United Airlines is cracking down on flight attendants who use their own personal devices onboard, warning of discipline including job termination for those who do not abide by the rule prohibiting the use of such devices when seated in a jumpseat.
United Airlines To Flight Attendants: No Personal Devices In Jumpseat
In a memo to flight attendants shared with Live And Let’s Fly by several flight attendants, United has reminded its cabin crew that it is “required” to offer “visible and attentive service to customers.”
“Neither is possible if a flight attendant is using a personal electronic device onboard.”
The memo warns that using a personal mobile phone in the jumpseat can lead to:
- missing an onboard security incident
- causing personal injury or injury to a jumpseat partner on landing if not properly braced
- an inadvertent slide deployment if the personal device is held during the disarming of aircraft doors
In terms of service, the memo asks:
“Customers look to flight attendants for great service. How comfortable would you be asking someone for help if they were engrossed in their cell phone? What impression would that give you?…Even in public, you should always remain approachable in uniform and display courtesy to customers and other employees.”
Consequently, the following rule is emphasized:
Use of a personal electronic device and/or accessories is not permitted while customers are on board the aircraft, with the exception of crew rest.
And for those who do not follow this rule? Discipline, up to and including termination.
“Any crewmember found in violation will be subject to performance discipline up to and including termination.”
For better or for worse, we live in a world in which people are glued to their mobile phones. On the street. In restaurants. On trains. Certainly on aircraft, too. And in my experience, this is true for flight attendants too.
United is right to note both the safety concern and the unprofessionalism of a flight attendant glued to a mobile phone. Even during breaks, it is simply not professional for a FA to be engrossed in a phone.
Note, this rule does not apply to United-issued iPhones given to flight attendants to conduct service onbaord and communicate between crew members.
CONCLUSION
United Airlines has reminded its flight attendants that personal devices are not allowed onboard, unless in a crew rest area. A failure to abide by these rules may result in termination.
The harsh punishment for failing to abide by the rules suggests the seriousness of this problem. As a frequent United flyer, it will be interesting to see if there will be less use of personal mobile phones going forward with the threat of discipline now clearly laid out.
image: United Airlines
Well, then United will have to hire older FAs. The current generation cannot function without using a smart phone so they won’t be able to work for United.
Nah. If it wasn’t smartphones they’d be wasting their time using some other medium like a book, magazine, crossword puzzles, sudoku, etc. Lots of younger people are able to put their phones down while working, this is more about lax corporate work culture in the airlines induestry that anything else.
You are correct. At the same time I think this is a very difficult situation. Yes, I understand FAs are supposed to work for the entire duration of the flight but at the same time on very long flights when most passengers are sleeping, there is actually not much for them to do for periods of time so checking their phones would not be a huge problem but rules are rules.
@Santastico … Mostly agree … Except they really do NOT Function in the slightest with any mobile phone in their hand . A mobile phone is like a handcuff locking their brain dead .
The word function was used to be nice. The young generation is mostly useless. They don’t know how to talk to other people. They don’t know how to interact with other people. They need a smartphone to be able to communicate with the world. It is very sad. I read the other day a study showing that gen Z has issues with anxiety when they need to talk on the phone or have a face to face conversation.
Cell phones turn people into complete morons. They will cause the end of the human race.
So when you have flight attendants on an aircraft for up to 20 hours a day and tied to the aircraft, when do you suggest they look at their phones?
Yay to 50 plus fa’s…… it’s a good thing
they are SICKphones which MicroWI-FI your brain.
I guess my question is, how will this be enforced? US carriers don’t have cabin crew supervisor positions on board, and most UA crew certainly aren’t going to let you take photos of them, so it would presumably be up to reporting amongst crew members– who are all unionized. I know UA crew don’t like those who snitch!
ahahahahajajahahaha ahahahahajajahahaha
This largely unsupervised workforce will be hard hold accountable. So either reports from coworkers or customers will be used, which aren’t great ideas.
Though I agree with the sentiment… I have a good friend of mine who is a flight attendant for a major airline and we will be texting and I’ll get a “brb, need to do a trash run” so guess it’s during a flight…
I’d say probably on a good 20-25% of my flights on UA, FAs are just texting on their phones in the jumpseat during takeoff.
This is a rule at Delta and Southwest as well. I heard United doesn’t tolerate snitches well
This is reasonable and necessary. If UA, or any other airline, was lax about enforcing FAA and its own airline safety standards then it would be much more difficult to criticize Boeing for not doing the same. I bet the Boeing scandal has made UA take a closer look at its own standards and practices during a company-wide safety evaluation and this was one result.
On another plus note, if FAAs of all airlines spend more time looking about the cabin and making eye contact with customers (and smiling), the it could lead to more positive experiences for both FAA and customers. It would also cut down on customers having to walk to the galley and ask for something because they can’t get a FAA’s attention from their seats.
I will say this passengers need to a better job of noticing when flight attendants are in the aisle and doing cabin walk throughs and listening to public announcements from the flight attendants and pilots. Passengers will ring their call light asking for things when we were in the aisle literally two seconds ago monitoring and checking in . That’s a prime opportunity to ask. We are constantly having to treat grown adults like children because they do not listen or pay attention. Just opening the bathroom door is a complicated situation for most passengers
Kinda painting all passengers the same. Maybe if flight attendants didn’t zip through the cabin so quickly, the call light wouldn’t be necessary. On my last flight, there wasn’t even an announcement the flight attendant would be passing through to collect rubbish.
