Thursday, September 18, 2008

The 'Alitalia' fiasco!




I'm not going to apologise for saying that Alitalia, it's management, it's unions and the majority if it's staff deserve all they get (or don't get).


They have treated their paying customers (of which I was one - years ago) like dirt for too long. Their attitude has always been "Well, if you don't like it - VFnC (Italian for 'go elsewhere....')!!!" - Well the public didn't like it, and over the years voted with their feet, and their anger - 'off to fly with other decent customer orientated airlines'.

This malais is,
I'm afraid, inherent in the Italian psyche. Their belief is (and it's often so TRUE) that if they are a 'State Employee' they cannot be fired. They have a job for life irrespective of how they perfom that job. The unions have supported this stance for decades and now it seems that there is nowhere to go for the Alitalia employees. They've been hoisted by their own petard.

The choices they had were two as I see it:
1. To accept that a certain % will no longer have a job, but the remaining percentage % would.
OR
2. Ensure that their unions do not give in and that Alitalia is no more and dies NOW...

Well it seems that the majority have chosen option 2! The pilots and cabin crew are not willing to give up (what they finally admit exists) those 'special considerations' that were the 'perks of the job'!

Great!!! Good decision!!! (NOT!) So now not only won't
you have a job, but in all probability your country won't have it's own airline either...

They should be ashamed of themselves!


But as an aside - Have you never thought why years ago the Italians began the habit of applauding when an aircraft landed safely?

It's obvious - they are thankful that at least the pilots did some work during the flight!

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Hello again dear Head Dork!

Very good but disheartneing post
regarding Alitalia. What a shame-it is indeed a fiasco!
By the way, I had no idea that Italians were the ones to begin the habit of applauding once the plane had landed! I'll bet they were thrilled to have been safely placed on solid terre firma in one piece!:p

Now since we are somewhat on the topic of Italy, I must tell you what I think about a certain topic-Lake Como!!

I Love Lake Como...
Since our return from our wonderful visit, that's all we seem to talk about. Yes, one could say it's because it's still fresh in our minds and that the memory will soon become distant and we'll be back to our day to day grind forgetting about it all...but I'm happily afraid, that's not the case.
This recent visit was like falling in love again...we got that "feeling" again--the one that says, this feels like were we should be..where we'd like to be for the rest of our lives..it's a place that sort of haunts you once you leave it, a ghost of sorts calling you back to return to it over and over again.Sounds like I'm being a romantic I know ...but it truly is all we think it is and more.
So we need to return again for good because Joe and I have as I've said, fallen quite in love.

One more thing...without our beloved "head dork" being there,the story would have quite a different ending...

Debs, the dorkette
xo

Carole B said...

Thanks Deb - I can't disagree. I'll put your post up as a Pet love - OK?