Bad Service In JetBlue Mint… A First For Me!

I’ve flown JetBlue’s Mint business class many times over the years, and one thing that has always stood out to me is how excellent the flight attendants are. JetBlue has a special subset of crews who work in Mint, and in my experience they’re always friendly and professional. Well, my last flight was an exception. I’m curious if I just got unlucky, or if there has been a bit of a service shift at JetBlue.

My rude & unprofessional JetBlue Mint flight attendant

At the conclusion of my review trip to Hong Kong, I flew JetBlue Mint from Los Angeles (LAX) to Fort Lauderdale (FLL) on a redeye. I booked it last minute with Qatar Airways Avios, for what it’s worth. I’m not going to be reviewing the flight, because I just slept the entire way, and desperately needed rest (I had started the day at 3AM at JFK, and was taking a redeye at 11:59PM from LAX).

I’m so used to JetBlue Mint flight attendants being way above average. However, on this particular flight, I was totally caught off guard by the flight attendant’s attitude, and that’s despite the fact that I didn’t take part in any of the service.

For one, boarding really sets the tone for a flight, and first impressions make such a big difference. Sometimes you’ll see flight attendants standing at the door greeting each passenger with a big smile and a “welcome aboard,” and even complimenting passengers (“I love your necklace,” “I love your shirt,” etc.)

As I boarded this flight, I said “hi, good evening,” as he was standing at the door. Even though he was looking right at me, there was no response. Okay, I figured maybe he didn’t hear me, or something. But then I observed him for the remainder of boarding (I was in the first row), and he didn’t greet a single passenger. He just stood there, staring at everyone.

The extent of his interaction with passengers was him rather angrily barking orders. He almost seemed to get a thrill out of the opportunity to yell at passengers. To be clear, it’s not that the content of his message in any situation was wrong, but rather the delivery. For example, when passengers tried to open the bin with emergency equipment to place their bags there, he seemed to almost enjoy loudly admonishing them.

Every time I’ve flown JetBlue Mint, the flight attendants welcome each passenger onboard, introduce themselves, etc. There was none of that. I was just so shocked with how he interacted with each passenger at boarding, since I don’t think he left a positive impression on a single passenger. And it wasn’t just me observing this — I made eye contact with two other people seated near me, who were equally confused by this guy’s attitude.

I slept for most of the flight, and then was surprised by the way he went about waking up passengers. Rather than turning on the cabin lights, he instead physically poked passengers with a tray that had snacks on it. Upon deplaning, there was again no goodbye, but rather he just looked at passengers.

I couldn’t help but notice how he was quite enthusiastically reading JetBlue’s post-landing script over the PA, about how “we hope you’ve enjoyed this flight as much as we’ve enjoyed serving you.” I can assure you I enjoyed the flight more than he enjoyed taking care of us (just by virtue of getting a bit of rest). He also read the part about asking for honest feedback about the flight with the post-flight survey.

Simply put, I fly a lot of US airlines, and service can be a mixed bag. While I have higher expectations in JetBlue Mint than in other cabins, he was the least professional flight attendant I’ve had on any US airline in a long time.

I’m curious — has there been a shift in service on JetBlue in Mint, or did I just get really unlucky? I mean, I can imagine why morale might not be that high, as JetBlue has been going through some tough times. I was just surprised, because JetBlue has delivered so consistently, in my experience.

I struggle with complaining about service

I have to say in general that I struggle with the concept of complaining about inflight service, when we’re talking about individuals.

On the one hand, I want JetBlue to succeed, and I also think feedback is important. After all, flight attendants don’t have a direct supervisor onboard, so the only way an airline can know if someone is providing subpar service is if they get feedback from passengers. JetBlue has set an incredibly high bar for service in Mint, and I imagine the airline would want to know if individuals aren’t delivering on that.

On the other hand, I feel bad. After all, the person not providing good service is also a human. Maybe he was having a bad day, or a bad week, or a bad year. I don’t know what he has been through, and I don’t want to pile on and contribute to that. The service was so bad that I almost assume that something else must be going on his life.

But I also think that not saying anything probably isn’t accomplishing a whole lot? I dunno, y’all tell me…

Bottom line

In the past, I’ve had nothing but good service experiences in JetBlue Mint, and have found it to be the US airline cabin with the most consistently high service standard. However, my last flight in JetBlue Mint was the opposite extreme, with some of the least friendly service I’ve had on a US airline in a very long time (which is saying something).

I’m curious — was this a one-off, or is JetBlue Mint not as differentiated when it comes to service as it used to be?