United Airline Overbooks Flight and Drags Passenger Off Airplane; Is this moral?
Many of us on PuristSPro are frequent travelers by airplane. And as frequent travelers, we probably have all received unfair and unreasonable treatment from the airlines. If you haven't, be prepared. It's not a well known fact that when you buy a "ticket"...
no excuse for this
They should have kept increasing the compensation offer until they had enough volunteers. At some point, people will accept. Airlines take a gamble by overbooking and they make millions of dollars on the bet. When they lose the bet, they should be prepare...
My question is
The injured passenger was a doctor. Now if he was travelling to transplant an organ placed on ice into a patient, got kicked off the flight and then the organ deteriorates to the point of no return (highly likely scenario); who provides a replacement (com...
Good point!
My understanding is that the organs themselves are usually transported by private jet. At least that's what my surgeon friend and former schoolmate tells me. But you bring up a definite possibility.
They may be
But the surgeon would still have a tight deadline to transplant the organ in that scenario.
I'm very shocked!
The man did nothing wrong. The airline overbooked and should have offered more compensation in excess of $800/$1000 in vouchers to clients until the required number of volunteers stepped forward. If you overbook, shouldn't you pay the price of offering mo...
Hey, this is America
he will get a good lawyer and sue United for Millions in compensation I hope he will win that case big time. CC
True...
The sad thing is that we are probably all indirect stockholders in United Airlines considering so many funds invest in major airlines. I'm not a shareholder individually and I checked if I was a shareholder through a fund I was in to declare any professio...
In my opinion
the issue is not of morality, if the 'legality' of it all was thought of right in the first place. For me, the issue here is in the fine print! Period.
You bring up a very good point...
According to ticket contract, virtually every airline does have the ability to kick passengers off after asking for volunteers. So I can see from a legality perspective United didn't do anything illegal. But considering how it was done, to enforce their s...
I believe its is about time...
the whole aviation industry, not just UA change the way how they do their business! I'm certainly not a lawyer nor do I pretend to be, but if I may, find this whole business of overbooking, "re-accommodating" et cetra a 'misrepresentation' or sorts. Bout ...
Certainly not moral. About legality, we have to read the rules written on the plane ticket or flight document.
But there is something certain: That sucks. You buy a plane ticket in due time, your seat should be guaranteed. Period. Best, Nicolas
Excellent technical viewpoint.
Thank you Nicolas for simplifying. We do agree to the fine print when we buy airplane tickets. Legally any restaurant in the USA can refuse service to any patron at any moment; not a lot of people know this, but it's true. I'm not legally entitled that I ...
Slightly different, though
In terms of a restaurant, if a patron is refused service before paying, that's different. With airlines, passengers pay up front, and sometimes months ahead. At the very minimum, if someone is kicked off a plane, there should be a full refund, plus compen...
You're right. Not an entirely fair analogy.
Which just means the airline has even greater responsibility to fulfill its contract because the customer has already paid in good faith. Whereas the customer pays the restaurant at the end of the meal.
Great point about paying in advance. Also, with a restaurant, there are others to go to. In the case of airlines there are only three big ones in the US
(Foreign owned airlines are forbidden from competing) So you can\'t take your business elsewhere and book a flight on an airline that doesn\'t overbook, or which will give compensation commensurate with disruptions. In terms of customer experience, it\'s ...
It may become my speciality, but for that, you have to kill the guy who refuses the seat you bought or the dinner you ordered... BUT...
There is a very simple rule to follow: Report to the Public what happened to you. This is certainly the kind of advertising companies fear...
Excellent advice Nicolas!
And don't worry, I'll be well behaved at any restaurant I go to. I don't even ask for more salt or pepper!
Very true...
I've been flying United Airlines since I was four years old. And I'm a frequent flyer with United; in the past six months I've booked at least five round trip flights booked with United (January to Geneva was with British Airways which was delayed, lost m...
