Aviation industry is definitely a unique environment compared to most other jobs, especially ever since 9/11. High security, safety focused, and very strict regulations and policies.
It's the type of job that you will either exit within a year or do it for the rest of your life. You are entering a bubble, where your job becomes your lifestyle. The job requires so much flexibility from one-- you either leave or become the job. It is either a brainwash or a new lifestyle. The movie "Up in the Air," is actually not a fantasized portrayal of the actual life of people who are in the bubble.
You will have the key to every door in the world. You literally wake up on your off days and think, ' Should I go to Paris or Turks and Caicos, or LA?' Also, you can hop on any airplanes under the same alliance with your airline at any time. You can literally run to a gate and ask if you can have a seat. However, this becomes a chasing game of 'what's my next trip' where you feel like you're fast forwarding you life because of that.
There's also a lot of waiting time where you're just sitting on the airplane waiting for it to ascend or descend. It gets pretty boring.
A lot of people tend to think the customers will drive you nuts, but this is not how I felt while working as a flight attendant. I was rather extremely annoyed by the "senior flight attendants." There's technically no boss on the plane, so whoever worked 148 years in the air will bully you or try to boss you around
Prosflexibility with traveling and days off
ConsThe job wears off your body- join pains, low immune system by experiencing different time zones and environments., No stability Salary is pretty bad here, but you're traveling and touring instead of shopping anyways.
This company has had a lot of changes,not for the better nor better for the employees.
More work and responsibilities without the pay to match.
Other airlines with same job title are paid $30-40 k more a year and have less responsibilities. example one type of aircraft to work on, while we have 6 and adding several more types.
Same large company "motto" continue to pay upper management large bonuses and take from the workers at the lower levels.
It's hard to see anything positive happening for employees. We are so far behind financially,we can never work enough to make up what this company has taken from the employees. Over the last 10 yrs I have lost more than $200,000.00 in wages alone.
Many employees are bitter and "done" with working here,just kind of riding out the storm and waiting for retirement. It was a good company to work for,until most of the company's energy is now spent on stealing as much as possible from the employees. It's to the point is seems daily stripping of something. At the end of the day you just about need to make sure they didn't take any silver fillings.
Hard to stay positive when upper managers receive bonuses that can support a family for generations and working 60-70 hrs a week and looking back we made the same amount 10 yrs ago in a 40 hrs work week.
This has been a mistake to have stayed with a company that doesn't care for it's employees. It has put a major strain on my family and my marriage because of financial strain. It basically
ProsIt was a goal to work for the majors, did and learned a lot, A lot of great people, and a few I still try to forget.
ConsIt was a total let down with the hours you have to work 24/7, the grass looked greener looking in. Now that I've been in, (24 yrs) it was all hype.
Typical day at American Airlines entailed of answering phones and assist customers with their travel needs. Sales of tickets, re-issuing vouchers, helping airport agents via phone to locate better flights and/or re-booking customers on different flights if there was any cancellations to customers travel arrangements.
I learned at American Airlines that having a great work attitude and good work ethics along with superb customer service skills your success will exceed your own expectations.
Every supervisor I had in different departments at AA were fantastic. When I was monitored on calls and called into the office they always made sure that I felt good about my performance. I received multiple praises from customers all over the world for the customer service I provided and my supervisor always made sure I knew how much of a value I was to AA. I had a great work relation ship with all supervisors at AA.
Most of my co-workers were folks I had graduated the training class with and this allowed us to grow close as a team. There have never been any issues with another team member in my department, in fact when I resigned my position at AA after the birth of my son, my co-workers threw me a miss you party. We helped each other out when one was “stuck” on a question from a customer and did not know how to proper handle the situation.
