A few weeks ago Conde Nast asked their Twitter followers what their biggest travel pet peeves are. The answers were mostly things I totally agree with, like people rushing to board, oversized bags shoved into the overhead bin, seat backs reclined during meal service, and the dreaded seat grabbers.
One I thought was kind of odd–"stale food and disinterested crew." Initially I thought, who expects airline food to be good?? And, well yeah, the crew often is either too busy or too apathetic to care about individual customers. These are just things that we've grown to expect from airlines, right? High prices and lackluster service seem to be the rule of the day.
But it kept bugging me, sitting in the back of my mind. The things I mentioned above—rushing to board, grabbing seats, excessive reclining—those are all things that fellow passengers do. Aside from giving every flying person etiquette lessons (which, while sounds like a great use of time, is not really feasible), there's not a lot you can do except grin and bear it. But the airline stuff is different—we are actually paying for them to give us crappy food and ignore us. Lame. I don't think anything we can do will change that, but I will add it to my list of pet peeves.
Another thing they mentioned were travel delays, which can certainly ruin a trip (pictured: the plane for this flight was delayed for almost an hour while special duct tape was used to keep this overhead bin closed). A few others to add: people who hold up the security line. If people followed the instructions, then picked up their bins and got out of the way the line would flow a lot more smoothly! Also, people who put their suitcase over row 8 when they're sitting in row 30. Do your best to put your bag over your seat!
Readers, what are your major travel pet peeves?
Delayed flights are actually in CN's post No. 5.
You're right! I was so focused on the passenger stuff I totally missed that comment. I'll fix the post.
I was recently one of the dreaded seat grabbers…I had a broken foot and needed the support. Crutches don't work so well in the leg room.
Mine would be parents allowing children to kick the seat in front of them. The last time I flew to Myrtle Beach I had a three or four year old kicking the back of the seat the entire flight. His Mom never corrected him.
2. Bad business class (First to you). If I pay for an upgrade, I EXPECT an enhanced experience. Last time I flew J, I was surprised to discover that my seat was mere inches from the seat in front and with it reclined, I would need to contort myself MORE than if I was in Y to get out to the aisle. What sort of J is that? I'm looking at you Qantas and your "new" A330s.
You might consider it acceptable for a domestic transcontinental J, but I do not.
3. Screaming and/or kicking kids and the crappy parents who do not attempt to quiet them.
4. When food is promised as a meal and it's no more than a snack. And a crappy one at that. If it's not going to be a proper meal, let me know that and I'll buy my own to bring on board.
I don't care about entertainment, I bring my own, I just want it to be *not a squeeze* and *quiet*.
Flight attendants who don't police the storing of overhead luggage. Most of the time they are just socializing or standing around. DO SOMETHING!
@Kristen I think when you have a physical limitation it's more acceptable. It's the people who just don't know any better, and are perfectly capable of using their own seat that really bug me.