Lessons Learned from Airline Snafu

Perhaps you’ve seen the recent news about United Airlines’ network outage incident this week.  According to CNET, United Airlines was plagued by some widespread computer problems earlier this week, causing serious travel delays around the country. The airline blamed the issues on a “temporary network outage” and a ground stop was put in place for United flights flying into Houston, Newark and San Francisco. The result? A backed-up, messed-up schedule that inconvenienced numerous passengers across the country, many of whom took to the social channels to complain. Bad PR for the airline, to be sure!

So what could have been done to prevent this? It’s no secret that application downtime is costly from a monetary and customer retention standpoint, but in cases like this it can also be damaging to the company’s reputation, especially with the proliferation of social media channels out there, which make spreading one’s frustration all too easy!  Having access to the most reliable data connectivity technology on the market greatly reduces the risk that your company will be negatively affected by application downtime issues.  DataDirect’s wide range of drivers offer numerous features, including application failover, that help ensure the “always available” connectivity from application to data that companies and consumers rely on for a positive experience.

Ensuring that your connectivity is reliable and secure is vital. And as we’ve seen with United, not doing so can negatively impact customers and revenue.