The hardest part of my position at AA was trying to help and angry customers that just were canceled on a flight due to mechanical pro
I started working in the warehouse and was forced to work second shift weekends for 5 years! I enjoyed the challenge of the work ! However in the beginning the training was sub par and many people were reluctant to share knowledge with others especially new employees! I worked with the company and the union to try to improve working conditions! I represented TWU employees for five years as a union show Stewart. Hoping for better job opportunities I transferred to the aircraft overhaul hangers and worked in two areas ! I worked many different jobs and enjoyed most of them! I honestly felt most of the time my work was never recognized or appreciated by my management! It was amazing to me they would promote some of the most incompetent individuals with little to no people skills into management positions for political reasons! Many times there was backbiting and fighting within certain work groups! Employees would compete for preferred work assignments and undercut anyone else looking toward the same positions! I finally found my niche in organizing and improving parts storage and kits for maintenance! I enjoyed it and was recognized several times for my contributions by the FAA and my bosses! However they would never consider me for promotion despite my going back to college and obtaining a bachelors degree in statistics! During my final years I gave up trying to improve things and resigned myself to maintaining the status quo because of my declining health! In the end I had a
I was hired by AA during massive onboarding of more than 600+ reservation agents; also at the growth of the HBR remote reservation role. The job, career path and opportunities within the division were well defined meeting expectations. The downside of the experience were underlying implications indicative of a company in the middle of merger of equals. I was hired in May; the merger with USAirways was completed in October of the same year. Although I have previous extensive experience working at the enterprise level during M&As this situation was different proved challenging. Prior to this job I had worked at 5 different global companies during the merger having access to information, authority to question/critique and opportunity to provide feedback to decision makers. The struggles I observed at the operational level both teased and tested my boundaries as new, subordinate at the entry level having a breadth of knowledge but lacking seniority to gain trust or opportunity to increase my value as an asset. There are many things I could say about the trickle down effect and implications of mismanaged information on employees, morale, producitivty, performance, reputation risk. From experience I can say with some level of expertise that the key to successful transition is strategic handling of BOTH inherent and residual risks that happen when 2 companies become 1.
As it relates to the reason I am no longer with the company - its as simple as a matter of non-compliance with IS
Prosbenefits - more than just flights
Constiming
1.0
Central Baggage Resolution Office | Tempe, AZ | Oct 23, 2019
Harassment, bulling and discrimination
In this specific department it goes from bad to worse, they don't pay you anything $16 an hour, if you ask for a salary increase they tell you that that's why you have the flight benefits. With that I cannot pay the rent, do groceries, buy clothes, and if you have children, forget it. If you complain to your supervisor, if you don't get along with a supervisor just for personal reasons, that will be your end with them, even if you do your job well they take everything personal and make your life impossible until you quit or get fired for anything.
If you buy clothes, you go on a trip, they think you're stealing from the company and they start to check your computer almost daily. They tell other employees to follow you and investigate your personal life. Since they dont pay much people dont have a choice then to have a lot of debt with credit cards.
There is a constant harassment from your supervisors and other employees. If you get sick, they don't believe you, even if you bring a doctors note, they want to know all the details why your sick even thought this is against the law. Your supervisors tell other employees to follow you to see if you are lying about your health. They are crazy. They treat you like a criminal or worse sometimes. If they fire you, they won't let you finish the day, they pack your stuff in 2 minutes and tell you to come back for your stuff. If you try to go to another department forget it, even if you do your job well they do not recommend you with
American is a great place to work and grow. The tremendous opportunities offered due to their expansion and global presence are endless.
My overall experience as an Airport Customer Representative with American Airlines was exceptional. I could not wait to go to work and be in the action and the busy and sometimes very stressful but gratifying environment, As one of my duties, speaker of five languages, I assisted passengers from all over the world, and the feeling of accomplishment was a great one, when I solve their problems and they were thankful and appreciative for it.
I learned to control my stress by making it fun and challenging in every task I was involved with. Management which at one point I was part of, was to a certain extent a mostly observant, carefully
grading the representatives and agents in every detail to improve their performance after a review of their observations. My co-workers, as in any other large company were of many different backgrounds, nationalities, cultures and religions. You have to respect them just the same, and learn how to work in harmony with all of them.
The hardest part of the job, was the inability to please all the passengers all the time. As we all know, the planes have a limited number of aisle seats and exit rows, so needless to say, you can not provide them all with what they want without making some of them a little unhappy.
The most enjoyable part of the job was to be able to solve problems using the skills learned, such as ticketing, routings, foreign entry documentation and the ability to communicate with so many different nationalities in their o
ProsFree and or reduced travel, paid vacations, great health Insurance, industry discounts, 401k.
ConsThe very changing and inflexible work schedule, based solely in seniority, and slots available to bid.
A typical day as a Reservation Sales Representative consisted of answering constant back to back calls, and sometimes answering the same questions more than once to the same customer. I personally learned so much from this certain position not only about a positive and memorable customer service experience, but about myself and how I am most productive. There were about 6 weeks of vigorous training on how to work on certain systems such as Sabre or Citrix, and also on how to treat customers. Most supervisors were more than pleasant to work with, at the end of the day the supervising department wants you to succeed. Some approach the situation differently of course, but still amazing. I truly loved working with my co-workers, through out those 6 weeks of training you grow extremely close, and learn to rely on each other when needed. The hardest part of working for this position was working from home. We knew from the get go that the position was working from home but for some of us didn't know what exactly we were getting into. In my case I was more productive in an office setting because it felt more high energy, and you also see how your co-workers are doing and you keep each other company when in between calls.The part I most enjoyed about the job was not only the life long friendships you make with some of the employees, but also the way you can flip a customers situation around to where they are so happy they got you as a representative. For example, I once had a customer
ProsVigorous training, lifel long memories, and employee benefits.
