David J. Danto

Business travel thoughts in my own, personal opinion

eMail: ddanto@IMCCA.org Follow Industry News: @NJDavidD

Mailbag – September 2022

If you’ve ever read the fine print on the bottom of these blogs that I write for JoeSentMe.com, you’ll always see the following sentences: “As always, feel free to write and comment, question or disagree. Hearing from the traveling community is always a highlight for me. Thanks!” As it happens, some of you have actually read that and send me email. On the occasion of this US Labor Day weekend I figured it would be a good idea to share some of the thoughts I’ve received with everyone else.

After my recent blog on Misplaced Priorities, Walt wrote to me and shared that he felt I was missing a key part of the story. He felt that the elimination of competition (which the government caused by allowing airline mergers) was also a huge part of the story. His words were:

“… let’s talk about the elimination of competition.  You mention that air travel was much better years ago and it certainly was.  But back then, there were a large number of airlines flying the same routes.  The majority of them have been consolidated or gone out of business.  And, it wasn’t enough to try just to compete on price.  They had to compete on service (what a novel idea).  In fact, do you remember when the airlines had advertisements all over the radio and the TV?  Do you remember what they were saying.

Fly the friendly skies of United

PSA billed itself as the world’s friendliest airline and I remember its jingle started with “PSA is having a party up there in the sky..”

Delta is ready when you are

Continental Airlines – We really move our tail for you

And, then of course there are the others

Eastern

TWA

Northwest Airlines

America West

Piedmont

Frontier Airlines

Midwest Airlines

Air Tran Airways

Pan American

National

These are all off the top of my head and I’ve flown on all of them (and probably others that I can’t remember in my 50 years of flying).

Of course, with no competition, there is no incentive to improve.”

He’s certainly not wrong.

After last week’s article on the Alternate Reality of no housekeeping at Hampton Inns, some of my readers sent me notes taking me to task for not realizing that fact earlier:

“The policy is over a year old. Rail if you want to, but Hilton has been pretty transparent…”

“You face a choice: Switch to a chain that still offers daily housekeeping, put the garbage outside your room--or … just pick up the phone like the card says and call the front desk for collection.”

They are of course correct, but my complaint did elicit a response from Hilton with an Honors points award to compensate me for the issue. I’ll be smarter next time, calling a Hilton property I’ve booked to ensure that there is free, regularly-scheduled housekeeping, and cancelling any reservation at a property that doesn’t offer it.

After I wrote about the terrible experience at Sandals Royal Bahamian, I heard from Corkie (a travel agent) telling me that I shouldn’t judge all ‘all-inclusives’ by my first, terrible experience:

Thank you for this report. I haven’t been to a Sandals in years, and then only on Jamaica. It really opened my eyes to how dishonest their (and other’s) advertising is these days. I will have to deeply vet the properties I use in the future for my clients.

I hope you give All-Inclusives another try. There are some that are stunning and do provide the service they say they do.

As opposed to Cruise ships, where my first bad experience has (correctly) turned me off of them for life, I will heed Corkie’s advice and give ‘all-inclusives’ another try at some point…but DEFINITELY not at Sandals, who are still fighting with me and my credit card company when we asked for a refund for only one of the four days costs (as some form of compensation for the awful experience. I felt that I was being magnanimous in not asking for a full refund for the entire miserable experience.) I mean, we’ve even publically posted indisputable video of ants crawling around in their suite’s bathroom (amongst the dozen or so complaints and unfulfilled promises about the stay) yet they still have no shame or remorse, and have never even apologized to us. Definitely avoid this group IMHO.

I’ve also received emails simply thanking me for informing people and sharing stories, as well as a few calling me biased or insane for insisting that people be vaccinated against COVID19 and wear masks. Please feel free to keep writing in. One of my favorite NSFW sayings – that I learned was true many, many years ago – is ‘Opinions are like a-holes: everybody has one.’ I fully appreciate that yours are just as valid as mine.

This has certainly been a summer like no other after a once in a century global pandemic. I hope you and yours have made it through OK and found some relaxation and enjoyment along the way. Here’s to all of us having a great autumn. I have one more local getaway scheduled for next weekend to extend the summer feelings for as long as I can. I’ll let you know how that one turns-out in a couple of weeks.

This article was written by David Danto and contains solely his own, personal opinions.

All image and links provided above as reference under prevailing fair use statutes.

Copyright 2022 David Danto

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As always, feel free to write and comment, question or disagree. Hearing from the traveling community is always a highlight for me. Thanks!