‘Ghost Riders’ : Airlines Spy on Selves in Service War

The tall, well-dressed man boarded the 747 airliner, found his seat--4F in first class--and opened his attache case. Throughout the long flight from Los Angeles to Narita, Japan, he read, ate, got some sleep, chatted with the flight attendants and made some notes on a yellow pad.

A typical traveling businessman?

Or a spy in the sky?

As it turned out, he was one of United Airlines’ 18 “observation specialists”--part-time employees who travel the world incognito to make sure that service is up to par and crew members have the proper attitude and demeanor.

A few days later, one of the attendants on the flight was summoned by a supervisor who was holding a report filed by the mystery passenger.

“Your interaction with passengers was limited mainly to the meal service,” the report card read. “The occasional interactions I observed in the flight were pleasant and you have a nice smile (but) more assistance would be helpful on deplaning, i.e. returning coats and garment bags. Addressing first-class passengers by name is needed, to add a personalized and professional tone.”

Service Complaints Up

United is not alone in conducting such secret surveillance of its employees. In the nine years since deregulation, airlines have had to trim costs to remain competitive. Among the reductions have been some of the amenities they offer passengers; as a result, complaints about service have soared.

Recently, though, the airlines have realized that better service gives a competitive advantage. They are attempting to improve service or, at least, trying to give the impression that they are working on their deficiencies.

All of the nation’s 10 major air carriers, except Delta Air Lines and Northwest Airlines, have some kind of surveillance program. Delta and Northwest say their top management people, who travel frequently, can keep an eye on how service is rendered.

Pilots’ Speech Rated

The programs are aimed at assuring that passengers are treated properly by everyone from reservation clerks to baggage handlers. And, though the airborne investigators do not critique the way pilots fly their aircraft, they do grade them on such things as their announcements to the passengers.

The undercover fliers come from all walks of life. Some are off-duty flight crew members; others are employees borrowed from other departments; some are retired employees. A few are actively employed in non-airline jobs and take a few days off every month to ride the planes. Still others are just indefatigable fliers who like the free travel their clandestine jobs allow them.

The airlines refer to them by various names: USAir calls them ghost riders; Eastern calls them mystery shoppers. Whatever they are called, the practice angers some airline employees, especially the flight attendants, who appear to be the most affected.

“We are opposed to it. These are basically fishing expeditions,” said Judy Stack, assistant to the president of the Assn. of Flight Attendants. “We don’t think they serve any constructive or useful purpose. Instead, it intimidates the flight attendants. It is management by fear.”

Stack said the major complaint is that many of the people who make the observations are not qualified to do so. The flight attendants have no objection other airline employees doing the job, she said, but the use of free lancers irks them.

“The observer might say in the report that the sweet rolls were not served--but what the observer doesn’t know is that the sweet rolls were not delivered that day. Or they might be critical that an attendant did not call a first-class passenger by name, when that passenger was a late boarder whose name was not on the manifest.”

All of the airlines also, in fact, often send supervisors, who identify themselves to crew members, to observe and critique. Nevertheless, the carriers maintain that secret observations are also necessary so that actual attitudes and service to the average passenger can be observed.

‘Real World’ Readings

“It is human nature that if people know they are being watched they change their behavior,” said Elisha Miller, manager of in-flight performance for United. “We want to have an accurate reading of how the customer in the real world perceives our performance.”

Continental Airlines uses off-duty flight crew personnel to do such observing. Kathleen V. Ward, staff vice president of Continental, said, “Workers have no way of knowing if these are just ‘ghost riders’ or dead-heading employees.”

Eastern launched its mystery shopper program about a month ago, and plans to expand it soon throughout its entire system. Eastern’s observers receive no payment, except the free travel. All of them are retired people who have flown on Eastern frequently over the years. As such, they are expected to be familiar with what businessmen and other passengers are looking for when they travel.

They score flight crews on such things as how they greet passengers on boarding, sincerity, professional appearance, whether they have a warm and friendly attitude, good eye contact and communicate clearly with the passengers.

Turnover Is Rapid

The turnover of mystery riders is expected to be rapid. “We (will) keep them until they are no longer useful,” said Jose Smith, Eastern vice president for sales and services. “That means that once they are identified, they have served their purpose and we have to get someone else.”

American Airlines calls its observers “shoppers.” They represent a variety of occupations, including physicians, students and lawyers. To make sure that the concerns of older people are considered, some grandparents are among them. “They represent the general demographics of our passengers,” said Lucy Iovinelli, assistant vice president for quality assurance.

Each of American’s 280 observers makes an average of 1 1/2 observation trips a month. They are compensated with future free travel--not including the flights on which they observe.

American gives them no training, Iovinelli said. “We don’t want to stack the deck,” she said. “We don’t want them to have a tainted view.”

The American Airlines observers are asked to put themselves in the place of paying passengers. Of interest to the carrier are things such as the timing of beverage service in relation to the meal service, the attitude and manner of the service, passengers’ reactions to the food and drink placed in front of them and the general appeal and quality of the meals served. The observers also note the manner in which flight attendants perform safety functions, including the instructions given at the start of every flight.

The observers “are just like department store shoppers,” Iovinelli said. “Other businesses use such ‘blind shoppers’ to sample their services on a continuing basis.”

