Posted on 04/11/2017 12:09:34 AM PDT by cba123
OK.
Sorry for the vanity.
I am just checking however, recently UA by way of the police, pulled (physically) a paying passenger out of a flight recently. He was actually dragged off the plane.
The plane was over-booked. The airline did some sort of lottery, and the guy lost.
Now I get that things happen, and I get that the flight was overbooked (not a good thing, from my view) but I think I just heard a report that this was partly due to a UA employee reservation, being kept.
On a nationwide, live news program.
So the guy was pulled out of the plane, so a free/discount employee could fly?
Is that true?
A case can be made that UAL violated their “CoC” which states that any “IDB” offers should happen pre-boarding. In any case they definitely violated “common sense” standards. Much information (2000+ posts) from experienced PAX & crew on the subject here:
I got $1300 in vouchers so far this year. The most convenient way to use them is at any airport for in person ticket purchases from an agent.
You can use them for date change fees or baggage fees too. If you buy your flight far enough in advance you can mail in a voucher, though I’d rather just buy the ticket next time I’m at the airport.
The vouchers can be worth more than you think if you can cover the entire cost of a flight with one, because then most of the taxes and fees are waived which are not small. Don’t forget to ask them to do this if they forget.
If your voucher “expires” in a year, a lot of times they will extend it with some fee deduction ($100?) but again you can extend it just by using it for a baggage fee and they’ll reissue the remainder with a fresh year remaining.
In years past, UL would have reacted to belligerents by pulling the full plane from the gate and parking it out on the tarmac for 10 hours, until there is nothing to drink, and the sewage tanks are full. Then take off.
Drive or just a charter a small plane for the four employees. Less expensive than what they did by a long shot. They are at an airport and there’s plenty of FBOs with full service operations.
It was a 5 HOUR DRIVE (one way car rental, about $100) - the airlines should really start requiring passengers to prove that they know how to drive and rent a car, if they intend to act up in this way.
Are those photos real? Why does he have a bloody nose in one photo and bloody mouth in the next?
Re post 10. Of course! Just keep increasing the reward to give up your seat until you get the four empties. Even if you had to go to $5,000 each it would have been far cheaper than what they are going to have to pay now.
They tried to get people to volunteer to leave for $800. No one would do it. That’s when they resorted to violence. It’s going to cost them a heck of a lot more than $800/person when they’re done. They could have gone higher and someone would eventually agree. The airlines made it all about money. Now they’ll see just how much money it cost!
...and then the conversation devolved into blaming the filmers:
United Airlines incident video could have broken flight provider’s rules, but not the law
I have been a member of flyertalk for many years and have a large number of postings.
Please tell me what United should have been done differently according to “common sense”.
They ask for volunteers, don’t get enough.
The gate agent’s computers select which passengers get involuntarily bumped, likely the ones who paid the least.
The passenger resists when denied the flight.
The police are called as per standard airport and airline protocol. If something doesn’t go well between the passenger and police that is absolutely not the airline’s fault at all.
Sometimes employees who need to fly show up after passengers have boarded but the door isn’t yet closed. Is it really “common sense” to delay hundreds of passengers on another flight by neglecting to bump one person on this one?
1. Plan better. I am not against over-booking. But this had to do with 4 employees without a way to get to Louisville last minute.
2. Keep raising the incentive until you get a true volunteer. Never remove someone against their will.
The Doctor is NOT at fault here.
Common sense: up the offer until you get a “volunteer”.
Apparently the flight was overbooked before the 4 flight crew arrived and the GA had to get some volunteers at the gate, then more after the PAX were already boarded (lack of common sense/operational prowess). Common sense would mandate that you pay out $1500.-$2000. to save millions of dollars.
You wouldn’t happen to be “MDJennings” on FT would you? ;-)
The optics are certainly bad however at that point the man was trespassing trying to assert a right he didn’t have.
What’s the difference between this and say protesters shackling themselves and blocking a freeway?
“1. Plan better. I am not against over-booking. But this had to do with 4 employees without a way to get to Louisville last minute.”
Every airline sometimes has to send crews out from due to contingencies that arise. Weather and mechanical delays.
You can’t eliminate the need to send out crews in a hurry for these events with better planning.
The law says pilots and FAs can only work so many hours. Once you get beyond that you need a fresh crew to man the plane...
“2. Keep raising the incentive until you get a true volunteer. Never remove someone against their will.”
We could change the law to do this, but this would increase flight costs and cripple the on-time rate. If one carrier offers very high compensation beyond what even involuntary bumps get by law, then they are at a competitive disadvantage against their competitors. They also have betrayed their fiduciary responsibility to investors.
You can say there is a serious PR problem here, but that problem is caused by the passenger resisting crewmember instructions and making the police drag them off when involuntary bumped as allowed by both govt regulation and contract.
Mount Athos
A VERY SIMPLE solution would be to not overbook the flight. Say a plane holds 50 passengers as an example. Sell tickets for say 45 seats. Then the airline has the flexibility to put their employees on who need to get to another destination.
If the seats aren’t needed then anyone who needs to fly standby, who has already PAID for a ticket then gets the seat. This way those seats are revenue generating. They are not revenue generating when they are given to the employees to fly to the other airport.
If the seats DONT get filled by either a standby passenger or employee needing to get to another airport it will still be less of a revenue loss than offering 800-1000 dollars per seat.
Pretty simple idea AND common sense.
How was the man trespassing??? He PAID for a ticket!! Therefore he had a RIGHT to be there.
By your logic I can pay for a car then have the dealership refuse to give me the car I PAID FOR and then have me arrested for being on the lot asserting MY RIGHT to a product I PAID FOR.
Exactly, not sure why the other poster didn’t grasp the logic.
Why would UA have to pay him million? I’m sure he will get some temporary perks as a result of the situation, but he has no case against UA. The police officer on the other hand, who doesn’t work for UA, could have resolved the situation without needing to use such force. UA’s policies are clear and you agree to them when you purchase the ticket. As well, if you are asked to leave the plane, you don’t go back to your seat and refuse to leave.
B.S. He paid for his ticket. Period. United screwed up, not the passenger.
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