Amtrak False Advertising on Twitter?

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Texan Eagle

Conductor
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Aug 25, 2011
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The official Amtrak Twitter account posted this tweet earlier today. Notice something odd?

Yes.. after eliminating flowers in Dining Cars and real tablecloths, advertising the same to attract passengers seems a wee bit unfair to me. :wacko:
 
It's just a generic advertisement that says, "Instead of road tripping and eating crappy fast food, relax on the train and eat better food in a dining car."

I seriously doubt they're saying, "Eat on the train. We have flowers." :p

Also, I know Flowergate has been talked to death, but I don't decide where to eat based on whether or not it has flowers on the table. I've been to really good restaurants that didn't have flowers and crappy restaurants that did have flowers. A flower does not equal quality. Personally, the less clutter, the better.
 
Texan Eagle said:
The official Amtrak Twitter account posted this tweet earlier today. Notice something odd?

Yes.. after eliminating flowers in Dining Cars and real tablecloths, advertising the same to attract passengers seems a wee bit unfair to me. :wacko:
Click to expand...
It is ironic. Show a picture that includes what you just removed. I hope the water outside the window is still there! :giggle: :giggle:
 
It's wonderful to see the Amtrak employee responsibile for the compny Twitter account has a spectacular command of the English language!

:Yes, some amenities are being discontinued on our long distant trains."

"We needed to advise our frequently passengers of the new policy."
 
Jimmy said:
It's wonderful to see the Amtrak employee responsibile for the compny Twitter account has a spectacular command of the English language!

:Yes, some amenities are being discontinued on our long distant trains."

"We needed to advise our frequently passengers of the new policy."
Click to expand...
Honestly, that looks like auto-correct.

I'm not saying they shouldn't watch for that stuff, especially since it's completely unprofessional, but I've seen the same thing from people who use their iPhones when posting on the AU app.
 
SarahZ said:
Jimmy said:
It's wonderful to see the Amtrak employee responsibile for the compny Twitter account has a spectacular command of the English language!

:Yes, some amenities are being discontinued on our long distant trains."

"We needed to advise our frequently passengers of the new policy."
Click to expand...
Honestly, that looks like auto-correct.

I'm not saying they shouldn't watch for that stuff, especially since it's completely unprofessional, but I've seen the same thing from people who use their iPhones when posting on

the AU app.
Click to expand...
Yup! I frequently use the app on my iPhone and type quickly and post without proof reading. Auto correct does whacky stuff sometimes. I promise I have a good grasp if English I'm just posting from my phone. :)
 
The ad tweet was innocent enough, but the response when called out on it by a customer was idiotic.
 
tonys96 said:
The ad tweet was innocent enough, but the response when called out on it by a customer was idiotic.
Click to expand...
Twitter limits you to 140 characters per post. Amtrak clarified in the next response. It's possible they were typing it as "K" posted their follow-up.
 
look for the new and improved PLASTIC salt and pepper shakers, but what comes out still tastes the same. Same with the great food wether flowers on the table of not. JMHO
 
"We needed to advise our frequently passengers of the new policy."

I get that tweets are short but this butchering of the language is just abhorrent. Is it really too difficult to proof read what you write? Especially when it is going out on social media as a representation of your company. Type, read, reread then post.
 
tp49 said:
"We needed to advise our frequently passengers of the new policy."

I get that tweets are short but this butchering of the language is just abhorrent. Is it really too difficult to proof read what you write? Especially when it is going out on social media as a representation of your company. Type, read, reread then post.
Click to expand...
Yes, as I said above:

"Honestly, that looks like auto-correct.

I'm not saying they shouldn't watch for that stuff, especially since it's completely unprofessional, but I've seen the same thing from people who use their iPhones when posting on the AU app."

It's not so much a butchering of the language as Apple's incessant need to assume it thinks I mean one word when, no, I really did mean another. Auto-correct can be turned off, thankfully, but a lot of people use it as spellcheck. Unfortunately, that leads to things like "advising" instead of "advise" and "frequently" instead of "frequent". As you type, Apple tries to auto-complete words for you, and it's suuuuuuuper annoying. 90% of the time, it's not the word I wanted.
 
It does seem like Amtrak is trying to have it both ways with posts that appear to draw attention to enhancements that are no longer provided as per Amtrak's own directives. Whether you feel that flowers and tablecloths make a difference or not it would seem that that Amtrak's social media folks do find those extra little touches important to the sales pitch side of the equation. It's not like these changes were implemented yesterday. The time has come for the social media advertisers to own up to what is actually being sold and manage expectations responsibly.

brentrain17 said:
look for the new and improved PLASTIC salt and pepper shakers, but what comes out still tastes the same. Same with the great food wether flowers on the table of not. JMHO
Click to expand...
I felt the call of the rails earlier this week and jumped on old #1 today. The gouda and cheddar grilled cheese sandwich at lunch was tasty (go Amtrak!) but the "pancakes" and "pork sausage" at breakfast were so bad that I ended up leaving 75% of my plate untouched. I was genuinely shocked at how bad it was. Tasted like the inside of a freezer. Even a lowly McDonalds breakfast is several times tastier in my experience.
 
I wonder how long it'll take to get the stock photos updated? They did post a picture from the CS today, and it showed the tables minus flowers and tablecloths, but it was on their Instagram (so, it was probably taken by a passenger).
 
Dine in Style, with a picture that doesn't happen anymore. I think that's the Crescent's route? Looks like Amtrak is emulating Denny's but advertising more.
 
amamba said:
SarahZ said:
Jimmy said:
It's wonderful to see the Amtrak employee responsibile for the compny Twitter account has a spectacular command of the English language!

:Yes, some amenities are being discontinued on our long distant trains."

"We needed to advise our frequently passengers of the new policy."
Click to expand...
Honestly, that looks like auto-correct.

I'm not saying they shouldn't watch for that stuff, especially since it's completely unprofessional, but I've seen the same thing from people who use their iPhones when posting on

the AU app.
Click to expand...
Yup! I frequently use the app on my iPhone and type quickly and post without proof reading. Auto correct does whacky stuff sometimes. I promise I have a good grasp if English I'm just posting from my phone. :)
Click to expand...
I do the same thing on my phone, or even on my computer there I can't blame autocorrect.
The difference is we're posting here, where it isn't a huge deal to have a mistake or two, even if we try mightily to avoid them.

There's a big difference between that and posting to twitter for a major company, where you are literally the public face of the organization. I don't think it's too much to hold them to a slightly higher standard and take the extra 3.5 seconds to look at all 140 characters to make sure you haven't hosed something up.

Sent from my iPhone
 
Honestly, I'd be quite disappointed if a large corporation had their Twitter account manager use an iPad to make posts rather than a regular computer, so Auto-Correct shouldn't be an issue.
 
That I didn't realize (not a Mac user). Though 99%+ of Amtrak's computers are Windows-based, I suppose whoever runs the Twitter account could be using a Mac.
 
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