11 ms·

I actually agree that it is what they should have done. OR at least go up to the $1,350 that the regulation stipulates. However I find it difficult to believe

I actually agree that it is what they should have done. OR at least go up to the $1,350 that the regulation stipulates. However I find it difficult to believe that the Airline (or the flight attendants manager) would have allowed a $5,000 compensation for the seat. Because they had no way of knowing how this was gonna unravel. / > Why the hell did you give this customer $5,000 for his seat, are you CRAZY? >> M'am, I just prevented the biggest PR shitstorm in our company's history > You're fired, and we'll make you pay those 5 grand / :)

ScottBurson 9y ago
By the point where they were about to have an airport police officer beat the crap out of the passenger (which they did, BTW -- he suffered a concussion and two lost teeth!) it should have become clear that this wasn't going to go well. So once it was clear that Dao wasn't going to leave his seat voluntarily, they should have brought in a higher-up with the authority to offer more compensation to get another volunteer -- or simply pick another person to involuntarily deplane. (They could also have publicly threatened Dao with a civil lawsuit, figuring that even if that didn't change his mind, it would deter the next person they picked from doing the same thing he did.)
- differentView 9y ago
  Saw on TV news this morning, those weren't even real cops. They were private security hired by United. They were even told to stop wearing jackets that said "POLICE" months ago, but kept wearing them.
  - joezydeco 9y ago
    They were Chicago Department of Aviation police. They're hired by the City Aviation department and usually have police training, but are not allowed to arrest citizens or carry guns (although they have been asking). http://www.chicagomag.com/city-life/April-2017/3-Things-to-Know-About-the-Officers-in-the-United-Airlines-Fiasco/ http://www.chicagomag.com/city-life/April-2017/3-Things-to-K... tldr: They're rent-a-cops hired by the airport, not United.
    - 15155 9y ago
      So, it stands to reason they have _zero_ civil immunity, unlike a sworn officer?
      - joezydeco 9y ago
        It does stand to reason. However, this is Chicago. Locals know to never assume anything about city government because you'll tend to discover the opposite later on.
        neeleshs 9y ago
        Fascinating. I'm genuinely curious to know some examples of this.
        toomuchtodo 9y ago
        Google "Chicago government corruption". Having lived in Chicago before, you fear the Chicago Police and your local alderman is the fixer.
        joezydeco 9y ago
        Here's a pretty famous example. If you're the mayor and you want to close an airport, do you follow FAA procedure and give notice to the government and all the aircraft owners (especially the ones with planes parked on the tarmac)? Nope! You shut it down in the middle of the night and bulldoze the runway. Problem solved! https://www.aopa.org/news-and-media/all-news/2003/march/31/mayor-daley-bulldozes-chicagos-meigs-field-(2) https://www.aopa.org/news-and-media/all-news/2003/march/31/m... http://www.airspacemag.com/flight-today/day-shut-down-meigs-field-180952788/ http://www.airspacemag.com/flight-today/day-shut-down-meigs-...
      - true_religion 9y ago
        They're sworn officers acting off duty.
        9y ago
- nikanj 9y ago
  They don't want to have that higher-up with authority on every airport. The fewer people can dole out compensation, the less compensation you end up paying.
  - justinclift 9y ago
    Doesn't seem to be a policy that's working out well for them though, when factoring in things like this happening.
- DigitalJack 9y ago
  The dude was complicit in the clusterfuck. Having seen the video it would surprise me if the man was sober and mentally sound. The the officers screwed up the extraction, but the guy was ridiculous. Did he actually believe wailing like a 2 year old and doing his damnedest to hold on to his chair would result in his remaining on the flight? His face injuries were caused when he finally lost his grip on his seat. The effort of the guy extracting him suddenly had no resistance and the guy sprang out across the aisle and whacked his face hard on the aisle arm rest opposite him. The whole thing was a shitstorm where mistakes kept compounding, made by both parties. Of course the whole thing was instigated by united and I firmly believe they were in the wrong, but the passenger was obnoxious and not free of blame.
  - victorhooi 9y ago
    There are professionals that are trained to deal with this situation. They have both the training, tools and experience to deal with this. I'm not sure what happened here - apparently the officers were "Chicago Aviation Police" - which is different to the "Chicago Police Department" (i.e. what you and I would know as real police officers). Surely there was somebody they could have escalated to (or simply called in the actual Police Department) if they thought it had to come to this?
    - colmvp 9y ago
