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Northwest Airlines

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Submitted By envyvaid
Words 1602
Pages 7
Sub : Northwest Airlines and the Detroit Snowstorm Analysis in January’1999.
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Date : March 17, 2014
The incident involving the Detroit snowstorm and Northwest Airlines is the quintessential of a failure to deliver a “Now you're flying smart" experience for our travelers. The course of events detail the experience of travelers, mis-calculated decisions by the ground staff and the lack of an effective emergency response plan that should have been implemented to provide the promise of delivering passengers from point A to point B.
The “act of god” and the associated repercussions in this case could have been managed and avoided with the following recommendations:
a. The passengers aboard the NW 1829 to Detroit had already been through the agony of a layover in Tampa, FL. (The experience involved waiting in long lines to check-in and eat at the buffets at the selected layover hotels.) This was coupled with an all over the place approach to accommodate their not too smooth transition to the next flight. After reaching their hotels at midnight, the passengers were made to arrive at the airport by 05.30 am for a flight that eventually took off only at 11.00 am.
Recommendation: A probable solution in the case above could have been having adequate staff to manage the experience of the passengers at the hotel and answer queries related to the delay. If the consumers were made aware that their concerns were being handled, they would have been more receptive to the problem. This would have gone a long way in handling the irate customers and delivering an efficient service experience associated with flying smart.
Rationale: Understanding the bad weather conditions, the passengers had minimum to low tolerance expectations from the hotel or the airline and saw the gesture of accommodation and meals as an acceptable gesture of

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