You’re reading Signal vs. Noise, a publication about the web by 37signals since 1999.

It’s cute and all, but having the weather on my boarding pass does not cause brand loyalty. I would love United to exchange that weather for better customer service.

It’s amazing how little touches can make a huge difference.

In addition to being useful information, I like that it’s not wasting ink by printing giant graphics

Alaska Airlines have been doing it for a long time. Pretty neat feature for frequent travelers.

Welcome to the year 2012.

Greetings from Europe ;)

That has to be the first times I’ve seen the words “Great”, “Impressed” and “United Airlines” in one place in at least 11 years.

You’re lucky you didn’t have to crop out 2 pages of full-color advertisements and then print your boarding pass..

All style no substance, unfortunately. My friends and I are literally on a 100% problem rate with United flights in the past few months.

It appears to me that their entire corporation has become disfunctional.

And then there’s the story of United losing a 10-year old girl:

http://bobsutton.typepad.com/my_weblog/2012/08/united-airlines-lost-my-friends-10-year-old-daughter-and-didnt-care.html

I think this corporate / customer service attitude would interest 37signals, from the article:

“This is the key moment in the story, note that in her role as a United employee, this woman would not help Perry and Annie. It was only when Perry asked her if she was a mother and how she would feel that she was able to shed her deeply ingrained United indifference—the lack of felt accountability that pervades the system.”

You must have an ad blocker on. Usually there are full color ads right next to that info from sojourn. A waste of printer ink and utterly useless.

Last few Delta boarding passes I’ve printed offer the same thing as an option. Also with a page full of color ads that waste ink. I could just as soon do without it as I can check the weather anywhere in the world on a variety of devices.

Want to avoid the problems?

Fly first class.

Or Charter.

Seems like a waste of toner. Bad enough that I need to print it out! Now it’s cluttered with junk.

Sorry but I have to disagree, I don’t like it actually.

I think a boarding pass should be a boarding pass. Anything other than the information I need to board the plane is getting in the way.

There are plenty of places I can get the weather forecast, if at all I even need one.

@JD, no, you’re not. Don’t accept that. Treat yourself better than you currently do, and the world will rise up to treat you better.

Seriously. Since I’ve adopted the “I only fly first class” attitude, I’ve made enough business contacts to justify the cost. Not to mention all the free Scotch!

:)

United can provide information on the weather and where you should eat, but is unable to give you a gate number. Brilliant.