      A mentally unstable person decided to go on a police car and start yelling at the police. While up there, she broke the rear windows too. What did the police do? Did they shoot her? Did they taze her? Did they beat her? No. They waited. They waited till she came down from the top of the car at which point they restrained her. Those police officers deserve praise for defusing the situation without escalating it. And at the same time, it also shows that yes, police can find ways to control situations without resorting to extreme violence. Even in this case on the airplane, I could easily imagine a competent officer saying to United, "is there any way you could convince someone else to give up their seat? Maybe offer more money?"
    - srtjstjsj 9y ago
      They are real police officers. http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/ct-united-chicago-aviation-police-met-20170413-story.html http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/ct-united-chicago-aviatio...
- FabHK 9y ago
  If they just picked another passenger, that rewards stubborn unruly behaviour. Next pax would then be well advised also to throw a hissy fit.
AnimalMuppet 9y ago
> OR at least go up to the $1,350 that the regulation stipulates. IIUC, regulation stipulates $1350 or 4 x the fare, whichever is lower. For Chicago to Louisville, the fare may well have been $200. If so, stopping at $800 was within the regulation.
- patpending 9y ago
  Are there any lawyers around who can explain the $1350 limit? Some sites like DailyKOS[1] have claimed that the $1350 "limit" has been misinterpreted. What it really means is that $1350 (or four times the fare, whichever is less) is the maximum amount the airlines are required to pay. It does not mean that they cannot pay more, nor that it is illegal for them to do so. [1] http://www.dailykos.com/story/2017/4/11/1652290/-The-Widely-Misreported-1350-Maximum-Offer-for-A-Passenger-Voluntarily-Giving-Up-A-Seat http://www.dailykos.com/story/2017/4/11/1652290/-The-Widely-...
  - scott00 9y ago
    Not a lawyer, but it's really very simple. The law defines the minimum compensation an airline must offer a passenger denied boarding. It does not define a maximum amount. As is generally true for most entities, there is nothing preventing airlines from paying anybody they want as much money as they want, for anything or for nothing. So they are perfectly free to offer more money than that. But in a practical sense, it is ALSO the maximum that any airline will actually offer. Why offer someone $1500 to give up their seat voluntarily when you can boot them involuntarily for $1350? They're not in the airline business out of love, they're going to solve problems for the least amount of money possible. Imagine if Comcast put on your bill "Please pay at least $74.99, or more if you think it's fair." Sure, a few crazy people might send $200 out of their unadulterated love of their cable service, but the vast vast majority of people are gonna send exactly $74.99. It's both the minimum allowed legally, and the maximum expected in practice.
    - patpending 9y ago
      I think I understand. To be fair, I haven't heard United claim that $1350 was the limit, but I've heard people on CNN and elswhere claim that (in effect) the airline's hands were tied and they could not offer more than $1350. I suppose an excellent reason for an airline to offer more than $1350 would be to avoid losing $1.6 billion off its stock price.
soneil 9y ago
I keep seeing $1350 mentioned. It's not a ceiling. $1350 (or 4x the cost of the leg, whichever is lower), is the maximum the airline is legally obligated to offer an involuntary refused-boarding. They're free to offer $2000, $3000 if they think it's in their best interests (or in this case, cheaper than the inevitable suit). $1350 is just a cap on their legal obligation, not their moral.
- guelo 9y ago
  Indeed. But I also keep thinking that regulation is broken. It should be just 4x, not 4x with a cap. If you paid $2k for the ticket the cap means the airline can steal from you. I'm sure airline lobbyists influenced that regulation.
  - ghaff 9y ago
    >If you paid $2k for the ticket the cap means the airline can steal from you. I don't have a real opinion on what compensation levels should be. (Although there are enough IDB's that the answer is probably "not enough.") However, in addition to the compensation, the airline still has to get you to your destination.
  - bpodgursky 9y ago
    It's in addition to the original ticket price.
  - kelnos 9y ago
    The airline is left to choose who they'll involuntarily bump. Typically someone paying $2k for a ticket is likely in business class, and they'd only ever bump someone from economy. Note that the monetary compensation is in addition to rebooking the bumped passenger on a later flight, so even if an economy passenger had paid more than $1350 for the ticket initially, they are still getting $1350 in addition to a seat on another flight.
    - gambiting 9y ago
      There was an article here yesterday saying that someone got kicked out of a 1st class seat on United plane(after already being seated) because they had to use a different plane that had fewer 1st class seats than the original plane planned for that flight - so after seating him, they kicked him out for a "higher priority" passenger.
markdown 9y ago
> However I find it difficult to believe that the Airline (or the flight attendants manager) would have allowed a $5,000 compensation for the seat. Delta has just announced they will offer up to 10k for giving up a seat.

