Full in agreement with this. Outside of making money (and not being bothered to provide change, easily 
) there really isn’t any reason to provide alcohol on board.
I love you.
Survive drinks?
And here I thought they were in the business of doing just that.
You should have just ordered 3 drinks, and given a $2 tip then all your problems would have been solved.
so I forget, if I go buy a ticket at the counter with cash, will they refuse to sell it to me unless I have exact change?
There’s also the fact that you can snatch a transfer slip, get off the bus anywhere you like, grab a drink, and then get back on and continue your route.
The Bus/exact change analogy is imperfect.
Oh, so that’s what he meant: he wanted a stewardess who could hold her liquor.
Oh, I am slain! What an inconvenience I am to the airlines!
Who the fuck are you to tell me how to fly? Spare me your righteous preaching, hmm? I’ll fly any damn way I bloody well please, hmm? It ain’t my fucking job to pack a roll of ones because the flight attendants can’t provide a simple service. I’m paying out the ass for an airline ticket, I don’t think it’s too out of bounds to have the people selling me something to provide fucking change for what they’re selling, hmm?
Yup, you CAN “fly any way you want” and you can continue to rant and rail at how things are all you want to.
It’s not going to change the fact that the “please have correct change” routine (among others) has been in place for decades and isn’t going to go away on YOUR behalf.
Tell me, do you have a conniption fit when the bus driver asks you for correct change as well?
Look, this method of them selling alcohol IS the way it’s done. It’s not some new thing the airlines just now thought up on your recent flight to bug you. It’s as much a part of flying as no smoking or tampering with the lavatory smoke detectors, or where to put your carryons.
It’s NOT going to go away.
So, you have two choices, you can continue to drive yourself nuts , On PRINCIPLE, trying to "make your point that (and I quote) “…I don’t think it’s too out of bounds to have the people selling me something to provide fucking change for what they’re selling…” by continuing to NOT have the correct change.
And then suffer the annoyances of having to wait for your change, and having the FA announce a need for change (by the way, I’ve heard them do this a number of times, and they usually just ask if someone has change)…
OR you can make it easier on yourself, and everyone else around you by doing what everyone ELSE who buys alcohol on planes manages to do without TOO much stress and inconvenience, and just HAVE the correct change.
Sheesh, do those 5-10 one dollar bills take up THAT much space and weigh you down that much?
If your attitude to the flight attendant was anything like your paragraph above, I’m not surprised in the LEAST that she was miffed at you and was bitchy back.
I agree with you on general principle. But again, this is NOT a retail store, or even a place that is specifically there to provide food and beverages.
Those services are, and always have been secondary to that of transportation. It’s not as if you all went out for dinner and drinks and just HAPPENED to be on a plane. It’s the other way around. Your primary purpose is to be transported, and theirs is to transport you.
First off, there is the question of how they would keep track of all the “banks” that they’d have to hand out to flight attendants, were they to do that.
Second, and again, this IS something that has been established and in use for several decades.
Why do I find it acceptable? For the same reason that I find it acceptable for buses to require correct change. In this particular application, it’s the quickest, least problematic way that they’ve found, withIN their industry, to do it.
And again, it’s not as if every single person on the plane is going to be drinking. If that were the case, the question of change wouldn’t probably be a problem.
Last, and perhaps most telling, it’s NOT as if not having correct change prevents the drinker from getting his/her precious fixie-poo. They will still sell it, they just have to get the change from somewhere, hence the common requests over the PA system for someone who has change.
Cut the OP some slack. I mean, it’s not like he was dealing with an English postman, or a WalMart cashier.
Or you could be really annoying and carry a drawstring bag with about $50 in coins. “You want $6 for that drink? Okay” <pulls out bag and starts counting out nickles and dimes and quarters>
For what it’s worth, I was flying AA from Dallas to New Orleans last week. I asked for a glass of wine, but only had a $10 bill to pay for the $5 drink. The FA took my ten, and disappeared for the rest of the flight. I considered ordering a second drink to use up the missing change, but finally decided it wasn’t worth the trouble (not to mention I didn’t need a second drink). Just before we landed, the FA came by, explained she hadn’t been able to make change and gave me back my money. Sometimes you come out ahead, I guess.