Its inhuman , disrespectful and unacceptable period
If the passenger refused and thats his right as he paid for the ticket just as everyone else I see it as also a racist act The American Airlines in general are full of incidents where race has something to do with it and that is a shame from the land if f...
I don't have that luxury...
Where I live, United is the major and definitive carrier. But even then, this could happen on any airline, all flyers should be cautious, I'm almost fearful!
Customer service
seems to be a thing long forgotten among many airlines which is a very sad thing. The CEO's statement has a lack of foresight as it has irreparable damage on United Airlines reputation in the long run. Airlines seem to think that passengers need them more...
I agree, the CEO's internal memo was too forboding and overconfident that the airline was in the right...
The CEO's actions are among some of the most surprising to me. Knowing that this is a potential powder keg, the CEO's first actions should be to protect the airline's reputation and the shareholders' investments. His memo does neither. If I were a shareho...
Completely reprehensible behavior.
Usually (AFAIK), the airlines routinely overbook planes, but end up with last minute cancellations. It did not happen in this scenario. I do not want to speculate as to what UA could have done to accommodate ALL passengers, but it certainly was not what t...
Well said...
"Immoral, unethical, and plane stupid" is a perfect summation! I too am so disgusted by this action and I emphatically feel for the other passenger. Just so terrible.
And to add to the stupidity:
They start a #unitedvoyages (or whatever it\'s called) campaign which promptly backfires. What did they think would happen? Who runs these companies? My dog could have predicted the fallout.
Their PR team right now is handling this situation so poorly...
Your dog literally probably would have a better "paw" on the situation!
It gets even worse...
According to how the news has been reported locally, the reason why they wanted to deplane the passenger was to accomodate four flight crew members from a partner airline (so not other paying passengers). Irrespective of the fine print, basically passenge...
There's a whole new social media campagin about United's post-dragging action...
United's PR team and CEO used the word "re-accommodate" the other passengers. Today, that word "re-accommodate" is now being made synonymous with dragging off airplanes or kicking off airplanes. The word "re-accommodate" was definitely a poor word choice,...
no, nope, nada, nyet....#boycottunited
awful and appalling, no words to describe this.
I still find it shocking that something like this happened!
Seriously, an airport police officer would drag someone off a plane like this. Police officers are supposed to provide peace and calmness and are specifically trained to defuse situations. Just a sad situation.
True, but I would hope that they have strong moral conscience too. And that their training reinforce that sense of morality.
I feel not enough blame is put on the officers who did the actual drag-ings.
True, root of the bad tree...
However, I'm happy to report I have met a lot of good police officers. But these ones in Chicago certainly didn't make the right decision.
I stopped travelling on Western Airlines....
Culturally too cold and indifferent to the point of being rude, too by the book and procedures due to fear of legal ramifications and fear of loosing their jobs, God forbid you are in Economy, seats as hard as granite. Airlines from smaller or less advanc...
You're right...
Having flown with those airlines of smaller countries, I totally agree! They are often quite good! EVA (Evergreen) Air is one of my favorites. I have a newfound appreciation for my friends coming from the East to the USA on an American carrier.
Violence is never right
There is something very wrong here as most of us agree. However if bumping passengers has to take place, surly that is done before the formal boarding an aeroplane? It certainly happened to me that way in Paris. Otherwise checked-in baggage has to be remo...
Thank You Clive.
I agree, the passenger should never have boarded. First mistake made by the airline. Just so shocking. I wonder what I would do if something similar happened in my presence. Admittedly there's not much I could do without getting myself into a lot of legal...
Overbooking is common and some airlines do it
more aggressively than the others. I just find it absurb that any airline would try to eject a passenger who is already seated. Shouldn\'t they manage the headcount at the gate instead?
Yeah, I've been denied boarding at the gate, but never once I've already been seated.
And come to think of it, I wasn't offered any compensation! And I had to fly into a different airport that was 40 miles further from my destination! The gate agent didn't do their job as efficiently as they should have.
