[Closed] United Airlines tickets include complimentary....

Just read that. Apparently he fell over once off the plane....... Yeah sure Mr officer that's what happened

....yeah Graham....the cynical part of me says they dragged the Asian guy off as well - most of the rest of the plane appeared to be white. Why else would you pick on someone elderly?

Didn't really see the video just read the story on the guardian so didn't notice the race of the guy. Apparently he was a doctor wanting to get back for his shift.

Not going to want to see any Americans getting a kicking, just hoping i don't have to go over with work as won't go on a personal trip anytime soon

you can understand not letting them board if overbooked but dragging people off once on is mental.

Beating them and then dragging them out is even worse.

What's more mental is that it was to give space to United employees - if United can't get their employees to the right location, you'd think a company like that would be able to charter a Beechcraft or Learjet if they don't already own several.

But no, let's beat the shit out of our own customers - that will improve sales.

Check your booking options carefully kids..

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I don't like flying so that's normally how they get me on.

While Polaris seems OK, I'll stick with BA, American, Cathay or Delta thanks.

What a crazy thing to do.

Social media will kill UA off..

Mental behaviour, turns out he was a Doctor too.

Does anyone fly with UA out of choice? So probably won't really affect them much.

Is overselling a bigger thing in the US?

See it on pretty much every US flight I've been on but rarely seen it in europe. Flew back from San Diego a few weeks ago and BA were offering $800, a night in the Hilton and no beating. I was almost tempted.

Overselling has been common in the US for decades - there used to be lots of no-shows which is why they started doing it. Before the 9/11 attacks internal flights were treated like buses, just turn up and fly so it was more common then.

I've been on a Ryan Air flight when someone got taken off due to there being too many passengers but that was the fault of the ground staff issuing too many boarding passes.

I used to fly regularly to the US - a BA employee once told me they oversold some routes by 20% to account for no shows and use various incentives to get people to take the next available flight. Interesting to know whether the goon in question is a UA or airport employee or most likely a Federal Air Marshal. UA are going to get a severe kicking over this and rightly so - disgusting behaviour. Would be interesting to know whether they 'profiled' the doctor and he was selected because he wasn't a US citizen?

Social media will kill UA off..

Thing is, low pricing and on time flights means that all this rhetoric of boycotts will probably result in very little fall in business in the long term.

Also, we are repeatedly told the flight was overbooked, which is something we have come to expect. In fact it was not overbooked. It was full and they wanted to add their own staf which is why they. started bumping people, literally

UA head honcho isn't exactly apologetic either! Must be something about being MD of an airline; see Ryanair also.

Just been reading about this on Ozzy Man's FB feed:

Amazing number of people defending the airline and accusing complainers of being whiny snowflakes 🙄

There's gotta be more to it than first appears. I don't believe they walked on, chose the doctor and told him to get off, then lamped him when he refused

njee20 - Member

There's gotta be more to it than first appears. I don't believe they walked on, chose the doctor and told him to get off, then lamped him when he refused

This ^ no chance he wasn't also shot at some point in proceedings.

They asked for volunteers, paid.

Didn't get any, selected 4 passengers.

3 left, he refused and got dragged out.

Yeah, I agree. There has to be more to this story than just UA security staff hoofing this Doctor off in that manner.

What else hasn't been released ?

Seems too harsh a forced exit than "oi, You.. gerrrofff our plane"

Amazing number of people defending the airline and accusing complainers of being whiny snowflakes

Is ninfan posing on there as well?

Some reports saying they let him fly in the end- that he was a doctor who needed the flight to return to work. 😯

I can see how this works- looks like terms and conditions were followed, but as often happens somewhere along the way somebody forgot that they're dealing with people, not freight.

There's never a case when you should just beat the shit out of someone to get them off a plane unless they're a risk to other passengers or themselves. Obviously the good doctor was a risk to himself as he clearly didn't understand that the LEO was going to bounce his face off the chair arm when pulling him out of the chair.

The airline need fining by the FAA and suing by the doctor and the LEOs need firing. Their behaviour was so disproportionate that it's hard to understand why they'd have done it.

Edit - seems the CEO has doubled down and blamed the passenger for his own treatment on his being uncooperative and belligerent. I particularly love how he says they selected "volunteers" to be "re-accommodated". I think his grasp of English is as poor as his grasp of customer service; my understanding of the word volunteer requires the person to actually agree to the thing proposed.

They asked for volunteers, paid.

Didn't get any, selected 4 passengers.

3 left, he refused and got dragged out.

