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Man dragged from plane for refusing to voluntarily give up his seat.

americanwoman said:
This. I worked in the travel industry and the majority of the major airlines have all kinds of restrictions and rules and change fees included in most tickets, it's ridiculous.
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Good point, from the customer perspective, the Airline treats the ticket as a binding legal contract.
 
americanwoman said:
Wow, I thought it was bad enough but the guy who didn't want to give up his seat had a pretty dang good reason according to the article:
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The laws may protect United from Criminal penalties, but I don't think they want a civil jury
watching those videos.
 
DaveFagan said:
United crapped their drawers, for sure. They should have bribed the passengers and called it an auction. Bigger bribes until it worked, auction format.

/
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You are exactly correct - everything has a price!
 
Mac77 said:
Its only fair if all the passengers agree to take their chances and abide by the luck of the draw

But the man had every right to keep the seat he paid for
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Actually I doubt he did.
 
ttwtt78640 said:
Why not say that once the plane is full then no more can board it (first come first served)? Don't let in (on?) more than the aircraft can seat and then start thinking about seating capacity.
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Seriously, there is no excuse for the airline not doing at least this much.

But this is America @2017, there are whole lists of things that we used to be able to do properly that we can no longer manage.

Putin Propaganda Network Brand SpuntnikNews is having great fun with this, because even the Russians can handle this little maneuver....only boarding those who are going.
 
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longview said:
The laws may protect United from Criminal penalties, but I don't think they want a civil jury
watching those videos.
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Oh yes, with the public's current dissatisfaction with the airline industry please play that video for a civil jury. I just hear the words KA CHING, KA CHING, KA CHING.

As someone else pointed out they should have just kept upping the amount they would offer someone to take a later flight. Eventually someone is going to take the bite. It would have been far cheaper than the lottery this passenger just won.
 
Winchester said:
Actually I doubt he did.
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Were this an actual case of overbooking, United would have a different sort of problem,
perhaps more so from a legal stand point. (Did they take money from two people for the same seat on the same flight?)
The announcement was that the flight was overbooked, which was not true, as the 4 seats needed were
not for paying customers, and had nothing to do with bookings.
 
Crosscheck said:
Oh yes, with the public's current dissatisfaction with the airline industry please play that video for a civil jury. I just hear the words KA CHING, KA CHING, KA CHING.

As someone else pointed out they should have just kept upping the amount they would offer someone to take a later flight. Eventually someone is going to take the bite. It would have been far cheaper than the lottery this passenger just won.
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Absolutely, If they offered me two round trips to Europe, to move to a later flight, I would be all over it.
 
americanwoman said:
This. I worked in the travel industry and the majority of the major airlines have all kinds of restrictions and rules and change fees included in most tickets, it's ridiculous.
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The other side which makes m wonder what happened here is that on a few occasions I have been booked on overbooked flights. Generally speaking the airline made offers starting with a discount future ticket or rebate on the present one, then the offer escalated to a free anywhere standby ticket or air miles. I've never been on a flight where the airline couldn't make a deal and drew straws for the seat.

Another article stated the removal was based on class of ticket, air miles, frequent flyer, etc. This may have been at least part of the problem.
 
Spartacus FPV said:
They're engaging in damage control trying to delete all reddit threads on the matter, its as if the fools never heard of the Streisand effect.
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1) I'm pretty sure United has zero control over Reddit

2) There are like a dozen threads on Reddit about this
 
mike2810 said:
In the linked article they needed four volunteers to leave the plane. They got none. So they said a computer program would be used to select four random passengers.

My question. What would you do, other than don't overbook flights? Seems to me a random draw is reasonable.
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Random, huh? If I put twenty dollars on first and business class passengers having never been "randomly" selected for removal, would you give me good odds?
 
mike2810 said:
In the linked article they needed four volunteers to leave the plane. They got none. So they said a computer program would be used to select four random passengers.

My question. What would you do, other than don't overbook flights? Seems to me a random draw is reasonable.
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Cardinal said:
Random, huh? If I put twenty dollars on first and business class passengers having never been "randomly" selected for removal, would you give me good odds?
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How to reduce the chances of getting kicked off a United flight

United Contract of Service

Under Rule 25—on page 35 if you print it out—the agreement says exactly what happens if the flight is oversold. “If there are not enough volunteers, other Passengers may be denied boarding involuntarily,” the language reads. (Of course, the deplaned man was not denied boarding, he was already boarded.)

The language continues however, shining light on how these “other Passengers” are chosen. It’s not random, it’s “in accordance with UA’s boarding priority.” That means that if you have a higher fare class, have a complex itinerary, have status (e.g. gold or platinum), have checked in early, or are a frequent flier, you are less likely to be asked to take the next flight. Even if it’s just a frequent flier card that you never use, it might save you from being forcibly dragged off a plane.

Any kind of priority is better than no priority, when it comes to not getting forcibly removed from a plane.

For passengers looking to take advantage of the budget seats offered, this unspoken ranking and largely unknown class system is important to know. Though companies take great pains to say otherwise, if you paid less, you are not as valued a customer.
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mike2810 said:
In the linked article they needed four volunteers to leave the plane. They got none. So they said a computer program would be used to select four random passengers.

My question. What would you do, other than don't overbook flights? Seems to me a random draw is reasonable.
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Keep offering more and more incentives to passengers to take the next flight. Offer enough and you will get volounteers
 
mike2810 said:
In the linked article they needed four volunteers to leave the plane. They got none. So they said a computer program would be used to select four random passengers.

My question. What would you do, other than don't overbook flights? Seems to me a random draw is reasonable.
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You got it right the first time. Don't overbook flights.
 
United is back-tracking on calling it an "overbooking." They now say they had to get a crew Louisville and asked 4 to deplane. One refused.

United says passenger was removed after they had to get a crew to Louisville to avoid a future cancellation. Flight was NOT overbooked.
 
Quag said:
Keep offering more and more incentives to passengers to take the next flight. Offer enough and you will get volounteers
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Or as I half jokingly suggested earlier, United would be better off today if they had bought four tickets from Ameican Airlines for their employees to use
 
buck said:
And if the crew they needed the seats for weren't able to get on... what about the other 200 people on the next flight that wouldn't be taking off? .
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Maybe the crew should have been put on an earlier flight? Just a thought.
 
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