November 28, 2006 - Holiday Operations with Scott and Sean

Hi, it's Glenn.  It's Tuesday, the 28th of November, and I'm calling today from Chicago.  Our customers have just returned home from one of the busiest travel weeks of the year, and as a result of weeks of careful preparation and planning, they experienced an airline -- United -- focused on service, running smoothly and on time across our system.

If we take a look at how we performed throughout the holiday week, despite load factors that were higher than last year's, our on-time departures, STAR departures, on-time arrivals and departure completion were all better than last year -- even with the tighter schedules we're flying through our resource optimization program.  All these statistics add up to a better, more consistent experience for our customers.

For more detail on our performance, I've asked Scott Dolan from Airport Operations and Cargo, and Sean Donohue of Flight Operations and Onboard Service, both of whom are calling in from O'Hare -- where, together with Bill Norman and Graham Atkinson, they are today meeting with employees -- to join me on today's call.  For some perspective from the airports, I'll turn the call first over to Scott.

Scott, over to you.

Scott:
Thanks, Glenn. 

To ensure our customers had a good experience over Thanksgiving at our airports, we focused our efforts in several key areas:  good advance planning, providing the tools our employees need to perform and helping our customers make full use of products, such as EasyCheck-in and united.com, designed to ease their travel through the airport.  As a result, more than 74 percent of our flights left exactly on time.  More than 86 percent arrived on time, and we completed 99.5 percent of all flights over the Thanksgiving week – better than the industry overall and some key competitors.

As you noted, Glenn, we started working in October to ensure we had the staffing in place to handle the passenger, baggage and cargo volumes.  We also worked with the TSA, our vendors, Revenue and Inventory Management and United Express to ensure we were prepared to handle the peaks and to manage cost in the off-peak periods.

We also took a hard look at the tools our employees would need to manage the loads and put a comprehensive plan in place along with our partners in Information Services and at EDS.  Technicians were on site all weekend at key airports to ensure our printers, EasyCheck-in units and other equipment were up and running.  The airports and the ISD leaders were in constant contact all weekend to monitor operations and respond to any issues. 

We took a similar approach to our baggage sorting equipment with our buildings and maintenance teams to ensure all our sorters worked at optimal levels through the holiday rush and that we could support the cutover to our new inline system at O'Hare.  All in all, reports from the airports and our operational statistics showed the teamwork across groups paid off for our customers.

Finally, leading up to travel week, and as customers arrived at the airport, we reinforced that customers could check in on united.com and check their bags through the united.com bag check feature.  At the airports, we highlighted curbside check in and EasyCheck-in.  From Wednesday through Sunday, 79 percent of our customers checked in using one of those methods, ensuring that our customer service agents were able to assist the customers who needed extra help with their travel plans. 

The story of the travel week was bigger than just the effort in Airport Operations.  For more detail on other work across the company, I'll turn the call over to Sean.

Sean:

Thanks, Scott.  A big story from Flight Operations and Onboard and for the entire airline was completion.  We completed 99.5 percent of our flights for the Thanksgiving week, ensuring that our customers traveled on schedule, without disruptions.  The completion story is really a credit to all the job groups across the airline – not just Flight Ops and Onboard.  The flight and onboard teams did a very good job getting prepared on the staffing side, and maintenance had the planes ready to fly.  Reservations made sure the customers came travel-ready to the airport.  Customer Service and Ramp kept the lobby, gates, baggage and cargo moving smoothly. 

We talk about working together as one company, but this past week demonstrated how well we can operate when we put that idea into safe and smart practice. 

I went over to O'Hare Thursday morning to spend some time with the employees who were working the holiday, and I saw first-hand how well the operation was working.  The airport was running very smoothly.  We were staffed and prepared.  Customers were making their flights and connections.  Overall, our customers were able to move smoothly through the airport on to their holidays, and our employees were in a position to deliver the kind of travel experience our customers expect. 

I want to thank all of our employees for the great work over the holidays.  It's that kind of performance that has us exceeding our on-time goals in both Success Sharing and STAR so far this quarter.  Glenn, back to you...

Glenn:

Thanks, Scott and Sean.  We have managed the operation this holiday week keeping everything in balance – making good choices for our customers, ensuring that our employees had the tools that they needed to deliver the experience our customers expect and make smart decisions to manage costs in non-peak periods in all operating groups, ensuring that we are good financial stewards of the company as well.  Those are the kinds of decisions we need to make every day as we continue to build a stronger United, focused on the customer experience. 

That's all for now.  I'll be talking to you again soon.  Until then, stay focused on our customers, and on one another...and stay united.