Yes, I've read the articles too. There has to be more to it than that. If they don't get volunteers they'll up the compensation offer, not arbitrarily choose people. I imagine if they'd paid $5k someone would have done it. Do you not think the reputstional damage of this is more than that? Definitely something being missed.

Extra-ordinary incident. I struggle to see any justification, he was given a boarding pass and had got on and sat down. United's responce is equally baffling. My BIL works for them, always posting stuff about how great they are. I think they'll need a new tag line.

Come Fly the Friendly Skies

Overbooking is common practice amongst all airlines not just US ones but they usually sort it out at the check in dthe so before issuing boarding cards so not consoling people who have already boarded.

I can only guess it was all about last minute for the airline and they needed to get the employees to their location ASAP - maybe mechanics going to fix a plane that had gone tech or re-positioning crew so as not to hold an aircraft up, they would have been protecting their schedule for sure, that is every Airlines number 1 goal.

Doesn't excuse dragging a fair paying passenger off the plane against their will. There are always people willing to give up their seat if the price is right.

Was it United embroiled in that incident with the broken guitar? Though to be fair baggage handlers are not airline employees so not Uniteds fault, but United handled that one wrong too.

njee - No the airline has said that's EXACTLY what happened. It was Sunday evening, the next available flight offered was Monday afternoon (according to another passenger) and nobody volunteered. Supposedly they offered 800 dollars but Americans have hardly any holiday so you'd have to have an understanding boss and/or family.

After nobody came forward they selected four passengers based on some unclear algorithm and told them to get off the plane. Three left, this chap said he was a doctor and had patients to see the following day and therefore would not get off the plane. They called the airport security officers (one of whom has been suspended from duty BTW) who dragged him off the plane.

The spaces were needed for 4 crew who needed to fly out from the arrival airport otherwise another flight would be cancelled. It's a 1 hour flight or a 4 hour drive. For the difference of three hours (actually 1 hour as the flight ended up being delayed anyway) they assaulted someone.

Booting people from the flight once they've boarded is not acceptable. Physically assaulting someone to get them off the plane is even more unacceptable.

Oh, and there's loads of other airlines flying to Louisville, maybe United could have bought their staff seats on those instead of beating someone bloody?

The Chicago aviation department said later that one of the officers did not follow protocol and had been placed on leave pending a review. Federal transportation officials said they were reviewing whether United complied with overbook rules.

UA playing fast and lose with the rules perhaps.

"There's more to it than this" because for some strange people, believing that authority figures may act violently and illegally is far harder than believing some nonsense conspiracy with no supporting evidence, even a conspiracy theory that's yet to be presented.

Social media will kill UA off..

United are one I try to avoid. The most cramped seat room, out dated facilities on the planes and their over booking policy. Only got asked to volunteer for another flight once and that was United. Okay at first glance it was a nice deal in getting an upgrade on the next flight but next flight wasn't until the next day, and would cause a lot of problems the other end getting in a day later.

On 2nd April we were about to fly out of Manchester, when a police officer boarded and was checking the names on the passenger list. A few minutes later another officer arrives. They quietly and quickly 'removed' a passenger. This was done without any fuss or aggression.
Imo UA are disgusting.

Leaked footage from another passenger filming on their mobile

Interesting comment within the BBC's piece on this:

Can an airline really treat passengers like this? - by Simon Calder, travel correspondent for the Independent

Yes. The captain is in charge of the aircraft. And if he or she decides that someone needs to be offloaded, that command has to be obeyed. From the moment that the unfortunate individual in this case said, "I'm staying put", he became a disruptive passenger.

From that moment he was disobeying the captain's command. Officials were legally entitled to remove him, and as the videos show, he was dragged from the plane. It appears from the evidence that the law was broken - by him, not by the airline. But I would be surprised if United pressed charges.

[url= http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-39563570 ]Full article[/url]

As much as UA is to blame - policies and all.

CPD and their use of excessive force needs to be investigated in this instance as well.

UA security staff

Yes. The captain is in charge of the aircraft

Nope..... not if it's on the ground with the doors open he ain't.

I think. I mean, I read that somewhere on the internet.

Edit: checked and confirmed - the captain is only in charge once the plane starts taxiing. I would imagine the pilot of this particular flight has also double checked this fact recently too 🙂

Nope..... not if it's on the ground with the doors open he ain't.

Hey you know what, you're right. I just checked with my captain and she said that the only time you as the captain have complete command is when the doors are closed and your airborne.

There are also four levels of disruption that a passenger can be guilty of, the lowest being the use of abusive and threatening language. Simply being uncooperative, as was the case in this instance, does not make him a disruptive passenger.

