7 ms·

United Airlines STILL using police to remove passengers in spite of promise

62 points by pm24601 9y ago

williamscales 9y ago
> flight crew denied their request to pay a supplement for the seats, which United sells as "economy plus", and told them to move back to their original seats, Hohl said. Sounds like they should have removed the guy sleeping in seats that weren't his, not folks who were probably cooperating with the flight crew. Or there's something missing in this story.
- joelrunyon 9y ago
  They woke him up and moved him. See this article - https://www.yahoo.com/style/united-airlines-kicks-couple-off-plane-en-route-wedding-181721817.html https://www.yahoo.com/style/united-airlines-kicks-couple-off... They refused to sit in their ticketed seats, which is why they were removed.
  - williamscales 9y ago
    Ah, I had a feeling something wasn't quite right with the account in the article. That makes it pretty much a non-story.
    - joelrunyon 9y ago
      Yes, it's another "outrage against United" story - but in this case, it's seems more likely that it's just a whiny customer who didn't listen to the flight staff and who's behavior affected the flight.
leephillips 9y ago
This story repeats the falsehood that the United flight was "overbooked". Explanation here: https://www.inc.com/cynthia-than/the-controversial-united-airlines-flight-was-not-overbooked-and-why-that-matters.html https://www.inc.com/cynthia-than/the-controversial-united-ai...
cwyers 9y ago
Headline is "United Airlines Reportedly Removed an Engaged Couple from a Flight to Their Wedding." The submitted headline would seem to violate site guidelines.
- joelrunyon 9y ago
  Not to mention, they're still ALLOWED to use police to remove passengers who refuse to comply with flight attendant instructions...which is what happened here... EDIT: It seems it was a US Marshall...not technically police.
  - paulgb 9y ago
    It's not even "in spite of promise" (in the HN headline as of this comment); the promise was not to do it when they are overbooked.
Clubber 9y ago
I'm afraid their culture is too far gone and it will be a long, slow descent. They're news fodder now.
- criley2 9y ago
  Or, this will all blow over in 1 month, like it always has before, and while they will churn travelers temporarily, the next Delta/et al scandal will churn them right back to United. Plus the dollar is king and RyanAir proves you can spit on people and treat them like trash and they will line up to fill every plane as long as the price is right.
  - _delirium 9y ago
    How people direct their outrage at these kinds of stories is pretty fickle, too. Right now, because of a quite egregious case, people are more skeptical of police removing people from planes than they used to be (which is probably good). But in a few months there will be some case of a passenger removed from a plane in circumstances that look bad for the passenger and/or trigger common pet peeves, and then we'll have a chorus of pro-police internet commentators saying "FINALLY someone did something about these assholes, I hope they start doing this regularly!!!"
  - joelrunyon 9y ago
    The crazy thing about this to me is that United isn't that cheap compared to other airlines. At least Spirit will actually give you a steep discount on most fares and then treat you poorly. United has long known to been this bad and they still charge like a full-fare carrier.
joelrunyon 9y ago
Listen, I'm not a United fan, but this stuff stinks of people jumping on the outrage train. This is pretty clear what happened: > Soon after moving to other, empty seats in the economy cabin a few rows up, flight crew denied their request to pay a supplement for the seats, which United sells as "economy plus", and told them to move back to their original seats, Hohl said. So, they were not in their original seats when the plane was boarding. They don't allow this while people are boarding because the flight team needs to match people boarding to the manifest & it screws up other people who's seats they might be taking. They might allow you to switch seats AFTER takeoff, but that's a different story. The other part of the issue is they didn't move to comparable seats. > "We thought not a big deal, it's not like we are trying to jump up into a first-class seat," Hohl told KHOU. "We were simply in an economy row a few rows above our economy seat." From a fare standpoint, they're actually a different fare class. Just because it's not a different cabin, doesn't mean that's a headache. I'm not 100% sure of their policy, but United certainly isn't obligated to change people's seats and upgrade them once they're already issued a ticket & booked on the flight. Can you imagine the nightmare that ensues after people start requesting upgrades, exit rows, premium economy, etc when people are trying to board with children, suitcases that don't fit in bins and all the other stuff that happens in economy on boarding? This article (https://www.yahoo.com/style/united-airlines-kicks-couple-off-plane-en-route-wedding-181721817.html https://www.yahoo.com/style/united-airlines-kicks-couple-off...) is pretty clear that the sleeping man was awakened and their seats were available for use and there's no clear reason why they refused to return to their original ticketed seats. Like I said, I'm not a United fan, and I do everything I can to avoid flying them & use my points on their partner airlines internationally (which aren't bad actually), but this stuff screams of novice flyers not knowing the rules of the air and trying to milk the bad press train United is having. Edit: typo
- LeifCarrotson 9y ago
  > match people boarding to the manifesto Manifest. A manifesto is rather different.
  - joelrunyon 9y ago
    fixed - thanks :)
bobbytherobot 9y ago
I'm not a United fan, but there is a big point of their story that is confusing. Why was a man napping across a row of seats during boarding?
- logfromblammo 9y ago
  I presume that the man was already boarded from a previous segment of a multi-segment flight, and that segment was lightly-booked enough to nap across multiple seats. This would be especially likely when boarding at a hub airport--like ORD. The fully-booked portion of the flight is from the hub to the end destination, but those passengers are coming in from N feeder routes. So 1/N of the feeder passengers can remain on the plane instead of getting out to make a connection. But even so, you still need to have enough of your ass in your own seat to be belted in during takeoffs and landings. That makes it mighty difficult to sleep across 3 or more seats through a stop. Looks suspicious. I suspect this couple was embellishing to surf a wave of anti-United sentiment for a bit. The guy was probably asleep in his own seat, and they just didn't want to climb over him and sit 3-to-a-row when other rows were empty. I wouldn't put it past United to seat an affianced couple in separated seats with a stranger seated between them, either.
burntrelish1273 9y ago
Most airlines aren't incentivized to treat customers as human beings... that's the bargain. That's the diff between Virgin / JetBlue and United / American. ProTip(TM): Virgin counter at LHR is probably the best on planet earth. Super friendly and helpful.

