'I. Don't. Care.'
Posted on 04/10/2017 7:37:53 AM PDT by BulletBobCo
“No, this is wrong,” a woman shouts at security officers in the video.”Oh my God, look at what you did to him!”
A disturbing video was uploaded to Facebook by Audra Bridges Sunday night. It shows a full United flight sitting at a Chicago airport and bound for Louisville. But there was a problem – United had overbooked the flight, they needed four seats for their stand-by crew and no one was volunteering to give up their spot.
That problem led to a violent confrontation as security forced one passenger off the plane, who said he was a doctor and couldn’t take a later flight because he had patients to see at his hospital in the morning.
Bridges, a Louisville resident, told the Courier-Journal that United announced in the terminal Sunday night that the flight was overbooked and offered passengers $400 and a night at a hotel to give up their seat and opt for a flight at 3 p.m. on Monday. No one volunteered, and passengers boarded the flight. United told the full flight that they couldn’t take off without the four seats, then upped the offer to $800 plus a night at a hotel, but still no one volunteered.
(Excerpt) Read more at sacbee.com ...
Every full flight is virtually always overbooked.
When I first started flying heavily for business, much of it involved flying to, or through O’Hare and I loved United. Their terminal was then new and awesome with those neon bolts shooting down the ceiling, their planes were comfortable and mostly new. I made it a point of booking a United flight if I could for that reason, I enjoyed it and was well treated by them. It appears that this is no longer the case. I don’t fly so much now, no reason to do so, most of what formerly required a flight can be Skyped. Air travel was actually fairly pleasant even in coach when I first started but by the late 90’s it was getting more like being shoved into a cattle car, a bus with wings. Sounds as if it’s only continued going down since then. Can’t say I miss it, really.
“All of this is longstanding practice and if you look at the terms of agreement on your ticket it clearly states that you may be bumped.”
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That’s the question I was going to ask——if it was made known to passengers at time of purchase.
I was not aware that it was on the ticket.
,
I too have status with United. The ground staff is the worst.
I too have status with United. The ground staff is the worst.
I too have status with United. The ground staff is the worst.
I too have status with United. The ground staff is the worst.
I too have status with United. The ground staff is the worst.
With an $800 voucher, it would be worth it to get off, rent a car, and drive. Heck, if you were a family of 4, you just got $3200, and all you have to do is rent a car and share a 5-hour drive.
You seem to think that being “right” matters... and that’s beyond stupid. It doesn’t matter if the airline was within their rights to do what they did, they are going to suffer massive massive damage to their bottom line for what is the most singularly stupid thing I have seen in ages.
United can be within their rights, but it won’t stop them from suffering 10s if not 100s of Millions of dollars of brand damage from this. Any shareholder in United is going to see a lot of their equity get wiped out over a stupid act by some stupid employee who made the call to do this.
Because you CAN do something doesn’t mean you SHOULD... and the fact is United just basically told every single passenger who sees this video, this could be you. And if you don’t think that they will pay a heavy heavy price for this, you are being beyond naive.
This is United, cross dressing bathroom moment, and their brand is going to pay just as much if not more of a price.
How can you claim to be “the friendly skies” when everyone sees this happening....
United - Fly the Ghestapo Skies..
Just absolutely idiotic.... to the Nth degree. Legal or not, I guarantee not only will United wind up paying out cash directly to this guy, and well over the $800 and hotel room each they were offering , but they are going to pay a very heavy hit to their brand value.... This is something that is just as stupid as the Target CEO men in womens bathroom nonsense and it will haunt them for years.
Having done same with American Airlines, it's just not worth it.
They could have offered $10,000 in cash, and it still would wind up costing them a hell of a lot less than it’s going to now.
'I. Don't. Care.'
I fortunately don’t fly often, but there is little doubt that Flying is largely more and more cattle calls than anything else, especially domestic US flights. International flights still are decent usually as they must compete with International Carriers who do not operate on the cattle car mentality, but domestic flights in the US... every time I fly, regardless of Carrier... is more of a damn I wish I had another option, every time.
Back in the early 80’s we had two primary banks in the State of Washington, Rainier Bank, and Seattle 1st National. Seafirst was notorious for poor customer service and didn’t really care as they were the biggest bank in the state.
So the story went that one day a grisly looking old farmer walked into the Spokane Branch of a SeaFisrt and asked if they could validate his parking. The Customer Service Rep told him they don’t really do that without a transaction, so the old timer requested a minor withdrawal but the Rep still resisted. The old timer then asked for the bank manager and requested to close his account. He had almost $3 Million in the bank and went across the street and deposited it in the Rainier Bank.
Rainier Bank made a commercial out it with the slogan “we don’t judge a book by it’s cover”!
“who said he was a doctor and couldn’t take a later flight because he had patients to see at his hospital in the morning. “
Yeah, sure. If it was an emergency, then someone else can do it. If it’s routine, then a delay of a few hours doesn’t matter. The problem is that a doctor isn’t used to following rules set by what he perceives as lesser people.
That's why sometimes I wished we had a better train system in this country.
My gold standard is the old Piedmont Airlines that went out with the merger into USAir, they exemplified a customer-centric philosophy. They went above and beyond, extremely helpful in every instance that I ever had requiring intervention. Their planes weren’t always the latest and greatest but by golly you got fed well if it was a meal flight, with silverware and hot towel service afterwards, in coach. I was on the very last Piedmont flight, pilot took it low and slow, pointing out landmarks, passed over the NASCAR track at Concord with a race ongoing, then landed at Charlotte. They all thanked us profusely for being their customers, several were crying. Then, Piedmont was no more. USAir was miserable.
why not up it to $1200?
What right does the doctor or anyone have to demand that “someone else gets off, not them?”
I mean aren’t these FAA rules that everyone agrees to before boarding. It’s in the fine print.
The beauty of FR...I only have to read 7 post to see someone write exactly what I was thinking.
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