ScottBurson 9y ago

By the point where they were about to have an airport police officer beat the crap out of the passenger (which they did, BTW -- he suffered a concussion and two lost teeth!) it should have become clear that this wasn't going to go well. So once it was clear that Dao wasn't going to leave his seat voluntarily, they should have brought in a higher-up with the authority to offer more compensation to get another volunteer -- or simply pick another person to involuntarily deplane. (They could also have publicly threatened Dao with a civil lawsuit, figuring that even if that didn't change his mind, it would deter the next person they picked from doing the same thing he did.)

differentView 9y ago
Saw on TV news this morning, those weren't even real cops. They were private security hired by United. They were even told to stop wearing jackets that said "POLICE" months ago, but kept wearing them.
- joezydeco 9y ago
  They were Chicago Department of Aviation police. They're hired by the City Aviation department and usually have police training, but are not allowed to arrest citizens or carry guns (although they have been asking). http://www.chicagomag.com/city-life/April-2017/3-Things-to-Know-About-the-Officers-in-the-United-Airlines-Fiasco/ http://www.chicagomag.com/city-life/April-2017/3-Things-to-K... tldr: They're rent-a-cops hired by the airport, not United.
  - 15155 9y ago
    So, it stands to reason they have _zero_ civil immunity, unlike a sworn officer?
    - joezydeco 9y ago
      It does stand to reason. However, this is Chicago. Locals know to never assume anything about city government because you'll tend to discover the opposite later on.
      - neeleshs 9y ago
        Fascinating. I'm genuinely curious to know some examples of this.
        toomuchtodo 9y ago
        Google "Chicago government corruption". Having lived in Chicago before, you fear the Chicago Police and your local alderman is the fixer.
        joezydeco 9y ago
        Here's a pretty famous example. If you're the mayor and you want to close an airport, do you follow FAA procedure and give notice to the government and all the aircraft owners (especially the ones with planes parked on the tarmac)? Nope! You shut it down in the middle of the night and bulldoze the runway. Problem solved! https://www.aopa.org/news-and-media/all-news/2003/march/31/mayor-daley-bulldozes-chicagos-meigs-field-(2) https://www.aopa.org/news-and-media/all-news/2003/march/31/m... http://www.airspacemag.com/flight-today/day-shut-down-meigs-field-180952788/ http://www.airspacemag.com/flight-today/day-shut-down-meigs-...
    - true_religion 9y ago
      They're sworn officers acting off duty.
      - 9y ago
nikanj 9y ago
They don't want to have that higher-up with authority on every airport. The fewer people can dole out compensation, the less compensation you end up paying.
- justinclift 9y ago
  Doesn't seem to be a policy that's working out well for them though, when factoring in things like this happening.
DigitalJack 9y ago
The dude was complicit in the clusterfuck. Having seen the video it would surprise me if the man was sober and mentally sound. The the officers screwed up the extraction, but the guy was ridiculous. Did he actually believe wailing like a 2 year old and doing his damnedest to hold on to his chair would result in his remaining on the flight? His face injuries were caused when he finally lost his grip on his seat. The effort of the guy extracting him suddenly had no resistance and the guy sprang out across the aisle and whacked his face hard on the aisle arm rest opposite him. The whole thing was a shitstorm where mistakes kept compounding, made by both parties. Of course the whole thing was instigated by united and I firmly believe they were in the wrong, but the passenger was obnoxious and not free of blame.
- victorhooi 9y ago
  There are professionals that are trained to deal with this situation. They have both the training, tools and experience to deal with this. I'm not sure what happened here - apparently the officers were "Chicago Aviation Police" - which is different to the "Chicago Police Department" (i.e. what you and I would know as real police officers). Surely there was somebody they could have escalated to (or simply called in the actual Police Department) if they thought it had to come to this?
  - colmvp 9y ago
    A mentally unstable person decided to go on a police car and start yelling at the police. While up there, she broke the rear windows too. What did the police do? Did they shoot her? Did they taze her? Did they beat her? No. They waited. They waited till she came down from the top of the car at which point they restrained her. Those police officers deserve praise for defusing the situation without escalating it. And at the same time, it also shows that yes, police can find ways to control situations without resorting to extreme violence. Even in this case on the airplane, I could easily imagine a competent officer saying to United, "is there any way you could convince someone else to give up their seat? Maybe offer more money?"
  - srtjstjsj 9y ago
    They are real police officers. http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/ct-united-chicago-aviation-police-met-20170413-story.html http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/ct-united-chicago-aviatio...
FabHK 9y ago
If they just picked another passenger, that rewards stubborn unruly behaviour. Next pax would then be well advised also to throw a hissy fit.