Similar experience. Checked in with no seat assignment, arrived at the airport three hours early and told my flight was cancelled. I could see it still listed in the departure board. It wasn't cancelled. I was driven in a van to another airport.
We didn\'t take off until hours after my original flight. I asked again and delta said it was a weight and balance issue. Complained more and delta finally explained that a preferred customer was booked on an earlier flight that had been cancelled. As a r...
Lying airlines...
An airline can't lie to you like that. That's terrible. If a flight is cancelled for weather reasons that's one thing; but to lie to you and tell you it's cancelled in order not to pay you your deserved compensation for an overbooked flight, that's just h...
They probably thought that if they lied and I believed it, best possible outcome. But given the flight was still scheduled, and I asked, they made up a new lie.
Maybe it\'s my fault for questioning them too much. Otherwise I would have thought "my flight was cancelled for reasons beyond the airline\'s control, but thankfully they got me on another flight back from another airport. I\'m so lucky!!!" The guy who to...
Goes back to US govt.
United and continental were allowed to merge thanks to to our govt. basically creating a monopoly. Since then United has screwed the flyers every possible way they could. All about $$$. Not about people. Wells fargo makes false credit cards and thats fine...
I never understood American and European airlines ...
Team, I don't understand why the most advanced regions of this planet, have the worst airline services ever. Every time I need to fly local/regional trips, I think about this matter. Do they look around (Asia is my reference) to see how the others do? Old...
It's quite funny...
The British wrote the book about service; and they established the roles of butlers, stewards, hand-maidens, and others. But I find British Airways to be one of the worse airlines in existence.
Lack of competition is one factor. Airlines enjoy narrow oligopolies, and sometimes monopolies on some routes.
This greatly limits consumer choice and therefore heavily impacts airline business behavior.
Not right.
You can't remove a seated passenger from the plane without mutual agreement. The plane was heavily overbooked. I guess even at check-in or the boarding gate, a number of passengers had been denied boarding, with or without compensation. From what the news...
Valuable experience...
$1500? Wow, I would've taken that! Definitely agree with your statements; "you simply can't remove a boarded, non disruptive, seated passenger from the plane without mutual agreement, let alone by force." That's definitely a fair statement that all airlin...
I would have taken up that offer, if I hadn't been lined up for my schedule over the next week.
I guess my fellow passengers on the same plane felt the same, but no one moved even as the gate agent gradually increased the offer from several hundred to $1500. Back to this incident, the airline should have denied boarding to passengers at the gate (wi...
Yeah, I can understand why nobody took the offer...
They had already been seated. And the next flight is a whole day away. And the compensation is a little low. I gave up my seat once for a 90 minute wait for the next flight and I was compensated $400 in vouchers. $800-$1000 for a whole day would throw a m...
This is one of the facts that bothered me the most.
UAL is falsely claiming this is a standard situation of overbooking, when in reality it appears they just wanted to bump (oops..."reaccommodate") passengers to accommodate the four airline employees.
This "Re-accommodate" is the new word!
The definition of "re-accommodate" is basically anything the airline wants it to be.
Good juicy topic Patrick
I've been reading the thread on FlyerTalk but I never participate there so glad we have one here. As a frequent business flyer, this story tells me a few things: (1) I am a glass half empty person when it comes to flying and this kind of thing just suppor...
Busier here than expected!
As of right now there have been about 2000 views on PuristSPro and we're not even a travel website! There are countless pages of discussion on FlyerTalk and nearly 3000 posts lambasting the CEO and the incident. The pages on FlyerTalk are growing by the h...
+1. Just really amazed UAL have defended themselves they way they have
It stopped being an issue of who is right or wrong once the mobile phone videos got out showing the passenger with a bloodied face. Oscar Munoz has to be a robot not to understand the emotional impact of seeing those videos. This is the beginning of the e...
Yeah, this recalcitrant attitude in defense of the airline's actions is unusual...
