USNFDX

I'm sorry but I will have to disagree with you here. Tuesday night was NOT a big weather event. They got maybe 2-3 inches snow. There was NO FRZGN RN. The airport authority had runways and taxiways in nice shape. The FCIF hyped something that wasn't.

The huge capitol investment has already been made.

The bulk of the problem in IND is a result of extremely poor coordination/Leadership and training.

Yes there is money involved in that managers are pinched, so they are reluctant to spend it on training and overtime for qualified people.
They would rather hire someone off the street to deice then pay an AMT overtime. Hence barely qualified people with 100% turnover.

The guy in Dallas, who doesn't get his overnight, that he was really counting on, doesn't really care that we had snow showers in Indy. Just that brand X didn't get him his package on time and there is no reason to pay a premium for this service.

Busboy

Word, Brother!!

True dat!!

Jetjok

The bean counters might not see fit to fix the problem, but I'd bet that Fred Smith cares a lot about any problem that helps to put a sour face on any FedEx customer, especially if the problem could have been eliminated before it caused massive service failures. Regardless of whether the cost of such problem is passed on to the customer or not. In fact, I think the correct thing to do, especially in the case we're talking about, would be to honor our service commitment and rebate customers whose packages didn't get delivered on time, because one arm of our company had a really bad night. After all, it's not as if the destination airports were all closed for fog or snow and the jets couldn't get in. Those are "acts of god" and as such, the customers aren't entitled to a rebate, but if the problem is ours, they should be. That would go a long way to getting stuff fixed so that it works as it's supposed to. As for the guys operating those de-icing trucks lasting a year or less... that shouldn't surprise anyone, as that job is right up there with the folks who drain the blue water from the lavs, probably the two worst jobs in aviation.... right behind the 727 s/o of course.

MAWK90

First of all, I wasn't there...so I am not disagreeing with you or agreeing with you on any specifics regarding the event.

I was more or less referring to the extensive "recommendation letter" that was sent to the chief pilot.

My point is this company is not going to spend money on stuff that they can "write off" to weather.

I myself, several years ago, had paid FULL PRICE to ship loan closing documents to my home for a new home that we were to close on a Friday. The shipment did not arrive. I called FedEx to inquire and they said that there was a "weather delay" and that no package + no refund was my expectation. I happened to be JUMPSEATING on the jet that was supposed to be afflicted by the weather delay. WE ARRIVED ON TIME. I had a friend who is a CSA pull up the shipment/tracking data and found that the truck with my package on had stopped to help a truck that had slipped into the ditch. That caused the truck that had my package on to be severely delayed. The weather was CAVOK and NO PRECIP on roadways.

See how they will manipulate this "weather delay" to keep the customer in the dark and devoid of any compensatory payments?