ConsYou do have to pay to work from home: Electricity, Home Office, Internet, Etc.
Reservations - 2001-2005: Booked and sold tickets for American and its airline partners, up—sold: rental cars, hotels, American Airlines Advantage Program, Group Travel, and Vacations Packages to customers. Expert—flight status information specialist, which includes weather, flight information updates, and equipment change announcements. Assisted: re-booking passengers by working from a set of queues in Sabre to rebook travelers aka CONFOS. Set up and issued Travel Visa's per customs and immigration requirements for international gateways, arranged special meals, wheel chair, and unaccompanied minor services, and all special needs required at the request of passengers (“All passengers are important”). Facilitated tariff rules and e-ticket requirements for ticketing PNR’s changes “validate or re-issue rules.”
Facilitated travel documents required in PNR's and Sub PNR;s for customs documentation and verification processes to expedite and excel check in.. Facilitated passenger’s travel advisories to inform of safety information through foreign lands advised by government.
*Airport Customer Service “Walk A Mile” - 2001-2005: I had the pleasure to experience what is known as the "Walk A Mile" program during my years at American. My supervisor made arrangements for me to go to Milwaukee and work with a co-worker who was previously stationed at the reservations office. I was assigned and approved by my supervisor to work at Milwaukee Airport on 4 separate trips to gain expe
ProsFlight benefits, I got to go to Europe and travel to Canada and all over the United States
If you live a fairly active lifestyle THIS JOB IS NOT FOR YOU. Staying sedentary for the majority of my shift is EXHAUSTING; physically, mentally, and emotionally. I took this job to have a sense of purpose and to enjoy the perks of traveling. It is true what they say about micromanaging in this company. Customers (for the most part) are very kind, but be prepared to handle escalation calls from time to time. I adore my manager as he is very kind to me and am happy to have such awesome coworkers (majority from my new hire class). Everyone in the building, from what I know and have observed, are very nice. There's not a lot of room for absences even for sickness and emergencies. Theres not a lot of flexibility in this job unless you have seniority...good luck with that as theres a lot of members who are tenured. You will be at the bottom of the list for a long time as they do not hire often. Just know that I come from jobs where I am constantly on my feet and moving and this job...wow..I cannot believe the amount of stress and little movement this job has placed on my body. With the perks of traveling and "decent" pay, its not worth it. If you care about your mental health and overall happiness, PLEASE STAY AWAY. I thought this was my dream job....but even with the free travel its difficult to travel anywhere when you are scheduled to work 3pm-11pm and requesting time off is difficult. If you care about your body..stay away. If you care about moving up..stay away. If you care
Prosflight benefits, nice coworkers, good health benefits
Consmicromanaging, sedentary job, short breaks, no flexibility
Questions And Answers about American Airlines
What is the interview process like at American Airlines?
Asked Mar 8, 2016
The overall interview was good and very much confidence one
Answered Sep 15, 2021
I had two interviews. General questions and STAR type scenario questions. Be prepare. Competition is high
Answered Apr 27, 2020
What is the best part of working at American Airlines?
Asked Feb 2, 2020
Inexpensive travel.
Answered Nov 20, 2020
Of course the travel, but for me it was the planes and the not knowing what we where going to face on a day to day bases. every day is different
Answered Nov 1, 2020
Is the pay period weekly, bi-weekly, or monthly for American Airlines temporary worker position?
Asked Feb 7, 2016
Union job is weekly, salary on is biweekly
Answered Apr 27, 2020
Biweekly Supervisions I think weekly for crew
Answered May 6, 2019
How flexible are your working hours at American Airlines?
Asked Mar 26, 2020
It depends if the employee is union or management. If the employee is a union employee there isn't much flexibility. as management, it depends on your immediate supervisor.
Answered Nov 20, 2020
They can be very flexible. You are able to swap your shift with others.
Answered Nov 1, 2020
What advice would you give the CEO of American Airlines about how to improve it?
Asked Dec 28, 2016
It's also a good time to be hiring that quality candidate.
Answered Jul 24, 2020
Move on....let some one else steer this sinking ship to shore safely...you are done Sr.
