I was a Captain for one of the 17 (of the 1900) FAR-135 companies who employ a System Safety Program. My employer was ahead of it’s time regarding charter marketing. The SMS program was a sales tool like ARGUS/WIVRN, and used solely to attract large customers and compete with the other “bigs” in that business. Yes the company went through the motions. Yes nothing happened as a result of the motions. For example the first summer I was employed two sets of wings were bent in turbulence. Bent as in a near disaster. Accidents were never shared with the pilots. Results of accidents were never incorporated into future training. Accidents were hushed up because the company didn’t want paying customers knowing what was really going on. A (serious) rejected takeoff in Ohio landed one of our birds in a maintenance facility for 6 months. Another lost control in Michigan on takeoff and went through some snow banks, etc, etc, etc. One of our pilots was fired for denying boarding to a drunken passenger. The company claims the pilot was fired because of the way the pilot handled the drunk. Maybe the pilot handled it wrong but have you ever experienced the wrath of a drunk who was just told he couldn’t board an aircraft he owns for the day. The pilot deserved a medal. He didn’t deserve being fired. He potentially saved lives of many. The law is clear that you must deny boarding to an intoxicated passenger. The company encouraged passenger to “have a good time”. They didn’t encourage pilots to deny boarding. The example of the pilot being fired made for certain no other pilot would deny boarding to a rich drunk. It was a message and not a SAFETY message. 14 months ago I had the drunken passenger conversation with the CFO in a recurrent training class. To date there has been no change in the drunken passenger policy that I know of. To recap, SMS is only as good as it’s managers. There is more but I will save you the pain…God bless.