THIS CUSTOMER SERVICE WILL SOUR YOUR STOMACH!!!!

[rooter]

Spirit Airlines boss calls complaints about unpopular airline 'irrelevant'

Published : Thursday, 03 May 2012, 9:36 PM MST

By: FOX News

MIRAMAR, Fla. -- The boss of Spirit Airlines isn't about to cave in to a dying former Marine, and he doesn't lose sleep knowing his company leads the industry when it comes to customer complaints, he told FOXNews.com.

"That's an irrelevant statistic," Spirit CEO Ben Baldanza said when told his airline generates gripes at two-and-a-half times the rate of the next most complained about carrier.

Spirit racked up 8.27 complaints per 100,000 passengers in January, while United finished a distant second-worst, registering 3.5 complaints per 100,000 fliers, according to US Department of Transportation statistics. By comparison, Southwest notched just 0.2 complaints per 100,000 fliers.

But Baldanza told FoxNews.com in an exclusive interview that being the industry leader in customer complaints doesn't bother him.

"If you ran a restaurant, and out of every 100,000 customers, eight of them said they didn't like your menu, would you change your restaurant?" he asked. "Why don't we interpret that 99.92 of all customers have no complaints?" he added. "Because that is what it says."

Spirit is generating complaints at a much faster clip on Facebook, where a "Boycott Spirit Airlines" page has seen its number of "likes" soar to more than 20,000 from about 700 since the carrier denied a $197 refund to Jerry Meekins.

The 76-year-old Vietnam veteran and former Marine tried to get his $197 back after learning his esophageal cancer is terminal and being told by his doctor not to fly from Florida to Atlantic City. Airline officials told him to forget it, and didn't budge after Meekins' plight drew national media coverage.

Baldanza, 50, has staked his company's model for success on "unbundling" services. Customers pay extra for each additional service or amenity, including a new policy unveiled this week in which they will pay $100 for carry-on bags that go in overhead bins.

[terryu1]

I saw that on FOX and now they have a site on Facebook "Boycott Spirit Airlines" I went on yesterday and "liked" it and it had over 18,000 "likes" yesterday already. I also posted a message for them. What is incredible here is he said if they could not refund money could he change name on ticket so his daughter could use it and they told him flat out NO!!.. I would drive rather than fly Spirit. Well within the borders of North America anyway LOL

[Gun Geezer]

One of the few freedoms we still have is our right to choose how and where we spend our travel dollars. With what I have been hearing on the news, having to pay up to $100 dollars for a carry-on and generally increasing air fares, driving is getting more cost effective every day.
If enough people pass on Spirit Airlines, they will either go belly-up or have a new CEO. Capitalism at its finest at work here. On the other hand, when everyone is required to buy the same health insurance policy, we all lose.

[raven818]

Refuse to help a dying Marine and his daughter. That's the Spirit.