JUST SAY THE WORDS AND WE'LL BEAT THE
I’m retired, and I don’t fly nearly as much as I used to. That’s a relief, actually, because flight delays, cancellations, and missed connections seem to be more and more a routine part of the air travel experience. And then there’s United Airlines. A company that once boasted of its “friendly skies” now seems to be actively trying to drive customers away.
A couple of weeks ago, United stopped two teenage girls from boarding a flight because the girls were wearing the sort of leggings that millions of teenage girls routinely wear. Not content with the negative publicity from that incident, United outdid itself on Sunday when they had airport security drag a passenger off their plane in Chicago. A fellow passenger recorded the incident on her smart phone, and the video has gone viral.
As I understand it, the plane was full of paying customers, leaving no room for four United employees who were trying to get to Louisville to crew a flight there. United decided that their employees were more important than their ticketed customers, and launched its usual “we’re in an overbook situation” spiel, offering to pay passengers who were willing to delay their trip $1000. Apparently they came up a couple of seats short. Rather than leave two employees behind, they approached an older Chinese-American couple and told them they had to get off the plane. The man refused to comply, and three security personnel picked him up and dragged him out.
United obviously had better alternatives than the one they chose. The easiest thing to do would have been to increase the value of the voucher offer. Sooner or later, a couple of people would have taken the money. It would have cost the airline a few hundred extra dollars. This incident will wind up costing them a lot more than that, both in legal settlements and bad publicity.
Newspaper accounts indicate that the United employees needed to be in Louisville on Monday. The flight was scheduled to leave Chicago early Sunday evening. Were there no other flights out of O’Hare (whether on United or another carrier) that could have gotten the employees to Louisville by the next day? Or if flying wasn’t an option, it’s only a five hour drive from Chicago to Louisville. Why not rent your employees a car and let your paying customers stay on the plane?
The other major unanswered question is how United chose its victims. Do they have a policy with criteria (last ticket bought, last boarding pass issued) to guide the choice? Or did the captain go eeny-meeny-miny-moe, and just happen to land on two minorities? For that matter, why didn’t they identify the two unlucky passengers at the gate, break the news to them there and avoid a scene? Making the decision after everyone was on the plane and seated was a big mistake.
And – pro tip of the day for overpaid executives – when you find yourself in the middle of a PR disaster, don’t make things worse by resorting to bureaucratic bafflegab. Apologize, promise to fix the problem, and pledge to make whatever changes are necessary to avoid a repeat of the situation.
It seems bizarre that airlines are allowed to overbook – to sell more spaces on a flight than they actually have available. How is that even legal? And since transporting flight crews from airport to airport is a routine part of doing business, why can’t airlines factor that into their calculations about seat allotments? The incident in Chicago was a result of two kinds of bad management, and it doesn’t surprise me that passengers are beginning to revolt.
The days of flying the friendly skies were long gone before I ever got on an airplane, and the quality of the air travel experience has deteriorated further in recent years. I’ll put up with TSA lines, cramped seats and minimal amenities, especially on domestic flights. Just don’t make me miss my flight because your business model involves selling more seats than your planes actually have. As a paying customer, all I ask is that you get me to my destination more or less on time and don’t lose my luggage. That’s the only job airlines have. Just do your job.