0

I am a frequent traveller 150K miles and up a year for 20 years and every airline has the same problem, the 3.5mm stereo/mono jacks! Problems from a plug has a broken jack in it, poor connections to high pitch squealing. It was really bad this past Christmas when my wife, our 2 kids age 5&7, went back to England to see our family and our audio was not working. We got vouchers totalling $100 USD for our next flight but the kids did not care and neither did the passengers around us when they started crying. Lucky I was prepared and gave them my iPad to watch Frozen and play games.

Surely I can not be alone here, who else has had broken to poor in-seat audio problems and what are the airlines doing to solve this problem?

Robert Melton
  • 11
  • That is your solution: be self sufficient. Sucks I know but what you can do. Noone really can do much to fix a broken jack on spot. –  Jan 17 '17 at 05:17

1 Answers1

6

As someone who flies 100k+ per year, my experience is just the opposite, 90% of flights work just fine.

Perhaps the routes you fly are served by older aircraft, perhaps you just have bad luck.

Bottom line the audio systems are constantly having plugs inserted and removed, frequently being removed by force (knocked out accidentally by body parts). And so the jacks wear out.

Most airlines will fix broken audio systems during scheduled maintenance not immediately, as the systems are built into the seats and there just isn't enough time to perform the necessary repairs between flights. So a broken jack could remain broken for a while.