Having 50’s and 20’s just sitting in your pocket? I’ve been a waitress wayy too long.
It was Continental Airlines.
What astounded me was that the woman who asked about the chicken didn’t even seem to take offense.
If I was a F.A., I would make it my business to carry whatever cash needed to perform my job in an efficient manner. Running around a crowded airplane scrounging for change is both stupid and avoidable.
The conductors on my commuter rail line (Metro North) have no problem making change for onboard ticketing, even though nearly all the passengers have passes or pre-paid tickets.
Try this concept: the main purpose of an airline is to deliver self-loading cargo from point A to point B physically intact. That’s their primary business, not selling booze or fluffing pillows or providing eye-candy to immature male featherless bipeds. (That last bit was for Mr. E.T. Bass in particular)
Know that that means? If the turbulence is horrible, or there’s some other emergency going on you won’t get fucking food or drink at all. The booze-selling is a frill, and extra. If no one on a flight bought booze they’d hardly go bankrupt. (On the flip side - the booze sales won’t make a bankrupt airline solvent, either…)
There are also quite a few people in the airline industry who would like very much to do away with all alcohol aboard airplanes and who therefore have no interest in making it easier for folks to buy booze.
Look, the airlines are selling booze in increments of $1, right? So carry 10 ones and you’re set. If they’re charging shit like $1.75 it ain’t gonna kill you to just hand over $2.
Or you could wait for the flight to be over to get your beer. If you can’t wait that long for a beer I have to wonder if you’ve got an alcohol problem.
Personally, if they’re going to sell any shit at all on a flight I think we’d all be better off if they switched to using credit cards. Solve the whole making change/theft of cash problem. Of course, then you’ll have someone bitching they don’t want to use plastic, they want to use cash…
This may have changed, but the last time I bought a bus transfer in Chicago you couldn’t do that. If you got off, your transfer couldn’t be used on the same bus route you just took - you had to get on a different bus route or the subway. [/nitpick]
I’m a pilot, Dooku. If you’re on my airplane I have a truly amazing amount of say in your life for the duration of the trip.
On the other hand, people like you make me grateful I don’t fly for the airlines.
Not on my aircraft you won’t!
As I pointed out, the airlines really don’t give a fuck if you buy their booze or not. What they are selling you is a safe trip from point A to point B. The booze, headsets, and other bullshit is an extra, like getting free toaster when opening up a bank account or a candy cane for shopping at a store during the holiday season.
If you find drinking more important than traveling it might be cheaper and less hassle for you to hang out at a bar.
Now, I was going to just ignore this following troglodyte, but what the hell –
Yes, among other things I’m sure your father didn’t worry too much about terrorists slicing his throat with a boxcutter then flying his plane into a skyscraper.
I’m not sure how you think that - although judging from most of your post I’m not too sure you think much at all. The original flight attendants in the U.S. were required to hold R.N. degrees, among other talents. There’s quite a bit of physical labor involved in lifting baggage into and out of overhead bins. Their schedules (like those of pilots) play merry hell with the bodies natural rhythyms. The job actually pays better these days, once you get senority. The maximum duty hours are actually LESS than they were in the 1960’s and 1970’s. They no longer have to suck up second hand smoke from chain-smoking passengers. The job is probably better now than it has ever been.
They have also always insisted on correct change. That, too, is nothing new.
They are also the folks on board who know how to use the emergency defibrilator to jump-start your heart when you have a coronary over this “exact change for drinks issue.”
Their emergency training is like having the fire department around - most of the time, you don’t need those skills, and hope to God you never do, but if you do, you’re damn glad to have those folks around.
There’s also the idea that the FA’s are there to deal with the customers so the pilots can do their main job - that’s is, fly the airplane rather than argue with drunks and assholes such as yourself.
HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA! You’re kidding, right?
If your father was flying for the airlines as late as 1992, then it WASN’T like that most of his career.
