THE PERILS OF AIRLINE CODESHARES~Caring and Sharing

The Perils of Airline Code Shares

Sharing and Caring

Sharing is caring, or is it? Did Virgin Atlantic, one of my favourite long haul carriers, care when I was served a rank barbeque chicken breast on a slime of mash potato with a side of grey broccoli and a floppy wedge of reconstituted carrot on a Delta aircraft? Did they even know? I think not. Had Sir Richard Branson seen what I was given to gaze at in 30E on my return to the UK he would have been truly concerned.

Christmas skies are crowded and the jets are crammed to capacity. We all know that. I had to book on relatively short notice to fly to the USA for family business and for press about my book (BRIGHTON BABYLON), my coming novel (SIGNATURE WALK) and the reality TV show featuring Kellie Maloney I (was) to produce and appear on. Everything airline was full going across. I needed to get to St. Louis in the heart of America and the only flight I could get, and I literally got the last seat, was a Virgin flight to Detroit with a connection onward to my destination.

“It’s the last seat,” the booker stated, “and it’s a code share.”

My Christmas spirit sank. Code Shares and Alliances amongst a wide range of carriers gives the traveller more choice of routing to their holiday, home and business destinations and more flexibility with times of arrivals and dates of departure (when it’s not Christmas and January…two of the busiest and most stressful times to fly).

“It’s a code share and although you are booking on a Virgin ticket, you’ll be on a Delta aircraft.” That was it. I knew the trip would be tedious. Although I’ve never travelled with Delta I knew it was not for me. Delta is one of the oldest American airlines and serves a complexity of national USA and international routes. 

Here is the thing; airlines in the USA tend to oversell their flights. They ram their aircraft with passengers. Flights are, by and large, always full. Their overseas crews are, by and large, always of an age. Their younger cabin crew members, or flight attendants, are to be found working the shorter domestic routes in North America. The senior FA’s bid for the more glamorous European routes so the cabin staff seem to be dour. Hours of dour ain’t fun.

This Delta flight had no leg room. The food was particularly under par. They had no duty free to look at in their inflight magazine. When I asked when they would bring out the duty free cart so that I might purchase some perfume or a trinket for my wife I was told that, “We stopped all duty free service 7 months ago.”

I asked for two small bottles of wine with my ‘meal’.

“We don’t do bottles of wine. We do cups of wine.”

At outbound check in at Heathrow I asked if they could seat me away from any families with small children. “We can’t do that but ask again at the gate and they will try to accommodate you.”

I did. I was given seat 45D, centre seat, second to last row on the Boeing 767-400ER service. To my right, one seat away on the aisle in 45F was an infant in her father’s arms. Right behind me in 46D was a boy of about three years old whose doting mother thought him the best thing as he screeched and screamed and kicked my seatback continually all the way clear across the North Atlantic.

Who would I complain to if I was in mind to do so for spending close to £1,000.00 to be so uncomfortable and overlooked? Who would I carp on to about a lack of duty free, one of the joys of cheap shopping in the skies? Virgin Atlantic? I think not.

Delta? “Sorry sir, we stopped listening to passenger complaints 7 months ago.”

When you book your next flight having chosen an airline that you think you quite like the look of and the face of, do yourself a great favour and ask if it is a code share and exactly what service you can expect for your money.

Three other things you should know about Delta.

One: On domestic flights within the USA they don’t take cash. I had to pay with a credit card for my pre-mix Bloody Mary on my second leg from Detroit to St. Louis, however the cabin crew were friendlier and decades younger.

Two: The Captain cheerfully announced we would be served a hot breakfast before landing back at Heathrow. We got a yogurt, a cup of frozen, yes…frozen orange juice made from concentrate and a dry caramel chocolate brownie.  

Three: Swerve Delta altogether.

  

Peter Jarrette is an international journalist & author. 

Update: In personal exchanges with Sir Richard Branson's PA and subsequent correspondence with the airline and Delta a travel voucher for a cash sum was awarded me. Virgin Atlantic bent over backward to reassure me that they were concerned about the episode(s) and I had their every sympathy.