How the United Passenger Suckered Us

Canada Free Press ^ | 04/15/16 | Michael Fumento

[Sean_Anthony]

But part of the phenomenon long precedes YouTube, Twitter, Facebook, and social media dictating the news. It's the American cult of victimization

You’ve been snookered folks! By that poor elderly doctor who was involuntarily dragged from his seat, had his face smashed in, and was beaten unconscious by the evil airport security at the behest of United Airlines.

Because there’s no evidence any of that was true. It was in fact a premeditated temper tantrum gone viral, comprising one 69-year-old Vietnamese-American David Dao, a medical doctor who lost his license, planning a lawsuit from the moment United first politely asked him to give up his seat. He demanded to be dragged, did an excellent impersonation of Ned Beatty’s character in that horrific scene in Deliverance, and struck his lip on an armrest. From the many videos taken by numerous passengers, obviously from numerous angles, there’s no evidence of a beating, a “serious” concussion, or bodily damage beyond that lip.

[Lumper20]

If you are told to get up you get up. United owns that damn plane and just like a taxi cab-the owner can demand you leave/un ass it.

[Thumper1960]

AFAIK, he's a US citizen. That's not going to happen.

Once a "criminal" pays his "debt to society", the past is the past.

[marron]

I’ll drive two days to avoid flying, if I absolutely can.

But if I’m flying, its usually because I absolutely have to be somewhere at a certain time and date. At least half the time, getting bumped and arriving a day late would be bad.

I have to believe that many or most people are in similar circumstances when they travel. I don’t see much respect on the part of airlines for the people who travel with them.

[tenthirteen]

you can ly all of this crap right at the stinking feet of Obama and Clintom.....

him: get in their faces and scream

her resist

This Dao guy is, in my opinion a fraud, cheat and a discredit to our society. He is poster boy as to why we shoulde l3et very few foreigners into this country.

[SoFloFreeper]

Your response really surprised me, Larry. The numbers on "re-booking" and people being booted from the plane are surprisingly low from what I have seen. Airlines have been doing it for years and it has not caused a consumer backlash--some people (most?) happily take the money and credit offered.

CNBC offered this chart:

And in this article:

Involuntary boots happen all the time

The "all the time" seems a bit overdramatic as a headline, but here are the numbers: 40,000 involuntary boots every year. But that is out of 650,000,000 passengers a year.

The CNBC article DOES say that the "involuntary" boots are higher than it was in the 90s, but not as high as it was a few years ago--as opposed to people who VOLUNTARILY give up their seats for compensation, but the market ought to be a place to solve the problem, don't you think?

I think it really matters whether or not this Dr. Dao inflicted the injuries on himself--and maybe United and Dr. Dao both are culpable. JayGalt, another FREEPer along with others seems to think the problem was the fact that United allowed people to BOARD before "bribing" them. Once you're on the plane, the agreement between passenger and airline is a bit more binding.

Anyway, a strange case, in my opinion, should not be the occasion for massive federal intervention between the customer and the provider of a service. :)

[samtheman]

Completely agree.
Count me as another FReeper surprised by the number of holster-sniffing bootlickers so eager to seek to defend the indefensible.

When I purchase airline tickets days (or weeks) in advance, check-in 24 hours prior, obtain boarding passes, arrive to airport 3-4 hours before departure, bring correctly-sized luggage, clear security with my Global Entry (which required yet another interview at airport) credentials, and quietly board the jetliner...I’ll be damned if I am going to unexpectedly deplane just because UAL flunkies cannot manage their logistics and staffing.

Most of my airline travel is for WORK without luxury of flexible outbound travel times. The people here so vocal about “just taking it” would be the first ones having a tantrum if the newsstand clerk accidentally shortchanged them while buying coffee and a newspaper. On my return journeys UAL might have luck if they are courteous, humble, and offer me meaningful CASH for my assistance. That is how professionals peacefully negotiate.

---

I am purposely quoting your post in full because it deserves duplication. (And I reserve the right to do the same on other threads.)
Look, I know there are more important issues going on in our country and this world, but I’m sorry, this hits home to all of us who have ever traveled. In the name of security we are treated like cattle.

Well, finally one of the cattle kicked back instead of saying moo!

And BTW, I have a very good friend who is a lifetime commercial airline pilot, who actually retired and then returned to service, so he has spent decades in the cockpit and he is someone whose opinion I greatly respect on airline issues and he told me (and all his friends) a long time ago that after 9/11 they did two important things:

1. Locked the cockpit doors.
2. Change some crew check-in procedures (he’s not allowed to say what those are)

Everything else, according to him, his a multi-billion dollar boondoggle.

Now I know that aspect of it is not UA’s fault, however, on top of all the SH*T we all have to put up with, the idea of being dragged out of a seat that YOU ALREADY PAID FOR AND YOU ARE ALREADY SITTING IN for the sole purpose of giving some late-arriving employees a free ride...