We don’t make announcements we are coming through to collect trash. The expectation is you use both your working eyes to realize a person is walking through the aisle with a giant trash cart or big bags to collect trash. It’s truly not rocket science I promise you. That’s the problem with todays passengers they themselves are so engrossed in themselves they can’t notice basic things or grasp such simple concepts.
You have a rotten attitude. “Today’s passengers…” Really? Your primary duty is to safely evacuate the aircraft. After that, SERVICE is next. You complain about having to go out of your way to help somebody. YOU are there for the PASSENGER, not the other way around. And if you have such a problem interacting with or helping a passenger, find yourself another job where you don’t interact with others. You give the word service a seriously negative connotation.
Customer facing jobs in ANY industry are met with levels of ignorance or apathy to the worker. How you approach it is with empathy and a “servers heart.” Not as a headmistress at a British boarding school in 1900.
If you can’t handle it, don’t do it. Your very comments here are at the root of why US flight attendants are the embarrassment of the industry globally. You hate your jobs, hate passengers, hate the career, and blame everyone else. I’m starting to wonder if actually hating yourself is the only requirement value the airlines have in the US in looking for in hires.
Well said as a retired FA of 3 decades I don’t missed not even a single day. This days pax are a bunch of brats and disgusting creatures in my opinion. Now I enjoy road trips that I never did before cruises and trains haven’t been on 1 single flight last July in 30 months and ohh boy
I foresee more and longer bathroom breaks, and other work arounds.
What we hate is self entitled a holes like yourself who essentially can’t whipe their own butt and expect to be spoon feed like Singapore Airlines. Newsflash to you Stuart! US airlines will NEVER be like foreign carriers and if you’re not aware most of them have a much higher turneover rate such as Emirates. Being in customer service no longer means being a slave to customers. You will follow are policies and procedures because that is what we are trained on and you will stfu about it or be removed from the plane. Too many crazy self entitled people like Stuart lately getting on the plane and causing us to divert or making us remove passengers. It’s only a matter of time before the system soon changes on passengers and there will be no more time for us to tell you twice. I can’t wait until the day I’m able to report passengers and fine them for not listening to us. Shouldn’t have to tell a grown man he needs to put his phone or laptop away three times. Shouldn’t have to tell a grown adult they shouldn’t be getting up to use the restroom when we are on active taxi when we literally warned you right before we landed. Can’t wait to just fine your pathetic self entitled self. I’m sure you’re speaking from a “privileged” perspective
Does this ranting individual have the right to be an FA, unionized or otherwise? Are there personality tests for these unionized people?
Does the rule extend to pilots?
FAA explicitly bans personal device use while the aircraft is in flight. Exceptions are for navigational aids like iPads, tablets or devices that contain flight related software.
Ok but what am I supposed to do for 9 hours in between services? Pax don’t want to interact or chitchat constantly. I certainly don’t want to talk to my colleagues that much, and on overnight flights pax would be rightfully upset if there was loud chatter in the galley the entire flight. So I do my cabin walkthrough every 15-20 minutes and I read on my iPad. I consistently get compliments on my service and that is unaffected by my PED use.
If you’re a bad FA, you’re a bad FA. Reading a book or texting won’t change that.
Interesting comment, I get your point. Instead of making an all encompassing rule that may or may not make sense, start by training and retention of high caliber employees.
Imma on the side of the Company on this one. Being on your phone during taxi, takeoff, and inflight is a distraction both from a safety situation (recent events) as well as perhaps a Passenger suddenly having a medical emergency. If their mind was focused on the task/s at hand perhaps passenger inflight services would actually improve.
@Robb … “If their mind was focused” … ha-ha … that’s an optimistic idea ?
A personal device can activate a slide?
I was wondering the same.
What about a book or magazine? Don’t see the difference.
@AndyK … mobile phone owners likely don’t read books ? Perhaps they do tend to walk into outdoor fountains whilst studying their mobile phones ? And rear-end other drivers whilst texting ?
I always read my Bible on my phone. Sometimes Quran as well. So come at me.
I dont entirely agree with this. I’ve never had a customer service problem due to an FA having a phone in hand. If I walk up to the galley or the jumpseats and ask for a bottle of water, I’ve never been treated rudely or dismissed for it. As for security alertness, maybe encourage more frequent walkthroughs. That seems more effective than a mandate on devices.
Ironic that the picture used for the article has the FA holding a company issued device
The flight attendants work device IS an iPhone. It has all of the flight information, announcements, seat maps, and it’s how they process purchases and meal orders. If your flight attendant is on a phone it’s most likely the literal work phone required of them to use in flight. Hopes this clears things up.
CONFUSION. How can one tell that the FA is on their personal phone given that they use them for work purposes? I am assuming that United Airlines has had a good amount of complaints about this. Public perception may very well be inaccurate, unless the FA is on an Android phone.
Agree completely
. No cellphones, attn only in the cabin on pax.
What are they supposed to do, look at your face so they can find something wrong and kick you off the flight?
Don’t do that: don’t threaten the flight attendants. Then they will treat us bad and go on strike.