Useful Stuff

Edward at Hertz in New Orleans

I've just happened across a most amazing person. Edward is a shuttle driver for Hertz in New Orleans, but he's really a highly accomplished jazz DJ. If you're an owner of a jazz station, you need to hire him before your competition does. Or if you're Hertz, you need to promote him... quickly. He exemplifies the very best in customer service. Every company needs lots more people like Edward.

American Airlines boarding policy

  I'm sitting on a flight from JFK to MIA. Boarding time was posted as 4:45, yet when I showed up at 4:44, they were calling for "all passengers, all rows." What's up with that? I (fortunately) got an upgrade, so I'm sitting in 1F, but that means everyone behind me had to wait for me to stow my stuff. If they'd posted the correct boarding time, I wouldn't have had to delay anyone.

The Smart Purchase Experience

Actually, the purchase experience of my new Smart car left me feeling anything but smart. It's more like "what kind of an idiot was I to put up with that?"

   But before I get into more, let me say that the car is absolutely brilliant on several counts. It rethinks nearly everything about the small car experience... for the better. But then the marketing department completely screwed it up. Here's what happened: I've gotta say upfront that wasting many hours with a car dealer is about as interesting to me as getting all my teeth pulled. So I'm an easy mark... I want to get in and out as quickly as possible. So once my feeble attempts at negotiation revealed that the Smart dealer in Coral Gables was just taking orders at full retail price, at the worst time ever for the car industry, we had a choice to make.

   We decided to buy the car... it's coolness made up for the dealership's refusal to negotiate. Fair enough... So far. But then they called in their lawyerly closing agent who introduced us to the fact that warranties cost extra. As does service. As do several other things. So the car we thought we were buying for $18,000 ended up being about $24,000 instead. I was inches away from throwing the contract back at them, but ended up negotiating (think: pain of tooth extraction) a little of their bait-and-switch money back out. So we have the car, and love it... but absolutely detest the experience of buying it. Was it the fault of the Coral Gables Smart dealer, or do their dealers everywhere treat customers this way? Anyone else have an experience with Smart?

My New Car

  Here it is, doing the unthinkable... parking sideways:

 

 

   That's my new car... a Smart. Finally, we have a car equal in compactness to our 747 square foot condo, which is just behind the car, on the first floor. I'll have more to say later about the Smart purchasing experience, but the design of the car largely lives up to its name. Shockingly, it doesn't feel small. Unless you look behind you and realize that the back end of the car is about 3 feet away, you feel as if you're in a fairly normal-size car. And the payload area behind the seats is actually larger than in our previous car, a Mini Cooper. In theory, it gets 33 in town and 41 on the road, but we appear to be averaging about 40 so far, and that's with mostly in-town driving. And Bill McDonough would be proud... the Smart is highly recyclable, as McDonough called for in his Cradle to Cradle book several years ago. But on top of all that "responsible" stuff, it just looks cool. Similar to driving a Mini several years ago, people on the road tend to look at it... and smile. The "anti-road rage!"

Delta's Upgrade Policy

I'd been upgraded for several days on my return trip to Miami this evening. Unfortunately, weather in Atlanta intervened and I got bumped to the next flight because Delta couldn't get me to Atlants in time to catch my assigned flight.

   I've flown roughly a half-million miles with Delta, but they apparently base their upgrade policy purely on miles, because three people jumped ahead of me this evening for upgrades. This may sound like whining, but when you're 6-3 like me, getting stuck in a Coach seat when the person ahead decides to lean back is physically painful. But physical pain is beside the point.

   The real point is if you give someone an upgrade, keep your word if at all possible. Just because you can't get them to Atlanta on time, don't let their upgrade evaporate. Those three people who got upgrades this evening had no idea they'd be upgraded. Meanwhile, Delta emailed me several days ago telling me about my upgrade that never happened. Creating an expectation and then destroying it creates far more negatives than the positives that accrue from unexpected last-minute upgrades.

SkyClub Schedule

The first flight out of Miami departs at 5:45. The SkyClub opens at 5. It's new (and nice) but near the terminal, which means it's still several minutes' walk from most gates. Here's the problem: by the time you get checked in at the club, it's probably 5:05. The plane boards at 5:15, and it takes awhile to get there. So what's the point of stopping? Delta needs to do one of two things: either open the SkyClub 15 minutes earlier, or don't worry about catching travelers on the first flight and let their employees sleep a little longer.

Braman Mini Can't Make A Deal

Our Mini Cooper was in a flood on South Beach a few weeks ago, and we just got the shocking news a couple days ago that State Farm is totaling the car, although the repair bill is only 10% of the car's value. I guess they're afraid of problems we don't see yet.

   In any case, we're just leaving Braman, which is the closest Mini dealership... in a taxi. Here, in the middle of what should be the biggest buyer's market in the history of the car industry, their "best deal" on a lesser car than what we had was still nearly $50/month more. Strangely, I'm sorta looking forward to experimenting with a car-free life for awhile.

SkyClub Silliness

   Delta Airline's recently renamed SkyClubs (previously Crown Rooms) has instituted one of the silliest new policies I've seen in a long time. In this era when everyone else is working to make their transactions more friction-free, Delta has inexplicably begun requiring customers to show not only their boarding passes (which clearly indicate that they are, in fact, SkyClub members in good standing) but also a government-issued photo ID.

   What is Delta trying to prevent? Do they think terrorists are going to sneak into the SkyClub? Who knows? All I know as a customer is that it's just one more thing to think about, and one more thing to have to dig out as part of "The SkyClub Experience." I asked one agent this morning how it's possible to get through security without having do produce a government-issued photo ID? She couldn't answer. I had a similar conversation a moment ago with another agent, and she said "It's one of the stupidest things SkyClub has done in a long time. It makes things more inconvenient for you and me both. Please go upstairs and complain online. And so I am... except I'm going one better, and blogging about it. Hopefully, Delta will pay attention... I'll definitely call this post to their attention. We'll see if they're serious enough to comment. What are the odds? And if they do, what are the odds they'll change the silly new policy?