Bashing Royal Air Maroc Not A Solution

M. CHTAINI

09/18/10

San Francisco  / Morocco Board News Service ----Royal Air Maroc’s North American market, in spite of the time of crisis for the industry, is navigating on a profitable track; profitability is a goal which many airlines are attempting to reach and maintain.
To be more specific, RAM’s Casablanca-New York route is profitable not because of alleged predatory pricing imposed by the airline but because of the steady demand in this market.  Aside from the Moroccan demand for this CASA-NY route, there is an appreciable African demand because Casablanca is a hub for African travelers. 
Ticket prices are not uniform; tickets for some classes within the flight are provided at lower prices when available and purchased on time. As it has become a rule for all airlines if the lower cost classes are sold then the remaining classes are available at a higher price up to the Y class price.  Airlines do not just make prices up as they please for different markets and nor does Royal Air Maroc.  There are many factors which influence price. 
Comparing Turkish Airline’s $650 to RAM’s $1200 has prompted me to investigate the validity of this comparison and what causes this almost double price differential.  I discovered that the low cost class for these airlines, if purchased on time, is only $100 difference, with Turkish Airline’s NY-Istanbul fare at $650 and RAM’s NY-Casablanca fare at $750.  But price comparisons between RAM and Turkish Airlines are unfair.  Turkish Airlines, which code shares with United Airlines, has over 5 flights daily between Chicago-Istanbul and New York-Istanbul alone and has a US Turkish population of 500,000 people and 700,000 US tourists who visit Turkey annually.  It is no surprise that prices for the New York-Istanbul route are lower than for the New York-Casablanca route.  It is unfair to compare prices in this instance.

By December 15, RAM is going to add two flights per week.  With a schedule of more than 7 flights per week, the number of low cost fares should increase.  These two extra RAM flights will meet the increasing African passengers’ demand. The addition of these two flights weekly will simplify flight connections to other African capitals for RAM’s African passengers.  

Furthermore, RAM will be acquiring 5 new Boeing 787 Dream Liners.  This heavy investment for these types of planes will contribute to the modernization of RAM’s fleet and will allow RAM to schedule more frequent flights, making this route more competitive and attractive to the entry of other companies, dealing a death blow to any false assumption of a RAM monopoly.

Vilifying Royal Air Maroc in articles is not going to result in lower prices.  However; we can analyze whether there is any merit to the RAM-bashing by some of the Moroccans residing in the USA.  What are their complaints?  (1) High prices, (2) Poor service, (3) Unprofessional staff.  Let’s examine these in turn.

1. High Prices

The High Prices issue is going to require Moroccans of good will residing in the US to resolve.  Fortunately, a foundation for resolving the RAM high price problem exists.  It is the viable regional Moroccan American Associations all over the United States.  Most, if not all, the Moroccans who belong to these regional associations visit Morocco at least once a year. These visits are planned in advance because of work and school responsibilities.

The second factor, in addition to planning, is organizing with other members of the community association to identify all those who will be traveling to Morocco within a year’s period so that one can assess how many people will be traveling during the identified year. This number will give negotiating strength in price reduction with RAM. Many of us Moroccans residing in the USA no matter how capricious we are towards our own RAM still fly with RAM on our way to Morocco.  Why not do it in a planned, organized manner so that we all can benefit by our sheer number from price reductions?

The third factor is that there are several Moroccan-owned travel agencies and tour operations in the USA which deal directly with RAM in a win win situation in their business dealings. Each Moroccan American Regional Association should identify such a travel agency or tour operator to work with on this important project.  The selected agency or tour operator should cooperate with the Moroccan American Associations in his region to develop a list of potential passengers who will travel to Morocco within the year.  Once the number of passengers on the list reaches 1,000, the travel agent or tour operator can make arrangements from a position of strength with RAM to obtain lower prices for the participants.

If we do our homework and reach or surpass  RAM’s 1,000-passenger  benchmark, I challenge anyone who will tell me that RAM will not reduce prices substantially and begin to court us as viable partners.  We will ally ourselves with the selected travel agency or tour operator who looks out for our interest and we will insure that they get paid for their service while reducing the cost of travel all around.

As to those members of the Moroccan community in the US who experienced what appeared to them as price gouging and who are criticizing RAM on the high price issue, you have been heard left and right and up and down; let us embark on constructive criticism and change our attitude and plan and organize so that we can make RAM care about us and work with us as it is supposed to do. 

Your criticism, no doubt, has been read and understood by the two Ministers, the President Director General of Royal Air Maroc and its Board of Directors and its private and public share holders especially as it relates to high prices.  When criticism is  supported by a well-planned and organized proposal which provides RAM with thousands of  Moroccans residing in the US as a block of passengers, all of the above mentioned entities will make sure that RAM welcomes as it should this planned and organized group of passengers as a serious clientele to respect. If criticism fails to propose a solution, I doubt things will change.

