Pre-Boarding Hoarding

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You would think by now that I’d be unfazed by passengers being rude because I have to deal with it on an almost daily basis, but on some level it always bothers me.

We were boarding a flight from New York (I know, enough said — right?) to Las Vegas (yep..it just got worse), the flight was full and we we just started boarding first class. The passenger seated in 2A boarded, put his stuff away, and quickly after 2C boarded and did the same. About 2 minutes later i walked over with my normal “good morning, can I get you anything to drink while you’re getting settled” statement.. and 2A’s response about knocked my socks off

Yeah, when the f*** were you planning on coming over to take my jacket?

Umm, hello to you too. So, I explained that unfortunately we didn’t have closets on board, so everything goes into the overhead bins. Now a days, its almost normal to not have closets on board because most US airlines removed theirs in the oil crisis last year to help make the planes weight less, using less fuel — this shouldn’t be a shock to the passenger. But it was.

Are you f***** kidding me? God I wish I flew Continental

So this time, I responded with

well, I’m sorry you regret your decision to fly with us today, but if you want something to drink, please feel free to let me know.

Okay, that was over. Moving on, 2C is traveling with a garment bag that takes up 2 over head bins in first class. As row 1 boarded and I tried to make some room for their bags, I touched the garment bag to simply slide it over to create space and I hear

do NOT touch my things

so I leaned over and explained I was trying to make space for someones bag, and if he wishes I not touch it, would he mind moving it for me. He responded saying that he bought his seat, and it came with “his” space and since I couldn’t provide a closet, he wasn’t moving it. Great. Tweedle Dee and Tweetle Dumb right next to each other. Then I explained that he actually paid for the service and the seat, not the space — it is shared space. To which he waved his hand in front of me and sarcastically said “and look at the level of service I’m getting.”

So I left the situation alone there.. and waited for our Passenger service team to arrive and I was going to pass the situation on to them, I mean after all, I’m not getting paid to board — why deal with this now? Later I realized this was the best decision I could have ever made.

As the PaxSvcs talked to the passenger, he explained that we needed space…etc, etc, and that he was going to move the garment bag to the other side of the bin and place it ontop of other items. Well, after he did that — the passenger flipped out. He thought his “$5000 suit” would all crunched up and not flat.. he was screaming, yelling and being downright rude. Luckily, at this point in time I was making my departure announcements and had nothing to do with it.

After the agent got the bags situated, he kneeled down to the passenger and said “I’m sorry for the inconvenience and I hope you enjoy your flight” to which the guy responded: “I’m already having a horrible experience.”

Once inflight, after I cooled myself down, I went and took beverage orders, 2C was nicer than ever to me. Please, thank you, you’re welcome; everything. I was shocked. 2A wouldn’t speak to me. At all. Not a word. Fine, Good luck if you get thirsty.

Whatever happened to common decency and courtesy? I swear sometimes people in first class get a huge head because they think they’re better than everyone else, when really, all they have is a bigger seat and a hot meal.

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