6 ms·

I think United were wrong here (maybe not legally) but morally and, even from their self-interest they took a major PR hit. People involved in this should be ge

• pbiggar 10y ago
  Revisited the decision to remove him.
• tomp 10y ago
  Maybe they could arrest him first? (Handcuffs and everything.) At least he would then realize that the situation is serious. Maybe also flash a gun or something...
  • devereaux 10y ago
    yeah let's start toting gun at people who refuse to give up their paid seats.
• pera 10y ago
  Randomly selecting passengers is not a bright idea, specially after they boarded into the airplane and are already seated. Just offer more money until you find a real volunteer: even if you have to pay $10k that's going to be much better economically and morally than forcing a random client out of a plane.
  • gdubs 10y ago
    Plus, there's no way it would get that high. Likely people were willing to be bought out, but wanted it to be "worth it". Fear of missing out would intervene very quickly, once the vouchers reached a certain point. Even on a plane full of game theorists, willing to bid up to a million dollars, you're still probably miles away from the amount this will cost in negative PR, to say the least.
    • AjithAntony 10y ago
      I think one of the articles or tweets said that some passengers offered to go if they were given $1000
      • FabHK 10y ago
        United apparently offered USD 800 plus a hotel room for the night; that seems pretty close.
• MrMember 10y ago
  Based on the circumstances (he wasn't a danger to anyone or acting out in any unreasonable way) the better choice probably would have been to just leave him be. He may not have had a legal "right" to be on the plane and United may have been within their rights to remove him but it can't have been worth the image hit to have him strongarmed off the plane. If they had given up on removing him and just picked someone else, or raised the compensation for someone to voluntarily give up their seat, or found another way to get their crew to their destination, this wouldn't have even been a story.
  • mcv 10y ago
    Did he not have a legal right? I thought the only reason they removed him was because the plane was overbooked and they wanted the seat for their own employees. Sounds like he had a valid ticket and every right to be on that plane. The airline should not have overbooked, and discovering that they had, they should have put their own employee on the next plane. Treating paying customers like this is inexcusable.
    • MattSteelblade 10y ago
      Airlines are legally allowed to overbook. It's an established practice.
      • khedoros1 10y ago
        Well, yes, but established practice is to deny people the opportunity to board the plane, not to violently remove them after they've already been seated.
        • cema 10y ago
          Seems like it may be crucial. I am really eager to see how it resolves!
      • ptero 10y ago
        Yes, but then there is a prescribed compensation that everyone involuntarily denied boarding (IDB) is entitled. The vouchers is an attempt to avoid this IDB by getting someone to voluntarily fly later. Plus, I am not a lawyer, but I think IDB means just that -- boarding. Once you board the airline cannot change its mind, not for commercial reasons (although it might be able to weasel out of that by getting everyone off and re-boarding without some people). Again, take with a grain of salt; this is just what I heard.
• enraged_camel 10y ago
  Simple: they announce that the plane is not taking off until enough seats open up. Then just wait. Sure, the flight would be delayed, perhaps significantly, but the impact of that would pale in comparison to this horrendous PR controversy.
  • deleted 10y ago
    [deleted]
  • greenyoda 10y ago
    Or, they could probably convince someone else to give up their seat voluntarily by just upping the incentive by a few hundred dollars. A very cheap solution, considering what the current fiasco will cost them.
    • yeukhon 10y ago
      Or, let it go. Seriously, or buy tickets from other airlines.
  • nunez 10y ago
    It costs a lot of money to idle a plane at the gate and even more if the crew times out and the flight gets cancelled. No-one is going to do that because of one difficult person
    • ajmurmann 10y ago
      Or rather because of one difficult corporate miscalculation and unwillingness to pay more for people to get off. I got one would get off pretty much any flight for $10k. That seems cheaper to me than the cost of removing your paying customers by force.