JetBlue... I remember when they first started out back east and quickly grew into this large airline that they are today. JetBlue deserves credit for their in-flight product. TV to help alleviate the boredom, check. Free snacks and something to drink, check. No luggage charge on your first bag, check. Aside from Southwest, they are the only other airline that I can think of that doesn't charge for the first bag. But the thing here to remember is that as long as you're flying, the experience is great. On the ground, things fall apart badly should something snag their system.
Case in point, our flights went from SMF to LAS via Long Beach (JetBlue's west coast focus city) and back. Flight going to LAS were fine, no delays, just a smooth ride and we were in Vegas in no time. Coming back was entirely different. Due to problems back east (which I later found was a major storm), the entire JetBlue network was snagged. So our 3:43pm flight became a 4:45pm flight. Normally delays don't phase me, but we had a connection in Long Beach that would take us to Sacramento. First thing that stuck out to me was that I found out about the delay through my flight track app on my phone. JetBlue's ground staff in Las Vegas never told us any info until after someone asked. The most I got when I asked about whether us Sacramento folks would make our Long Beach connection was "we'll let you know once we get more information." Fair enough, I've had glitches likes this with Virgin America, Southwest, and even United. The first info we got after an additional hour of waiting was confirmation of the delay to 4:45pm, and then being told that Sac bound passengers would be moved to a San Francisco flight and then bussed to Sac airport. There was an understandable outrage from most of the Sacramento passengers, and I had already braced myself and my girlfriend for this scenario. The first question that I had to ask was: if the delay is that bad, why not allow us to remain in LAS where it's easier to accomodate us who will knowingly miss this connection than bus us? Then the info changed to "if we board the flight fast enough, we can just make the SMF connection and an agent will be waiting to shuffle us to the waiting Sacramento flight." So now we're thinking "awesome! we'll make it after all!" In the air, flight was normal, and the flight crew even reiterated that we'd make the connection and requested that non-connecting passengers make way for connecting passengers so we don't miss our flights. Once in Long Beach, different story. We rush off the plane, but no agent except for Portland and SF bound passengers. Come to find, we landed 35min. after the Sacramento flight left and there was never any hope of making it. We were given the alternative of being bussed or staying in Long Beach. The Long Beach crew even told us that they communicated to the Las Vegas crew that there was NO WAY we'd make that connection. So now we were Long Beach's problem. But kudos to that team for making sure we were all taken care of.
In short, good in-flight experience, but JetBlue really needs to get their ground staff together. The Vegas crew could borrow a page from the Long Beach folks. read more
