David Neeleman apologized in a Youtube message on the Jetblue website, promising reform. He assures the public that the events of last week and the way they transpired will never happen again. In the future, all Jetblue employees who do not work at the airport will be badged and trained to report to the airport in an emergency situation like this. We wonder if we’ll see Neeleman himself assisting during the next snowstorm. They are also working with their home-based reservations agents to keep them on in this type of emergency so people can get through by phone. Finally, they will be enhancing their crew scheduling…allowing them to triple the size of that section in an emergency.
Part of that reform is the Jetblue Customer Bill of Rights. It promises the following if they fail to live up to standards they have set for themselves:
- Cancellations
- If a flight is cancelled, Jetblue will provide a full refund or reaccomodation on a future flight at no additional cost.
- If Jetblue cancels within 12 hours of scheduled departure due to a “Controllable Irregularity”, Jetblue will also provide the customer with a voucher for future travel in the amount paid for the roundtrip in addition to the above.
- Departure Delays
- Customers whose flight is delayed prior to scheduled departure due to a “Controllable Irregularity” are entitled to:
- Delayed 1-2 hours: $25 voucher for future travel
- Delayed 3-4 hours: $50 voucher for future travel
- Delayed 4-6 hours: Voucher for the amount paid by the customer for the one-way trip
- Delayed more than 6 hours: Voucher for the amount paid for the roundtrip
- Customers whose flight is delayed prior to scheduled departure due to a “Controllable Irregularity” are entitled to:
- Overbookings – Customers who are involuntarily denied boarding shall receive $1000.
- Ground Delays
- Customers who Experience a Ground Delay on Arrival are entitled to:
- 30-60 minutes – $25 Voucher for future travel
- 1-2 hours – $100 Voucher for future travel
- 2-3 hours – Voucher for the value of the one-way trip
- More than 3 hours – Voucher for the value of the roundtrip
- Customers who Experience a Ground Delay on Departure are entitled to:
- 3-4 hours – $100 Voucher for future travel
- More than 4 hours – Voucher for the value of the roundtrip.
- For passengers who experience a ground delay in excess of five hours, Jetblue will take necessary action so that passengers may deplane.
- Customers who Experience a Ground Delay on Arrival are entitled to:
Now, the policy has a few flaws, and we’ve emailed Jetblue about it. Most importantly, what is a “Controllable Irregularity” defined as? Most airlines avoid compensation for weather-related delays, but the situation Jetblue is responding to is weather-related. Secondly, although with a 30 million dollar bill for this week-long disaster, we are sure we will be seeing less of the less than $50 or less than $100 fare…if you are travelling on one of these, your compensation after 3-4 hours is less than you would get after 2. How will Jetblue respond to that?
Finally, the most interesting is that is Jetblue overbooks the flight…something they would only do in this situation or in certain other emergencies, they will give $1000, rather than the federally mandated $400(not increased since 1979).
Jetblue, Neeleman says, wants you to be confidant in them. They have been in business for seven years and he promises this will be an abberation because they are going to make the major changes to make sure it doesn’t happen again. He asks for “your business and your trust and we[Jetblue] will show you that we[Jetblue] will be even a better company because of the very very difficult things our customers had to endure and our crewmembers had to endure over the past week.”
Prudential analyst Bob McAdoo commented that “although the press coverage of JetBlue’s problems has been widespread, the problems experienced are not likely to be repeated nor any negative impact on the company’s reputation be long lasting…Other new airlines have experienced similar problems with few lingering image problems.”