Thinking of throwing a tantrum the next time things don’t go your way when you travel? Consider what happened to Gary Zeune before you do.
“Dammit,” he overheard the passenger in front of him scream at a Southwest Airlines ticket agent in Columbus, Ohio, “I have to get to Chicago.”
The agent politely asked him to calm down, assured him that profanity wouldn’t get him on the flight he wanted, and offered to add him to a standby list. All of which only appeared to make him angrier, unleashing yet another torrent of salty language.
“The ticket agent asked him for his credit card,” remembers Zeune. “And he gets a big smile, thinking he’s going to get on the flight. Then she says, ‘Sir, you’re not flying Southwest today. Go fly someone else.’ And she refunds his money.”
Isn’t that what should happen when travelers misbehave? Zeune thinks so, and he should know. He’s an expert on white-collar crime, and while his fellow passenger’s rant technically isn’t illegal, it wasn’t without its consequences.
After last week’s column about travelers who get special treatment for good behavior, you might conclude that rudeness would always result in some form of punishment. But as I suggested, the truth is complicated.
Yes, in an ideal world, every obnoxious hotel guest would be shown the door, every boorish passenger sent packing.
But not in this world.
Zeune’s story is the exception, not the rule. Bad behavior isn’t just tolerated in the travel industry. At a time like this, when the travel business is hitting rock bottom, bad behavior can be a means to an end. The passenger in Columbus thought his diatribe against the Southwest agent would result in a seat on his desired flight. And it often does.
There’s a difference between a polite but firm request and a shrill demand, of course. Where’s the line? Here are six things you should never do when you travel, at least according to these veteran travelers:
1. Threaten violence
Bad idea, and it usually has the opposite effect than the one you intended. Valerie Lockwood, a sales coordinator for a hotel company in Plymouth, Minn., remembers one customer who broke two chairs, a sofa bed and left cigarette burns in the furniture in his non-smoking room. When he checked out, she told him the hotel would keep his $100 deposit. “He flipped out and threatened to beat and kill me,” she says. Eventually, the police had to be called, and the angry guest was fined $500. He should have just paid the $100 and left quietly, don’t you think?
2. Yell
Raising your voice is almost never an effective way of getting what you want. Niyati Chheda, a higher education consultant in Chicago, was standing in line at the airport recently when a family cut in line in front of them. She pointed out that there was a line, which set the mother off. “The lady kept screaming at the top of her voice at how we didn’t understand it is difficult to travel with kids and she used some very abusive language,” she remembers. “I understand she may have not noticed the queue and it was an oversight. In such a situation, one would apologize, at the very least. They were, however, far from that.” Not that it did any good. The family was sent to the end of the line.
3. Have one too many
Alcohol and travel don’t mix. That’s definitely true if you’re driving, and almost always true when you’re flying. When Allison Hughes was flying from Orlando to St. Louis with her family, she witnessed a loud argument between a gate agent and a drunken passenger. “Very, very, drunk,” she recalls. At issue was the agent’s refusal to allow her to board, presumably because of her inebriated condition. “She kept saying that she needed to get to Houston that night because her husband was going to pick her up, and she couldn’t miss the pick-up. When the gate agent offered her a later flight, she began yelling all sorts of expletives and swinging her arms wildly,” she says. Result? The agent called airport security and the passenger was escorted from the gate.
4. Be inconsiderate of others
Selfish behavior gets you nowhere when you travel. Consider what happened when Stan Prus, an attorney who lives in New York, was returning from Italy on an Air France flight. Not only did he have the misfortune of being assigned a middle seat in coach, but he was also sitting behind a problem passenger. “She decided that she was going to recline her seat as far as gravity would allow and smashed the back of the seat into my knees. She then started yelling at me when the seat couldn’t recline further because my smashed knees were in the way,” he says. Prus asked the flight attendants to intervene, and they didn’t. Did the passenger get away with her self-centered behavior? Yes, but the airline will pay for it. Says Prus: “I’ll never fly Air France again.”
5. Leave your manners at home
Somehow, travelers think the rules don’t apply when they’re away. You see that a lot with elite-level frequent fliers who believe they not only deserve the red carpet, but also have a license to misbehave. Candace Quinn, an executive consultant who lives in Washington, watched such a traveler hurry through the TSA screening area at Chicago’s O’Hare airport recently. “She shoved into me,” she remembers. “She told me to hurry up that she was late.” That got the attention of a TSA officer, who didn’t approve. “So she had her walk through a couple times. I felt somewhat vindicated,” she added.
6. Act like a jerk
You’ve met them elsewhere, but being trapped on a plane, train or bus with them can be intolerable, because you can’t just walk away. You’re stuck with a jerk and all the jerky behavior that goes with it. David Bowers, who works for a law school in San Diego, was boarding a Swiss flight from Zurich to Atlanta, when he witnessed an altercation between two passengers: a young woman sitting in a bulkhead-row seat, and a businessman who had the same seat assignment. “He went ballistic, blocking boarding for others and demanding that a flight attendant give him his reserved seat,” he remembers. The attendant did — but not before moving the young woman up to business class.
You can follow all of this terrific advice, but will you have a better trip? Maybe, maybe not. As I mentioned earlier, the truth is complicated.