62 points by pm24601 9y ago

> flight crew denied their request to pay a supplement for the seats, which United sells as "economy plus", and told them to move back to their original seats, Hohl said. Sounds like they should have removed the guy sleeping in seats that weren't his, not folks who were probably cooperating with the flight crew. Or there's something missing in this story.

joelrunyon 9y ago
They woke him up and moved him. See this article - https://www.yahoo.com/style/united-airlines-kicks-couple-off-plane-en-route-wedding-181721817.html https://www.yahoo.com/style/united-airlines-kicks-couple-off... They refused to sit in their ticketed seats, which is why they were removed.
- williamscales 9y ago
  Ah, I had a feeling something wasn't quite right with the account in the article. That makes it pretty much a non-story.
  - joelrunyon 9y ago
    Yes, it's another "outrage against United" story - but in this case, it's seems more likely that it's just a whiny customer who didn't listen to the flight staff and who's behavior affected the flight.

leephillips 9y ago

This story repeats the falsehood that the United flight was "overbooked". Explanation here: https://www.inc.com/cynthia-than/the-controversial-united-airlines-flight-was-not-overbooked-and-why-that-matters.html https://www.inc.com/cynthia-than/the-controversial-united-ai...

cwyers 9y ago

Headline is "United Airlines Reportedly Removed an Engaged Couple from a Flight to Their Wedding." The submitted headline would seem to violate site guidelines.

joelrunyon 9y ago
Not to mention, they're still ALLOWED to use police to remove passengers who refuse to comply with flight attendant instructions...which is what happened here... EDIT: It seems it was a US Marshall...not technically police.
- paulgb 9y ago
  It's not even "in spite of promise" (in the HN headline as of this comment); the promise was not to do it when they are overbooked.

