I flew up to Burlington, VT last Friday evening to attend a college re-union. After promptly boarding the plane, our flight was delayed for three and a half hours on the runway! The flight to Burlington is only 35 minutes but for some reason, all of JFK was shut down. The packed plane was completely turned-off and motionless on the ground with 45 other planes queuing ahead of us for take-off. It was not fun at all.

This was not JetBlue’s fault though – every other airline was grounded too. I was however, able to watch live DirectTV at my seat on JetBlue which made the wait far more tolerable.

On Monday, I received a $100 voucher in an email from JetBlue as an apology for the delay. I was very pleasantly surprised. The grounding last Friday was completely out of the airline’s control. This voucher re-affirmed my trust and loyalty in their brand despite an inconvenient delay.

JetBlue is still recovering from some negative press surrounding a snow storm incident last winter (which I believe was an unfair attack – possibly instigated by other jealous carriers). I’ve flown almost every other airline in the U.S. and in my opinion, the flying experience doesn’t get any better than with JetBlue. I guarantee you that the other airlines on the ground last Friday did not send a $100 voucher to their miserable clients (feel free to correct me if I’m wrong though). This is a relatively small price to pay vs. the alternative: losing a customer. If anything, I’m now an even bigger fan of JetBlue

[tags] jetblue, airlines, brands, marketing.fm, customer service [/tags]