This will definitely be the case study for many in the PR industry for the future. Going into the history books as one of the biggest PR nightmares and mishandlings ever.
Lot to talk about here...
I find peoples' visceral reactions to the use of force interesting. Across the universe of opinions, you have some who are quick to side with the airline: passengers/customers should always obey...almost as if humans are sheep and those giving commands (e...
Good points
...but 1) violence is never necessary unless one of the party turns violent and the police/authorities would have no choice .The 'patron' can still be successfully ejected by force not amounting to assault if not obeying a lawful request. 2) not a lawyer,...
No matter what the "fine print" may say (and I'm not an attorney), I'll just say what's already been said by others here.
The actions of the United employees and law enforcement involved in this morass are reprehensible and downright stupid. And then to hear the CEO make excuses..!? Unbelievable. And on top of it all 1) the guy was already seated and 2) the bump was initiate...
I like that last line the most!
"I won't do business with thugs. Not 'voluntarily' anyhow." Well said. That's a line I think everyone would want to follow.
I believe it is about time...
the whole aviation industry, not just UA change the way how they do their business! I'm certainly not a lawyer nor do I pretend to be, but if I may, find this whole business of overbooking, "re-accommodating" et cetra a 'misrepresentation' or sorts. Bout ...
From reading online it seems like it's the right of the airline to boot paying customers if they choose to
I don't see anything wrong with that from a business perspective because they have to protect themselves from unforeseen circumstances. The passenger is also in the wrong, as this is a private property, whether he paid or not. He has been asked to leave f...
Thank you for adding your perspective!
I can see from a strict legal standpoint that the airline does have the right to ask you to deboard. But imagine it was your elderly mother; who was asked to deboard. She doesn't know the fine print, but she wants to get home. She believes she paid good m...
Seems like it's a good decision to avoid united on hindsight.
Have avoided them since 2005 after horrible experience. Asian carriers are generally better in service from my experience. A different case if traveling domestic in us as you are left with the usual suspects. But I would defer to southwest or Alaska where...
Yes, UA acted badly. But what about the man?
Agreed that UA should have just kept offering more money until they got the empty seats that they needed. They screwed up. But, on the other hand, IMO the man should have accepted his fate and exited the plane, rather than raise a stink and refuse to comp...
I beg to differ in opinion
If United's offer of $800 wasn't good enough to entice any of the hundred(s) of checked-in, boarded, and seated passengers on the plane, and the "randomly" chosen few had to accept their fate, then United could well offer only $50 next time and the "lucky...
Please reread the first sentence in my earlier comment...
I do not disagree with you about that. As proof I refer you to my statement above: "Agreed that UA should have just kept offering more money until they got the empty seats that they needed. They screwed up." I do not think I could have stated it more clea...
I do not agree with the policies of the airline or the special laws/rules that they follow,
But being an educated person would you allow yourself to be dragged off a plane or would you walk off? Seems the passenger may have contributed to his own injuries. He had actually already deplaned and ran back on when he figured out the next flight was t...
For the sake of discussion the passenger also had the right to defend himself, he declined leaving the seat (that he paid for). While the "officer" forcefully evicted him.
First off I seldom travel, but I have to say that... No one has the right to put a hand on you if you are following the law. If there really is a clause in this contract when you buy a ticket that you can get forcefully removed from your seat then they wo...
Based on the current law he was not following it.
My only point is as an educated person the minute I realize something forceful is about to occur I would have changed course and walked off the plane.
On X-mas eve 2015 ...
.. my daughter and son in law booked a flight from Tel-Aviv to Brussels with Jetairfly (Now Tui-airlines). Upon arrival at the airport they couldn't get on the plane as it was overbooked. The airline stated they had sent them an email they couldn't go on ...
Haunting memories...
That's just a terrible story. It's amazing that we entrust an airline to get us to our destination in times of great stress, pain, and anguish; and not only do they not deliver, they rudely add greater insult to injury. Perhaps we should trust the airline...