Classic example of the miss-use of safety rules.

There's a rule saying (roughly) "you always have to do what the airline staff say". That rule is necessary and is in place for safety and security reasons, but in this case the airline used it for their own purposes.

I hope he takes them to the cleaners.

What's startling is the poor judgement demonstrated by everyone involved.... especially when you consider what they do for day jobs.

Whoever made the request to have security forcibly remove the guy needs sacking, as does the actual security monkey himself - even when asked, he should have refused.

The passenger was not disrupting the flight at all - it could have taken off with him in his seat.... he had a valid ticket, been issued a boarding pass, and boarded the plane.

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$800million plus off the share value

http://www.marke****ch.com/story/uniteds-stock-is-set-to-fall-5-and-wipe-1-billion-off-the-airlines-market-cap-2017-04-11

Ouch!

That has to be all on the CEOs non apology and handling since it surfaced as the shares did ok on monday 😕

UA you should fire the person(s) (ticketing, booking, supervisor and duty manager) responsible for that decision. End off.

UA has overbooked so should be the one arranging for transporting own employees etc Not blame it on others regardless.

[b]That passenger is a paying customer Not criminal.[/b]

Klunk - Member
That has to be all on the CEOs non apology and handling since it surfaced as the shares did ok on monday

That is as dumb a CEO as you can get nowadays in terms of PR disaster by blaming the passenger. Sometimes you side your employees but on this occasion the CEO is a dumbo.

the only time you as the captain have complete command is when the doors are closed and your airborne

One of those two clauses is redundant, surely? Unless the implication is that the captain is not in charge if they are airborne with the doors open?

Strange this, offloading due to over booking happens at the gate, not on the aircraft. If he was to be offloaded he should have got nowhere near the aircraft.

From Wikipedia: "The pilot responsible for the operation and safety of the aircraft during flight time."[1] Flight time for airplanes is defined by the U.S. FAA as "Pilot time that commences when an aircraft moves under its own power for the purpose of flight and ends when the aircraft comes to rest after landing."[2] This would normally include taxiing, which involves the ground operation to and from the runway, as long as the taxiing is carried out with the intention of flying the aircraft.

One of those two clauses is redundant, surely? Unless the implication is that the captain is not in charge if they are airborne with the doors open?

You misunderstand, he said "your airborne".

Where's danstw?
Perhaps sensibly keeping out of this one, and the flight bag thread...

I'd always thought the increasing voucher/money offers were sufficient to garner enough volunteers, but that's always been at the gate.

Cougar - Moderator

[i]"the only time you as the captain have complete command is when the doors are closed and your airborne[/i]

[i]One of those two clauses is redundant, surely? Unless the implication is that the captain is not in charge if they are airborne with the doors open? [/i]

What about if the door is open while airbourne because that's how the pilot left the plane . . .

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Where's danstw

I heard he was recovering from an accident at pilot school
[img] [/img]

Where's danstw?

This thread is only for pretend internet pilots.

How do you pilot an internet?

Webbed fingers, Shirley?

How do you pilot an internet?

From a chairoplane.

I find the whole thing staggering.

If I've paid for a ticket, got a boarding pass and got on the plane.. I'm sorry but that's that.

It seems the airline is completely out of line, if they need to move staff around, which is understandable, then those seats should not be on sale.

Or the airline should book the staff on a different flight or even have a gentlemanly deal with other airlines for discounted seats to move their staff around on flights that aren't fully booked.

This seems to be going beyond bad managers punishing thier staff for their own lack of planning, and punishing the customer, with a good kicking by the looks of it.

How to make friends and influence people haha!

bearnecessities - Member
How do you pilot an internet?
From a chairoplane.

It gives us all something to be righteously angry about, as a welcome relief from Brexit and the Madness of King Trump.

So I for one am grateful to UA.

Although I won't be flying with them if there's any way I can avoid it.

"From a chairoplane."

😀

The last time I was in the States there were significant numbers of Americans saying that they wouldn't fly with any of the American carriers if they had a choice. The view was they were in a race to the bottom, think RyanAir for a more local example. Given that Americans are patriotic to the nth degree this was surprising.

Burrito space cat looks down with disappointment at the human endeavour!

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uturn from the CEO

not influenced by the share price I'm sure..

One of those two clauses is redundant, surely? Unless the implication is that the captain is not in charge if they are airborne with the doors open?

Which is why my wife is the pilot and not me......

But seriously, if you're airborne and the doors are open then it is reasonable to assume that the concept of being in charge has largely passed.

