I really dislike congressional perks. It’s bad enough that they are exempt from insider trading laws (aka bribes), but bumping paying passengers is really lame.
Yeah, but that wine is really good. Just would make me ill to toss it…
I mean, couldn’t they just slip him a glass, jeez!
As much as I dislike politicians, and this obnoxious one in particular…I couldn’t make a fair judgement without knowing all of the facts. If United wants to hunt this one down, they could. And discipline someone who did improper actions. So, who really knows?
I suspect that SJL has such a history with Continental/United (as in being demanding), that they now just let her have her way.
Interesting. I used to fly to DCA regularly, and my congressional delegation made a point of flying coach/refusing upgrades so as not to be perceived as spending lavishly.
United has apologized to the customer that was bumped.
It’s easy for them to apologize, that means nothing.
What they need to do is a decent investigation, explain and then apologize or discipline if needed. As a customer, I’d prefer the honest truth over an insincere apology.
- Would the honest truth be better PR for the airline?
- Would most (potential) customers be able to tell whether the airline is telling the honest truth?
- Would most (potential) customers care if the airline told the honest truth?
If the above answers are “no”, then it does not help the airline to tell the honest truth. The same can apply to other businesses, politicians, etc…
According to The Points Guy:”United Airlines said Simon was bumped to economy because she canceled her flight using the airline’s mobile app [ after the app sent her a message while at her stopover noting a 90 minute plus delay] and showed a Houston Chronicle reporter a screenshot of an internal United system that appeared to back up the airline’s claims, but the reporter couldn’t immediately confirm independently that the screenshot was accurate. United did not respond to requests for comment by TPG by publication.”
So either United is minipulating evidence to the press or it’s a case of a poorly designed app that causes you to accidentally click “cancel” without even realizing you did so.
I said that the honest truth is what I’d want as a customer, not what was best for the airline. As a frequent flier, I would recognize the truth if presented with the evidence. Then again, I wouldn’t have made this public, I would have dealt with it privately. It is likely I would have gotten a more accurate response if they weren’t considering publicity, however with United, there might have been little response at all.
In this case, I would have specifically asked for a refund of the airmiles that I’d used for the ticket, and I wouldn’t have made a huge deal out of it.
The Congresswoman’s statement:
I read this as a graceless non-apology with a side of racist faux victimhood thrown in for good measure.
Agreed, @sherpa. Especially since others have said she has done this in the past. Maybe this is the first time someone publicly called her out on it.
And agree with @busdriver11. Unlikely anyone will believe much of anything from United right now.
The airline probably realizes that most people would not recognize whether something is true or false, even if you would in this case. Most people probably assume that anything the airline says is as false as something said by a politician that they oppose, so there is little incentive for the airline to try to make a detailed truthful explanation, rather than trying to make the news just go away as quickly as possible.
Here we go again -
Ugh, sorry for the long link. Basically, a woman was on a plane, belted in, and was removed because of a bureaucratic snafu. She pleaded with the gate agent that she needed to get to the beside of her dying mother. No go. She drove through the night, but her mother died before she arrived.
The airline was following policy. The woman decided to drive. There are 20 flights a day from Denver to MSP and she could have arranged another flight before starting to drive.
I guess you didn’t read the article. She was flying from Colorado Springs to Minneapolis, not from Denver. Her flight was scheduled to leave at 5:15 PM. Was there another one that night that had a seat? I don’t know so I won’t assume.
And what “policy” were they following? The one that says you can call to change a flight, inform the agent that the original flight was purchased through a broker, pay for all the changes, and be reassured that there won’t be any problem - and then this happends? Is there a policy in there? Sounds like incompetence and horrible customer service again.
I did read it. She was to change planes in Denver which is about a 30 min flight, or just over an hour drive from the Spring’s airport. It said her landlord drove her to the airport in the Springs, so the landlord must have dropped her. It didn’t say whose car she used to get to MSP.
United has a passenger with no ticket, just a record cancelled through a ticket broker. What are they supposed to do? The ticket was originally bought by a person with a different name and then cancelled. How is United supposed to know that this person didn’t order a ticket with a stolen card and the card owner discovered the fraud and cancelled the ticket?
There is also extra security for tickets bought the same day as the flight. Most often it all checks out, but in this case it didn’t. You can’t buy a ticket once you are past security so if the women had returned back to the ticketing desk, maybe she could have purchased another ticket, or gone back to the broker and had a ticket issued. Even if she had flown the next day it would have been faster than driving.
Because United was on the phone with this person and assured them that there would be no problem with changing the ticket that way.
“Carolyn Gallant, customer service supervisor at Traveler Help Desk, confirmed that the agency had voided the ticket after it saw that a change had been made to the reservation. She said that the intention had been to protect Ms. Amrich against possible fraud and that a representative had tried “numerous times” to contact Ms. Amrich first.”
Why Is United always at fault? Where is the outrage about this agency? Traveler Help Desk