Clubber 9y ago

I'm afraid their culture is too far gone and it will be a long, slow descent. They're news fodder now.

criley2 9y ago
Or, this will all blow over in 1 month, like it always has before, and while they will churn travelers temporarily, the next Delta/et al scandal will churn them right back to United. Plus the dollar is king and RyanAir proves you can spit on people and treat them like trash and they will line up to fill every plane as long as the price is right.
- _delirium 9y ago
  How people direct their outrage at these kinds of stories is pretty fickle, too. Right now, because of a quite egregious case, people are more skeptical of police removing people from planes than they used to be (which is probably good). But in a few months there will be some case of a passenger removed from a plane in circumstances that look bad for the passenger and/or trigger common pet peeves, and then we'll have a chorus of pro-police internet commentators saying "FINALLY someone did something about these assholes, I hope they start doing this regularly!!!"
- joelrunyon 9y ago
  The crazy thing about this to me is that United isn't that cheap compared to other airlines. At least Spirit will actually give you a steep discount on most fares and then treat you poorly. United has long known to been this bad and they still charge like a full-fare carrier.

joelrunyon 9y ago

Listen, I'm not a United fan, but this stuff stinks of people jumping on the outrage train. This is pretty clear what happened: > Soon after moving to other, empty seats in the economy cabin a few rows up, flight crew denied their request to pay a supplement for the seats, which United sells as "economy plus", and told them to move back to their original seats, Hohl said. So, they were not in their original seats when the plane was boarding. They don't allow this while people are boarding because the flight team needs to match people boarding to the manifest & it screws up other people who's seats they might be taking. They might allow you to switch seats AFTER takeoff, but that's a different story. The other part of the issue is they didn't move to comparable seats. > "We thought not a big deal, it's not like we are trying to jump up into a first-class seat," Hohl told KHOU. "We were simply in an economy row a few rows above our economy seat." From a fare standpoint, they're actually a different fare class. Just because it's not a different cabin, doesn't mean that's a headache. I'm not 100% sure of their policy, but United certainly isn't obligated to change people's seats and upgrade them once they're already issued a ticket & booked on the flight. Can you imagine the nightmare that ensues after people start requesting upgrades, exit rows, premium economy, etc when people are trying to board with children, suitcases that don't fit in bins and all the other stuff that happens in economy on boarding? This article (https://www.yahoo.com/style/united-airlines-kicks-couple-off-plane-en-route-wedding-181721817.html https://www.yahoo.com/style/united-airlines-kicks-couple-off...) is pretty clear that the sleeping man was awakened and their seats were available for use and there's no clear reason why they refused to return to their original ticketed seats. Like I said, I'm not a United fan, and I do everything I can to avoid flying them & use my points on their partner airlines internationally (which aren't bad actually), but this stuff screams of novice flyers not knowing the rules of the air and trying to milk the bad press train United is having. Edit: typo

LeifCarrotson 9y ago
> match people boarding to the manifesto Manifest. A manifesto is rather different.
- joelrunyon 9y ago
  fixed - thanks :)

bobbytherobot 9y ago

I'm not a United fan, but there is a big point of their story that is confusing. Why was a man napping across a row of seats during boarding?

logfromblammo 9y ago
I presume that the man was already boarded from a previous segment of a multi-segment flight, and that segment was lightly-booked enough to nap across multiple seats. This would be especially likely when boarding at a hub airport--like ORD. The fully-booked portion of the flight is from the hub to the end destination, but those passengers are coming in from N feeder routes. So 1/N of the feeder passengers can remain on the plane instead of getting out to make a connection. But even so, you still need to have enough of your ass in your own seat to be belted in during takeoffs and landings. That makes it mighty difficult to sleep across 3 or more seats through a stop. Looks suspicious. I suspect this couple was embellishing to surf a wave of anti-United sentiment for a bit. The guy was probably asleep in his own seat, and they just didn't want to climb over him and sit 3-to-a-row when other rows were empty. I wouldn't put it past United to seat an affianced couple in separated seats with a stranger seated between them, either.

burntrelish1273 9y ago

Most airlines aren't incentivized to treat customers as human beings... that's the bargain. That's the diff between Virgin / JetBlue and United / American. ProTip(TM): Virgin counter at LHR is probably the best on planet earth. Super friendly and helpful.