And a lot of those girls didn’t quit voluntarially. If you got married you HAD TO quit. You could be fired for going a single pound over the weight limit. You could be fired for having your hair too long or too short or not wearing your makeup as the company dictated or for really anything or nothing at all. If you got sick and missed a flight you could be fired. If you slipped and fell down and broke your wrist you could be fired. If you hurt your back lifting someone’s carryon you could be fired. If a customer pinched your ass hard enough to leave bruises you could be fired for telling him to stop that. You could be fired for refusing to fuck a male supervisor or other person higher in the food chain. That’s WHY they fucking formed a union, so they wouldn’t have to put up with being summarially fired anymore.
But then, since you obviously feel that all females should be pretty to be easy on your delicate eyes, and be your personal doormat, you probably don’t give a fuck about that, do you?
So, what you proposing? When a woman is 30 she has to stop working? We put a bullet through her head if she’s not pretty enough for you? Hey, newsflash - ugly people need to eat, too. So do folks over 30.
Right, except that now if a pilot left the flight deck he’d be sacked - the door stays shut the entire flight. And see note about the quality of modern hijackers these days.
You’re what? 14? 15? If not, quit acting like it. Other people are not put on this Earth solely for your convenience and pleasure. Get used to the notion that women are not here only to service your narcissitic little self, and you just are going to have to get to used to the idea that not everyone is 18 and beautiful. You’re pathetic. You’re pitiful. And those “Cloris Leachman” women are are laughing their asses off when they see your sad-sack-of-shit self coming down the road because you are such a ridiculous and out of place figure with your 1950 attitudes.
And the basic retail fact that applies here is that there is no other retail establishment selling drinks on that plane. So they don’t have to worry about you taking your drinks business elsewhere. (That’s why they can charge you $4-$6 for one beer in the first place!)
Similar to the concession stand in a movie theatre, or in an isolated National Park Lodge. The airline has chosen to reduce its costs by not providing a change-making operation (and the accounting that would be needed for this).
And apparently it works fine without it. As people said, it has been done this way for decades. Clearly most drinking passengers have no problem finding exact change. And it would be easy enough for a FA to obtain change before a flight, it would save them the effort & delay of trying to find change while serving (though I don’t remember seeing any pockets on their uniform to hold it).
That even experienced FA’s don’t bother indicates that it isn’t a big problem. As does the fact that, despite heavy competition, no airline has bothered to try to distinguish itself by advertising as the “exact change not required” airline. It just doesn’t seem to be a big problem for most passengers.
P.S. Comparision to buses that require exact change. For most bus systems, the majority of their fares come from non-cash transactions (monthly passes, pre-paid cards, etc.) Those paying cash are generally not the regular bus customers–they are riding the bus only because their car broke down or something like that, and often would never think of taking public transportation on a regular basis. So why should the bus company go to the expense of adding a change system, the delay to others trying to get onto the bus, etc., just to serve the non-loyal, occasional customers?
While reading E.T. Bass’s post, I experienced deja poo, that is, I had the feeling that I had smelled this shit before. So I checked, and sure enough, it’s our old friend crazy grady/shep proudfoot and a few other names. So, just in case y’all were WONDERING, that’s why he was banned.
Lynn
For the Straight Dope
I totoally believe this, and I thinks it’s incredibly stupid. I can take a train and the guy serving drinks has a little cash box with a modest, little float.
T-bonham while I may be a “captive market” and can’t take my business elsewhere mid-flight, I can still refuse to be their patron - not buy a refreshment, and not fly their airline next time.
I’ve seen flight attendants have to put up with incredibly stupid things, but they should still be able to maintain some decorum. When the pilot says “please remain in your seats with the seatbelt fashioned until we come to a full stop and turn on the lights” and some dumbass immediately stands up and opens the luggage compartment because he’s too stupid to follow the instructions he was just told - then fine, he has earned some Martha Steward-sized bitchiness. But for a reasonable request, like change for a purchase the way you can expect from every other retail sales situation commonly experienced by everyone sitting on the plane, than an FA has no business being unreasonably nasty.
I would have reported her to the airline and told I’d never fly with them again. So many of them are struggling that this is NOT what they want to hear.
If they can manage the accounting required to take care of the sales balances, I’m sure that a float won’t cause too much of an accounting burden.
OP: Dramamine (or Gravol) - for motion sickness - has some gloriously sedative effects, I found that it makes me so woozy that someone could say an alligator was loose under my seat and I would be too complacent to care. If flying makes you ancy, I highly recommend it.