What I read in the criticism is the need for the respect of what I would call our “Moroccanism” which we cannot shake off in spite of our Americanization. Work with your Regional Moroccan American Association and plan and organize and deliver the goods so that we all can benefit from a new positive relationship with RAM.  Come on, Moroccans! We are in America and we like to visit home as often as possible, we can plan and organize and make this project happen. There is no need for excuses! Let us do it because we can. The lower the RAM airfare prices the more frequent visits we can make to Morocco and allow our families to visit us.

2. Poor Service

Service is a tough one. I know that we Moroccans feel at home when we are in Royal Air Maroc, but we should not confuse between being home and being on an airline as a passenger. We do not make that confusion when we are on another airline.  We carry this attitude too far when we view the stewards and the air hostesses as servants.

I personally have known 3 different generations of RAM stewards and hostesses. Many of them are my friends. I resent seeing them mistreated by passengers when I am flying with RAM. I have seen passengers who were abusive and insulting without respect for themselves, the crew and the other passengers. We should all condemn abusive treatment of RAM’s well-trained, well-educated, multi-lingual stewards and hostesses. The kind of abuse I’ve seen would get a passenger arrested upon arrival on another airline. But RAM’s cabin crew is forgiving and ignores rudeness from impolite passengers.

These rude passengers may not know that the responsibility of the cabin crew and the pilot and his team is, first and foremost, the safety of the passengers.  Carrying safely the passenger to destination is number one responsibility.  While the cabin crew does its best to service all the passengers, some passengers are very obnoxious.  Especially when they ask for more wine during the meal and they cannot handle alcohol. Some passengers subject the hostesses to harassment; need I say more.
 
Royal Air Maroc serves meat, fish and chicken based meals; they even serve Kosher and special diet meals such as vegetarian or fruit ones if ordered in advance.  I have flown on RAM with my family in coach, business and first class since RAM started flying to New York; the service has always been up to par. 

RAM is known to be a family airline because of the demographic composition of the Moroccan community overseas. Travelers tend to be young couples traveling with children or older Moroccans visiting their children in America. The needs of passengers with children and grandparents visiting America for the first time are well served by the RAM cabin crews.  I witnessed this on many occasions while flying back and forth from Casablanca to New York.  The stewards and hostesses took care of the elderly and children as if they were taking care of their own parents and children.  This Moroccan cultural behavior surpasses the call of duty.

I question the complaints of  “poor service.” In my more than 200 flights with RAM since it started flying to New York, the passengers of the flights I was on were always provided  service which ranks from good to excellent.  No doubt travel difficulties pop up every now and then considering the number of flights and the volume of passengers.  When they do, I expect we will hear about them in the Morocco Board News.  
 
3. Unprofessional Staff

The allegation that RAM staff is unprofessional is not supported in my experience and is  extremely damaging to the dignity of RAM employees. It is unclear what measuring stick is being applied to evaluate professionalism at RAM. As a frequent passenger, the first RAM professional evaluation which comes to my mind is the airline’s safety record, which is unblemished. We pray to God that it will continue as such. RAM’s pilots and their crews are highly professional and could be hired by any other airline, and the same is true of the cabin crews.

High level management at RAM has changed many times because of different political and policy issues, but the core mid-management which makes RAM function and fly rain or shine is a highly professional staff which could make any airline function and fly anywhere in the world.

Then who is left? The General Manager for North America and the Station Manager at JFK, who have changed many times, are our direct contact in the USA. We all have known them.  The RAM General Managers for North America that I have known have always been professional in the execution of their responsibility.  They were competent and did their work in a transparent manner with integrity as does the current General Manager for North America.  Most of the General Managers for North America were young men who were highly educated, spoke at least 5 languages, and were task driven.  They cooperated with Moroccan-owned travel agencies and tour operations in America as does the current General Manager for North America.

We all know the present JFK RAM Station Manager, his assistant and their colleagues.  They have always been helpful to RAM passengers. I always found them to be very professional whenever I traveled and I am sure many other passengers would agree.

4.  Problems confronted by all airlines

Delays in departure, sitting in the tarmac for hours in the plane are problems confronting all airlines.  Luggage being misplaced or arriving late or even lost happens on all airlines.  Security and safety delays happen to all airlines.  Flight cancellations happen on all airlines.  These are not problems that apply to RAM alone.

 
5.  Conclusion

It is easy to bash RAM for personal and idiosyncratic reasons. If criticism is honestly made to improve RAM’s performance, no one will disapprove of it especially when it is made under a civil freedom of expression.  When it is constructive criticism everyone listens, but when it is just criticism for the sake of criticism, spare me from your refusenik attitude.