The PR nightmare continues ([url= http://www.latimes.com/business/lazarus/la-fi-lazarus-united-low-priority-passenger-20170412-story.html ]Handcuffs threat[/url]). Don't be a 'low priority' customer!

Thing is, it probably won't make the slightest bit of difference to UA. I don't know any-one who has a good word to say about Ryanair (for instance), and yet every flight I've ever been on of theirs is jammers.

There's a huge distance between social media, and spending your own cash money on a cheap flight from the comfort of your own laptop.

Footage of a United Pilot on his way to the gate has also been leaked;

[quote has a good word to say about Ryanair

Their business model is changed for the better since the bad old noughties. I can now tolerate flying with them rather than endure it.

Having said that they aren't in the news for assaulting passengers or robbing them.

Faint praise I know but it is praise.

Having said that they aren't in the news for assaulting passengers or robbing them.

Faint praise I know but it is praise.

Only because they haven't worked out how to charge for it.

"Only because they haven't worked out how to charge for it."

🙂

I've flown Ryan Air numerous times (short haul), and I've also flown UA (transatlantic).

Ryan Air are streets ahead of UA. Ryan Air is no-frills, and they make no bones about it, but once you get over that, it's fine.

UA I always feel that they just resent my presence on their airplane, and only just tolerate me using their service.

I recently flew Norwegian to California. It's about the same price as UA (I think a touch cheaper) but just in a totally different league.

[I]The last time I was in the States there were significant numbers of Americans saying that they wouldn't fly with any of the American carriers if they had a choice. The view was they were in a race to the bottom, think RyanAir for a more local example. Given that Americans are patriotic to the nth degree this was surprising. [/I]

20 years ago US-based carriers were crap, which is why you got so many Americans flying using non-US carriers to Europe/Asia etc.

Luckily I've not had to go to the states in +10 years but use to go monthly. 99% of the time I'd use BA.

Also read that nearly 4000 passengers had been ejected by UA over the past year, after boarding... Seems a pretty standard US approach, but I've never seen overbooking anywhere else in the world.

20 years ago US-based carriers were crap, which is why you got so many Americans flying using non-US carriers to Europe/Asia etc.

Luckily I've not had to go to the states in +10 years but use to go monthly. 99% of the time I'd use BA.

They're still crap, especially internal flights.

For long haul, I do the US about once a month, on a mix of BA, AA and Delta. BA have by far the best service, food and drinks, and an excellent seat (especially upstairs). AA have OK service and the seats vary, the new reverse herringbone is very good. Delta are friendly, lovely folks, but the seat and food are average at best.

Internally, AA are the only airline to have lost my luggage. Twice. On the exact same flight, two years apart! Skillz. The MDs they fly are noisy old rustbuckets, only saved by the gorgeous bare aluminium body.

I'd rather fly Southwest than Unoted.

Given the choice, for long haul, BA or Cathay every time.

Re: Overbooking, it wasn't even overbooked. The passengers were all on board and in their seats (well the one ejected certainly was). It was a late decision to put some UA staff on the plane. They should have simply offered a slightly bigger bribe to passngers to give up their seats, I'm sure someone would have taken it. In the past we have once taken the bribe - I think it was $500 in flight vouchers plus a hotel stay, we had a few hours sightseeing in NY and used one of the vouchers (which had a 12 month expiry) for a subsequent trip. No harm done.

They stopped offering at $800, which was a pretty lowball offer.

I was offered $1000 plus upgrade plus 5 star accommodation 20 years ago...

I think lots of us have been on flights with awkward passengers and have applauded the crew when they dealt with them. That wasn't what happened here, where all were horrified at the treatment of this chap. Even if he has been a bit dodgy in the past, this was out of order.

Becoming clear that it was deadheading crew who turned up late at the gate and a bad decision was taken for "operational reasons" with one of the police officers now suspended and the CEO making two stupid inflammatory statements before getting it right. Huge reputational damage to United who, after a few times going through ORD with them. I have avoided. Prefer AA and BA.

after a few times going through ORD with them. I have avoided.

To be fair, avoiding ORD would be sensible. Last time I was there, the ceiling was leaking rainwater. In the BA Flounge. Abysmal airport.

indeed - I twice had baggage delayed there - once we pushed back whilst I could see it still on the ground. Only travel transatlantic once a year now, try to go via DFW, not looking forward to JFK next week.

Even if he has been a bit dodgy in the past,

?

Even if he has been a bit dodgy in the past,

?

Check 'the news'. Not glorious past of the guy that was beaten up has been dug up, but it's completely irrelevant tbh.