I just got this email. What makes it even more impressive is I wasn't even flying last week. I'm a previous customer. If anyone in government ever had the honesty, courage, and integrity to send a letter like this to his/her constituents, she/he would win in a landslide. A company taking full responsibility? Voluntarily offering compensation and a Customer's Bill of Rights? A corporation using the word "humanity" in its mission statement?
"JetBlue Airways
An Apology from JetBlue Airways.
Dear JetBlue Customers,We are sorry and embarrassed. But most of all, we are deeply sorry.
Last week was the worst operational week in JetBlue's seven year history. Following the severe winter ice storm in the Northeast, we subjected our customers to unacceptable delays, flight cancellations, lost baggage, and other major inconveniences. The storm disrupted the movement of aircraft, and, more importantly, disrupted the movement of JetBlue's pilot and inflight crewmembers who were depending on those planes to get them to the airports where they were scheduled to serve you. With the busy President's Day weekend upon us, rebooking opportunities were scarce and hold times at 1-800-JETBLUE were unacceptably long or not even available, further hindering our recovery efforts.
Words cannot express how truly sorry we are for the anxiety, frustration and inconvenience that we caused. This is especially saddening because JetBlue was founded on the promise of bringing humanity back to air travel and making the experience of flying happier and easier for everyone who chooses to fly with us. We know we failed to deliver on this promise last week.
We are committed to you, our valued customers, and are taking immediate corrective steps to regain your confidence in us. We have begun putting a comprehensive plan in place to provide better and more timely information to you, more tools and resources for our crewmembers and improved procedures for handling operational difficulties in the future. We are confident, as a result of these actions, that JetBlue will emerge as a more reliable and even more customer responsive airline than ever before.
Most importantly, we have published the JetBlue Airways Customer Bill of Rights--our official commitment to you of how we will handle operational interruptions going forward--including details of compensation. I have a video message to share with you about this industry leading action.
You deserved better--a lot better--from us last week. Nothing is more important than regaining your trust and all of us here hope you will give us the opportunity to welcome you onboard again soon and provide you the positive JetBlue Experience you have come to expect from us.
Sincerely,
David Neeleman
Founder and CEO
JetBlue Airways"
If Jet Blue was a politician, the letter would have read as follows:
Dear Constituent,
We regret the weather chose to strand you and ruin your trip last week. Of course, no one can predict the weather, and had we tried, what message would it have sent to our enemies, the meteorologists? The anxiety, frustration and inconvenience the weather caused you has not gone unnoticed by us, and we are forming a committee to get to the bottom of this, and then take action, perhaps a non- binding resolution against snowstorms. All this costs money, so please use the enclosed envelope to give generously.
Say what you will, I'm flying Jet Blue. And I may even vote for it.