time to get to the gate from the publishing of the gate number before boarding started. It's bloody miles away down endless conveyor free corridors.
What use speedy boarding plus to avoid the thundering herd? Well, not only not much as you have to get to the gate before anyone else so that when they give you 45 seconds headstart on the herd you can take advantage of it. Well, today it didn't matter. The gate staff couldn't be bothered to allow the SB people in first. NO 45 seconds head start. No quick check in. What a waste of £32.
The industry uses the term "SLF" for passengers. Self loading freight. That describes the attitude of EasyJet staff to a T today. I wonder if anyone there cares? On the recent evidence the only thing they want you to do is pay money for useless extras and vile food.
