The Traytable Trial

Posted in Airline Insight, Airlines | 12 comments

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When a flight attendant asks you to put up your tray table, you usually do it and don’t think anything of it. In fact, if you have it down when you know it’s not supposed to be, you expect someone to tell you that it’s time to put it up. Now, here’s the question: If you’re in the bathroom, and your tray table is down when it’s not supposed to be; whose to put it up?

On a recent flight to Washington D.C. the passenger seated in 22C was in the restroom just prior to door closure. The flight attendant in the back told him that he had to hurry as we were about to depart. During this time, the flight attendant passed through the cabin, as usual, preparing it for departure as she made her way to the front of the plane to do the safety demo. Along the way she came across 22C’s traytable which had a cup of coffee on top of it. As she touched the tray table the passenger in 22B grabbed the coffee. Obviously she was traveling with 22C.

Situation over, right? You would be very wrong.

We took a 10 minute delay waiting for him to take his seat. Then, as that flight attendant made her way back to the aft of the plane he stopped her. He asked her if she touched his traytable and she responded accordingly. He said “What gives you the right to touch my table?” She responded by saying that the tables must be up for departure. He began to state his case: “Though that’s true, the plane can’t leave with me in the bathroom, so why didn’t you just wait for me to get out of there before touching it?” Though, true, we can’t leave with him in the restroom, she was being proative so that when he DID leave the restroom we could get underway, which is what she explained to him.

He then proceeded to tell her not to touch his things again, and questioned how she knew that the woman in 22B was traveling with him. The flight attendant explained that once she touched the tray table, 22B grabbed the coffee. No words were exchanged. He then expressed his unhappiness with her decision to touch his things and his table and told her “never do it again.” To which she walked away.

About 20 minutes into the flight the passenger stopped me. He wanted to know where he could complain about the flight attendant and I told him he was talking to the right person. He then began to explain the situation and added in that he was traveling to DC because is Uncle had just passed on and now this particular flight attendant ruined his day and his experience on my airline because she put his tray table up. I once again explained that it needed to be up and that she was proactive since we were taking a delay for his bathroom use, to which he didn’t respond. He told me he wanted her “reprimanded.” I told him I’d speak with her.

Later, I told this flight attendant that during the beverage service she should tell the passenger that she had a conversation with me and offer him something to eat or drink on the house as a peace offering. She shouldn’t, however, apologize since she didn’t do anything wrong. When she got to his row and did just what I explained he said that he and his girlfriend were “Okay, thanks.”

With the word, “thanks,” would you assume this situation was over? If you said yes, you’re wrong again.

Still not happy on the ground he sparked an argument with the Captain over his traytable. Though, the Captain was already briefed on the situation and defended the flight attendant. Additionally, the passenger was quite irate and belligerent to the point that it confirmed what he has already heard from us about the passenger.

Once deplaning, the passenger, still unhappy with the response he received, found yet one more employee to rant to and this time added that he booked on us because it was included in his package holidays and he didn’t want to fly his return flight with us.

This employee, a customer service agent, after hearing the complaint offered the passenger a complimentary upgrade on his return flight home, after stating that he wanted to be rebooked on another airline because of the flight attendant’s actions.

Do you think this was the right action to take, or, is this just sending a message to everyone that if you complain about anything, you’ll get something free?

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  • http://twitter.com/prairiesentry Jen Abbondanza

    I Think that the more we let people take advantage of the situation, the more it re-enforces that that is an acceptable way of getting what you want.  This is no different than a two year old having a tantrum. If you never give in, then they drop that from their repertoire of behaviors. Obviously this guy’s mom gave in. The Customer Service agent should not have however. And isn’t it YOUR tray table, not his? He only paid for the seat right? :)

    • KP

      Agreed. This dude is trying to milk the situation for all it’s worth, despite not having any real need to. It seems to me that he’s just doing it out of spite at this point. The FA did whatever she could to apologize to this man, and he responds by taking his non-issue to the next employee he sees.

      There may be times in which an airline may have to bend over backwards to satisfy a patron, but this is not one of those times. The man didn’t have a drink spilled on him or anything, his tray table got put up while he was in the bathroom. Big whoop. Time for this dude to put on his “big girl” panties and start acting like a respectable human being.

  • Traytable

    Urgh No no no no nooooooo! This is what irks me about CS agents these days… many of them don’t have the balls to tell the pax that yes, actually, they are not always right and no, they will not get an upgrade for that. They have just taught him that you can complain for stupid sh!t and get what you want.

    INSERT EYE ROLL HERE.

  • Tfretz

    The seat, tray table  and all other parts of the aircraft do not belong to the passenger.  They are not “his”.  They belong to the airline.  He paid for transportation from point A to point B. If he read the transportation contract he would find that even the particular seat he booked can be changed at the discretion of the airline.  Not only did he delay the flight by using the lavatory at pushback,  it also sounds like he caused a disruption during the flight with all the complaining over nothing.  We need to stop rewarding bad behavior.  If he wanted to take another airline home – let him.

  • http://twitter.com/brianjheck Brian J. Heck

    Maybe I’m missing something, but I cannot for the life of me figure out why this was such a big deal. Did anybody ask him why he was so upset that she put the tray table up? Who cares? His friend took the coffee without a word, and he had to put it back up anyway when he returned. Was his friend inconvenienced by having to hold the coffee? Did she burn her hand? Or was he just upset because he was attending a funeral and looking for an excuse to take his emotions out on someone?

  • http://www.facebook.com/joseph.singer Joseph Singer

    From the sound of it this passenger in all likelihood could not be placated and had a chip on his shoulder that probably had nothing to do with the quality of service he received from the airline. He thought that just because he experienced a personal issue it gives him the right to be a troublesome passenger.  It’s likely that there was nothing you could do to make his “experience” better.  He decided that at the outset.  He had no desire to make things better (even though there was nothing that the cabin personnel did in the first place.)

  • http://snapshotsandpoems.blogspot.com/ Shaz S

    First of all, a passenger pays for a flight, not for aircraft components. So there is no question of anything being his on the aircraft other than the things that he brought with himself.
    What gets my goat is when people who do not fully comprehend the situation at hand reward this kind of bad behaviour. The CSA should never have upgraded him; an apology may be (for the sake of customer satisfaction and blah-di-lah) but never an upgrade. Some people are just out there to milk every opportunity they get. It definitely sends out the wrong message and I am sure this guy will try the same tricks every time he is on a plane.

  • Linda T

    This is where the airline should have told the “passenger” he could fly with another airline.  He was looking for a fight…people like that should not be rewarded for their behavior. Kudos to the airline flight attendant for keeping their cool. 

  • Mark

    I would’ve just booked him on another airline as asked.  Not worth keeping shitty passengers.

    • Mark

      CRAPPY!  sorry, I meant “crappy” passengers.

  • Anonymous

    I wish someone had called this guy out on claiming that he was travelling because his uncle just passsed away, and then saying he was booked on a holiday package…

  • JonW

    I think the Flight attendant in question and everyone else who interacted with this passenger did nothing wrong.  OK, so his uncle died, understandably he would be a little emotional, but that does not give anyone the right to ruin the day of someone who is just doing her Job.