AnimalMuppet 9y ago

> OR at least go up to the $1,350 that the regulation stipulates. IIUC, regulation stipulates $1350 or 4 x the fare, whichever is lower. For Chicago to Louisville, the fare may well have been $200. If so, stopping at $800 was within the regulation.

patpending 9y ago
Are there any lawyers around who can explain the $1350 limit? Some sites like DailyKOS[1] have claimed that the $1350 "limit" has been misinterpreted. What it really means is that $1350 (or four times the fare, whichever is less) is the maximum amount the airlines are required to pay. It does not mean that they cannot pay more, nor that it is illegal for them to do so. [1] http://www.dailykos.com/story/2017/4/11/1652290/-The-Widely-Misreported-1350-Maximum-Offer-for-A-Passenger-Voluntarily-Giving-Up-A-Seat http://www.dailykos.com/story/2017/4/11/1652290/-The-Widely-...
- scott00 9y ago
  Not a lawyer, but it's really very simple. The law defines the minimum compensation an airline must offer a passenger denied boarding. It does not define a maximum amount. As is generally true for most entities, there is nothing preventing airlines from paying anybody they want as much money as they want, for anything or for nothing. So they are perfectly free to offer more money than that. But in a practical sense, it is ALSO the maximum that any airline will actually offer. Why offer someone $1500 to give up their seat voluntarily when you can boot them involuntarily for $1350? They're not in the airline business out of love, they're going to solve problems for the least amount of money possible. Imagine if Comcast put on your bill "Please pay at least $74.99, or more if you think it's fair." Sure, a few crazy people might send $200 out of their unadulterated love of their cable service, but the vast vast majority of people are gonna send exactly $74.99. It's both the minimum allowed legally, and the maximum expected in practice.
  - patpending 9y ago
    I think I understand. To be fair, I haven't heard United claim that $1350 was the limit, but I've heard people on CNN and elswhere claim that (in effect) the airline's hands were tied and they could not offer more than $1350. I suppose an excellent reason for an airline to offer more than $1350 would be to avoid losing $1.6 billion off its stock price.

soneil 9y ago

I keep seeing $1350 mentioned. It's not a ceiling. $1350 (or 4x the cost of the leg, whichever is lower), is the maximum the airline is legally obligated to offer an involuntary refused-boarding. They're free to offer $2000, $3000 if they think it's in their best interests (or in this case, cheaper than the inevitable suit). $1350 is just a cap on their legal obligation, not their moral.

guelo 9y ago
Indeed. But I also keep thinking that regulation is broken. It should be just 4x, not 4x with a cap. If you paid $2k for the ticket the cap means the airline can steal from you. I'm sure airline lobbyists influenced that regulation.
- ghaff 9y ago
  >If you paid $2k for the ticket the cap means the airline can steal from you. I don't have a real opinion on what compensation levels should be. (Although there are enough IDB's that the answer is probably "not enough.") However, in addition to the compensation, the airline still has to get you to your destination.
- bpodgursky 9y ago
  It's in addition to the original ticket price.
- kelnos 9y ago
  The airline is left to choose who they'll involuntarily bump. Typically someone paying $2k for a ticket is likely in business class, and they'd only ever bump someone from economy. Note that the monetary compensation is in addition to rebooking the bumped passenger on a later flight, so even if an economy passenger had paid more than $1350 for the ticket initially, they are still getting $1350 in addition to a seat on another flight.
  - gambiting 9y ago
    There was an article here yesterday saying that someone got kicked out of a 1st class seat on United plane(after already being seated) because they had to use a different plane that had fewer 1st class seats than the original plane planned for that flight - so after seating him, they kicked him out for a "higher priority" passenger.

markdown 9y ago

> However I find it difficult to believe that the Airline (or the flight attendants manager) would have allowed a $5,000 compensation for the seat. Delta has just announced they will offer up to 10k for giving up a seat.