Ira Winkler, a security expert based in Severna Park, Md., says rude and obnoxious behavior — the proverbial “squeaky wheel” — works a lot of the time. “Service people attempt to make them happy,” he says. “Other travelers avoid them or give them extra room to avoid being near them.”
Maybe that would explain the rude behavior of travel industry employees that Winkler and others have encountered recently.
More on that next week.
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This is completely off-topic, but on what planes do you have to worry about a seat being jammed on your knees? I have pretty darn long legs (as in, I have to mail-order pants because no store stocks them long enough) and I’ve never run out of legroom, on any plane. I’ve traveled in everything from 12-seat puddle jumpers to 747’s, and have always found that simply scooting backwards in your seat seems to work ok. There may not be enough room to work, but I’ve always had enough room to sit if I didn’t slouch.
My girlfriend and I found ourselves waiting on an overbooked flight to San Francisco. We calmly sat near the ticket counter waiting for the news while other passengers acted like total jerks, shouting at the ticket agent. When time came, the ticket agent boarded us and bumped us both to first class. We were drinking champagne and eating an arugula salad with raspberry dressing even before the flight left the ground! It pays to be nice!!!
Hi Elliott….So glad to get your emails…and this is all Common Sense…duh?..(sorry I couldn’t resist doing that cliche.)
I have done all of the above Good Things..and have never done the Bad..(Little angel me)…tho’ once I fumed ,(yelled)? at Shannon Airport at Ryan Air…at their bogus charges on my luggage…$30!!
So, yes, it all pays off…and in life…choose your battles, carefully.
Blissings, Connie(
I fully believe that all of your scenario’s were airline / airport related. Guess what. the airline aindustry is in the dumps! The rare times that you see a smile while flying, is when the kids are on the way to see Mickey Mouse. The Airlines are creating a seathing atmosphere with their total incompetence and indifference. They thinned their ranks of the Senior, knowledgable agents to save their millions.
In Jun, my daughter was flying USair Jacksonville, NC – LaGuardia – Pittsburgh. NY was stacked (too many airplanes), she missed her connector, and the Usair agent said “tough luck”. She called me as I was meeting her at the airport. I told her to ask the agent for a hotel voucher and food voucher for dinned and breakfast. I heard over the phone “USair does not do anything for this in NY”. Not my daughter started crying, I told her to calmly tell the agent that she wished to speak to a suspervisor that had a “considerably higher paygrade”. Meredith was given a flight LGA – Chalotte – Pittsburgh first class.
Her day ended up Jacksonnville BWI (For fuel) LGA CLT PIT 9a – 11pm. Yes the airlines deserve what they get from the passengers!
WELL GEOFF YOU HAVE A HECK OF A NERVE; WHY YOU LET A CHILD TRAVEL ALONE ON SUCH ACOMPLICATED SCHEDULE WHICH ALLOWED FOR SO MUCH CHANCE FOR ERROR; MY HUSBAND AND I WERE ONCE STUCK WITH ANOTHER CHILD FLYING ALONE WHAT A NIGHTMARE ; THE KID WAS A PEST TALK TALK TALK; I DO NOT CONSIDER OTHER PEOPLES KIDS CUTE ; GOT A FIRSTCLASS BECAUSE OF A STUPID PARENT AND WHO WANTS TO BE BOTHERED WITH THEM; YOU SEND A KED NON STOP MEANING MAYBE ONE STO NOT SEVERAL TO SAVE MONEY; SHAME ON YOU CHEAPIE.
Wow, Barbie – way to show your true colors as a selfish, self-centered human being. How do you know that this was a child and not a college student? Being tired and traveling a complicated flight plan can frazzle anyone’s nerves.
I suspect you’re one of the loud-mouth passengers that make it hard for the rest of us who do try to be courteous to our fellow travelers. “It’s-all-about-me” attitudes like yours are one of the primary reasons air travel has become painful. Next time you fly, rather than indulging your elitist attitudes, how about you try a little kindness and graciousness instead? Those of us tired of listening to your entitlement-driven whining will thank you.
PS: Lay off the caps and get a book on remedial grammar and punctuation, please?
I work in customer service, so I can appreciate the perspectives of the people behind that airline counter. What’s important to remember, as a customer, is that while this is the only interaction you’re likely to have with the airline today, the gate agent has probably already interacted with dozens (or hundreds) of customers. Depending upon the rules in place at the airline, that agent has a specific set of guidelines s/he has to follow, and while there may well be room for negotiation, the rules are in her favor. If your flight is cancelled or delayed, there’s a limit to what HAS to be done for you. What MAY be done for you is, therefore, up to the agent. Remember that when you ask for consideration, and behave with consideration and compassion. I bend over backwards to satisfy polite, patient, reasonable people by asking supervisors for exemptions, finding ways around the rules, etc., because 1) they make my day better, and 2) those are valuable customers as advocates for our company.
Put differently, if there are only 4 first-class seats available on the plane and 80 people in line, make the agent want to give you one of them.
Lady Siren; I completely ignore other passengers on a flight; I am couteous to the flight attendant, that is the only person who matters; also the gate manager; anyon who takes a complicated schedule like this to save a few bucks is bound to have difficulties; If everone ignored each other we would all have more pleasant flights; I was delighted with Southwest decision to toss a mother and her screaming 2 year old off the plane last week; and Southwests decision to force obese passengers to purchase an extra seat.