And, although American has one of the best service records in the industry, deficiencies are reported.

One “shopper,” on a recent American flight on the short hop between Minneapolis and Chicago, reported:

“After the takeoff, the flight attendants had to hurry the snack and drink service, thereby reducing the friendly atmosphere. . . . With a full flight, little time remained for pickup of trays before landing in Chicago.”

Discomfort During Wait

Passenger comfort is a very important factor. While an American plane sat loaded on the tarmac at the Dallas-Fort Worth airport, a “shopper” reported that “it was 89 degrees in Dallas and most passengers wore light summer clothing. The plane was cold with the air-conditioning on, and very few blankets were available.”

USAir, the smallest of the major carriers, has just four “ghost riders” in the sky. Currently, there are two businessmen, a housewife and a college professor in its three-year-old program.

Each rides the system for 12 days a month. They fly somewhere, stay overnight and return on a different flight with another crew. They do not stay in the same hotels that house the crews.

The observers go through all of the procedures that paying passengers do--from the time they telephone for a reservation until they pick up their baggage at the destination. Periodically, they change the way they dress to check on whether all passengers, regardless of appearance, are treated equally.

According to Donald Hansbury, USAir vice president for passenger services, the ghost riders get paid--but “not a large amount.” They also get two vacation passes every year for themselves and their families.

The USAir riders make notes about the service while they travel, but do not think that that is likely to lead to their being discovered. “Most businessmen today are taking notes on airplanes,” Hansbury said. “So that is something that will not attract attention.”

The program, he said, “is not a cover-up. Our people know they are out there.”

But, he added, “there are only two people at USAir who really know them,” Hansbury added, “the treasurer, who pays them, and myself.”

Trans World Airlines, which has had an observation program for about three years, has 30 observers.

To avoid being identified, they purchase their tickets in a variety of ways. Some, for example, buy full-fare tickets; others buy discount tickets. Some pay with credit cards; others pay cash. Some have their tickets mailed home. When they board the plane, they do not wait until all the paying passengers have boarded, as other TWA employees would.

Most Fly ‘Tourist’

The observers fly 10% of the time in first class, 10% in business class and the rest in tourist--percentages that roughly reflect the proportions of paying passengers in each class.

An observer’s cover must also be credible. They dress in ways appropriate to their destinations. Observers headed for a resort island in the Caribbean, for example, do not wear vested suits.

They also develop travel scenarios that jibe with their own personal interests, so they can speak comfortably and competently about those interests.

“They have to have a cover,” Michael L. Kelly, TWA’s director of quality assurance, said. “Lying could get them to blow their cover. The story has to hold water with other passengers, too.”

Kelly said it is not uncommon for a fellow passenger to ask one of the observers what he does for a living. If an observer answered by pretending to be, say, vice president for engineering of McDonnell Douglas Corp., it would be embarrassing if the other person turned out to be that company’ senior vice president of engineering.

“I encourage them to make up stories they can support,” Kelly said. “If he identifies himself as being in real estate, he should know something about real estate. Or they can answer: “No disrespect intended, but my company does not want me to talk about what I do.”

TWA’s observers, who have a 100-item checklist to turn in after each flight, are employees in other departments of the airline. They generally stay about six months in the observer job.

If they observe blatant deficiencies that need emergency action, they do not have to wait until their reports receive routine--sometimes time-consuming--attention. They can call a special telephone number if instant attention is required.

According to Kelly, observers are told to call immediately if a flight attendant has been rude or failed to provide proper service. “When observers deplane, they call us here with such flagrant negative observations,” he said. “In a number of cases . . . a supervisor has been sent to greet the flight attendant, review the incident. In some cases the employee has been disciplined. In other cases, we have handled it with counseling on the same day.”

The airlines say that, as a result of what they have learned from these programs, they have made significant changes.

For example, Miller, of United Airlines, which has offered service to the Pacific region for more than a year, said that United’s observers “were the first to report to us that our first-class product (on Pacific flights) was not truly an international product.

First Class Upgraded

“We had been serving travelers from Middle America who did not have the same requirements. We had to upgrade in order to compete with Northwest and Japan Air Lines.”

The secret fliers are not supposed to confine themselves to spotting bad behavior. They often send in praise.

An example: “Each tray was presented with a glass of ice water and lemon,” one United observation specialist reported. “Both made for a lovely offering and added touch to real first-class service. . . . You presented the required food/beverage service in an individual, passenger-paced manner and were sensitive to all customer needs. Your gracious and professional manner was well received by the passengers.”

The carriers that have no formal observation feel that they can learn more from their managers, who often are not known to flight crews, ticket agents and baggage handlers, than they could from other types of observers.

All of Northwest’s management personnel--from the accounting department to the marketing department--are familiar with the airline’s standards and are supposed to report any deficiencies they spot while traveling.

Ginny Beckett, Northwest’s senior director of in-flight services, recalled a recent incident involving Steven G. Rothmeier, chairman and chief executive officer of NWA Inc., Northwest’s parent company.

On a flight between Chicago and Minneapolis, during which he was not recognized, he observed that the service was not up to par. When he arrived in Minneapolis, he immediately called Beckett.

“He told me the flight attendants were having ‘less than a good day,’ ” she recalled. “. . . I told him that there is no such thing as a bad day in this business, or in any business where you are serving the public.”