Years ago, I used to work in the airline industry having spent 10 years in it. My first job was with American Airlines working in reservations in Hartford, CT. (Sad, the office is no longer there). My job required me to be trained on using SABRE, the original computer reservations system developed by IBM back in the 60s. To my knowledge, it is still being used today.

To modernize it, they have upgraded the GUI by putting another application on top of SABRE to make it more user friendly. Here lies the problem. Most of the online travel agencies are GUIs on top of the 60s technology that are the computer reservations system.

There was a company out of New York City that had developed a new booking engine specifically for online reservations. They used the 60s technology to only look at the availability of inventory on a flight, but built their own schedule and fare program. Speaking with my old boss, their system worked and was bought by Get Travel which was eventually bought by SABRE. I don’t think they ever implemented the fast and easy booking system.

So, here I was, making a reservation online and finding myself back in 1997 again. See, nothing has really changed. I went to Orbitz, Priceline, Southwest and Air Tran. All of them kind of suck. It seems that the designs are made based on the underlying technology and not what the user wanted.

The example for me was on Priceline, there was no way to request the flight I wanted and the morning with the flight I wanted in the evening on my return. They had the morning flight with another morning flight even though I told it I wanted a morning with an evening return. As an old SABRE hack, I would have simply selected my segments and said, “Give me the best price for those flights.”

So, in 10 years, non of these online agencies have made any improvements in the online booking experience. They seem more like Christmas Trees with all their 2nd sale decorations than a I need to buy an airline ticket. I advise people on 2nd sale stuff, but do it like the displays in your grocery store. Don’t distract people from their primary purpose for being there, to buy a ticket. Even Bob Parsons lets you get your domain name before he bombards you with all his chotzke offers.

Like AT&T’s confusing pricing, maybe the data is showing these online travel agents they make more money by making their booking systems suck. It just seems that buying an airline ticket online could be easier after all these years.
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I worked for American Airlines when Bob Crandall was running the company. To this day, I love to read or hear what it is he has to say. He is a tell it like it is kind of guy and always has been. The the difference between Bob Crandall and a lot of so called, “Tell it like it is guys today”, his commentary on the airline industry is based on fact and experience.

I was in International Sales at American Airlines in the early 90s. When we started running flights Internationally, we hired the Israelis to provide us with security consulting. The 5 layers of which he speaks, American Airlines has been doing since 1990 on International flights. If you research the shoe-bomber case, the AA security people in Paris red flagged Richard Reid and did their job.

Bob Crandall is right. it is about finding the people, not the things. The security theater we all experience at the airport actually puts us at risk because the time they are checking the little old lady, they may miss the real threat getting on a plane. This point was made at the beginning of the report when bomb making material made it on a plane as a test as carry on because the screener missed it. Which does not surprise me. An eyeball can not be mindful of details on a screen for a prolonged period of time.

Good security is about intelligence and human behavior.

Bob Crandall is right. Not every Muslim is a terrorist, but today, most terrorists are Muslims. It is a fact.

President Obama, hire Bob as your new Transportation Secretary. He would do it to serve his country, just like Mr. CR Smith did for President Johnson in the 1960s. He is right, we need Managers running these large organizations not political appointees. If we have an inefficient transportation system, this economy will continue to suffer and the terrorist have won. (This problem is not a Democrat or Republican issue, they both do it wrong).

Michael Chertoff, the former Homeland Security Chief is touting the $150,000 scanners on national TV. His firm happens to represent the company that makes the scanners. Boo to Mr. Chertoff. Let’s just add some more tax to your airline ticket to pay his consulting fee and his client’s new boat.