Well, F* United Airlines and I hope this costs them huge amounts of money.

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/3544052/posts?page=354#354

It’s not about the blood on his face.

It’s about this:
1. He already paid for his seat
2. He was already seated in his seat

Everything else, and I mean everything, is a billion ton pile of horse manure.

[DuncanWaring]

United owns the airplane, but they sold him the right to sit in that seat for the period of time it would have taken the airplane to complete its flight.

[Cboldt]

Separate from the abolishion of overbooking, Delta tried an interesting approach.

When you check in, and Delta knows the flight is overbooked, the check in process asks each passenger how much they would take in exchange for taking a later flight. In effect, the passengers bid against each other for the compensation.

Overbooked on Delta Air Lines? Passengers can bid for travel vouchers - Jan 19, 2011

I don't know if this is still done, but there are many articles on Delta's bidding war system, some positive, some negative.

Another thing I find interesting, some people want to get bumped, they structure their itinerary to maximize their chances of being bumped! Why You Want to Get Bumped Off Your Next Flight (and How to Do It)

[Locomotive Breath]

"the fine print says you can be bumped"

Nope. The actual fine print says you can be denied boarding. The common expression "bumped" does not appear. In contract law, words matter.

Boarding Priorities - If a flight is Oversold, no one may be denied boarding against his/her will until UA or other carrier personnel first ask for volunteers who will give up their reservations willingly in exchange for compensation as determined by UA. If there are not enough volunteers, other Passengers may be denied boarding involuntarily in accordance with UA’s boarding priority:

Contract of Carriage Section 25

Under the terms of their own one sided contract, it's a perfectly reasonable argument UA could no longer deny boarding once they actually took his boarding pass and boarded him. I'm sure UA's lawyer will argue that actually boarding doesn't mean you have boarded and that some other meaning applies.

[marron]

Drag me off, and I’ll own the plane.

[DuncanWaring]

This jerk is a convicted criminal plus a faggot.

Even if that's true, and United doesn't want "convicted criminal faggots" on their airplanes, they shouldn't have sold him a ticket and allowed him to board their airplane.

[vespa300]

Even so many conservatives were suckered by this drama queen. I would have expected it from the fools on the LEFT.

[GBA]

Had United Airlines followed good business practices and their own rules, none of this would have happened.

United is clearly too stupid to know how to run its own business and will now be getting some assistance.

A haughty spirit before a fall seems to apply here to all who conspired through circumstance to beat down an elderly man in order to take back what UA had legally sold to him, and that he had legally and peaceable taken possession of.

United Airlines started the fight, not the Dr.

And at any point, any and all of the UA and security personnel involved could have chosen a different path with a different outcome.

United Airlines instead chose take his seat back from him, and then chose to be cheap and then violent about it, instead of following good business practices and their own rules.

The Dr. was just minding his own business, not being a problem, just waiting to go home, sitting in the seat he paid for, just like everyone else.

United Airlines' own haughty spirit brought them to their fall, as it would have sooner or later.

Will their pride now bring about their destruction or will they learn a better business model?

[Thumper1960]

He was boarded and seated. UA violated the contract. That a Conservative would advocate violating contracts and law is something I’d expect from a mind numbed Liberal.

[major-pelham]

This article is loonville.

[Cementjungle]

They should have offered a higher premium. That is where they messed up.

They also should have done it during the boarding process, not afterward. They can deny boarding to accommodate the employees, but he was already boarded.

[Leaning Right]

> In his case, he was traveling with family.

All four passengers were already seated waiting for take-off, with boarding passes in hand, in seats they reserved, paid for, and occupied. <

Don’t you get it? The article says that this was a “premeditated temper tantrum”, planned from the moment he was asked to deplane.

So in the spirit of blaming the doctor, I’ll guess the family was in on it too! In fact, they probably weren’t even his family. They were probably all actors, hired by the doctor for some nefarious reason.

[Cboldt]

So sue for breach of contract. Same outcome either way, you're denied a seat on the flight, whether you fit under Rule 25 or not, on account of "having boarded."

Of course airlines try to deliver the bad news before the let the passenger board, if for no reason other than the delay that accompanies swapping of passengers.

-- I'm sure UA's lawyer will argue that actually boarding doesn't mean you have boarded and that some other meaning applies. --

IMO, that point is not worth arguing. Just stipulate that they broke the contract and move on to damages. It would cost more to litigate the point than to concede it.

[Locomotive Breath]

The two are completely unrelated. He had made it right with the criminal justice system and was no longer under any sanction, penalty or restriction.

Under the law he has the same rights as anyone else.

[JayGalt]

I agree the Government doesn’t make solutions; it makes problems. The legal system and the free marketplace will resolve the issue as long as we don’t have a defacto monopoly as we shed carriers and carriers combine.