Newsstand - You think your reservation is safe?

If your saving money or miles to fly, you better use them fast.
I personally predict FF programs will be gone in a few years and even cheap tickets in general, whoever pays the most flys, period.

http://www.signonsandiego.com/news/metro/braun/20080813-9999-1m13braun.html

The story is just set up too dramatic.
If someone is in hospice care, death is imminent in a way. You don't book tickets six months in advance, and pay for a beach house one year in advance, if it's related to a hospice situation, because you just don't have that much time.

I guess it is UA related:The very mention of United reminds me of how the airline ruined Cabral's dream vacation...

...

The day before they were to depart, Anita's daughter, Deanna Kawasaki, received an e-mail from United telling her she could check in her party online. But the site would not let her.

When she called United to see what the trouble was, she was told the flight had been canceled.

...

United threw out another explanation – a computer “lost” their reservations. That made no sense, either. If her reservations weren't in the computer, why did she get an e-mail telling her to check in?

At last, United confessed. There was indeed a flight, but they'd been bumped from it. Their assigned seats had been sold to someone else.

It's funny how every story of airline misbehavior inevitably arrives at this junction – the point at which a passenger must debunk a blatant lie to learn the truth.

Yup, UA-related.

It's interesting that in this story, they couldn't check in online because they were IDB'd. But as I understand it, the contract of carriage states that the airline has to seek volunteers first before denying anyone boarding. It's pretty clear they didn't do that in this case. And funnily enough, it looks like they didn't do it in another IDB case, which resulted in a lawsuit.

I don't think litigation is the solution to everything, but from the facts presented in this story, I'd love to see the IDB'd family take UA to court. Maybe after a few large pay-outs, UA's abysmal customer service problems will finally receive some attention from management.

I'm with snic, but there is a limited flexibility on the customers part in this story. Splitting up the group might have allowed them to have most of the vacation (it's not clear from the article). I'm definitely not defending UA, but as usual, there seems to be more to the story.

The story is just set up too dramatic.
If someone is in hospice care, death is imminent in a way. You don't book tickets six months in advance, and pay for a beach house one year in advance, if it's related to a hospice situation, because you just don't have that much time.

I would suggest you read the scomments left by the daughter below the article to have that comment answered.:rolleyes:

I'm with snic, but there is a limited flexibility on the customers part in this story. Splitting up the group might have allowed them to have most of the vacation (it's not clear from the article). I'm definitely not defending UA, but as usual, there seems to be more to the story.

It's true that there's probably more to the story, but according to the article, the best the airline was willing to do was to put them on flights that got some of their party to their destination 5 days into their 7 day trip. If true, that's clearly unacceptable.

It's true that there's probably more to the story, but according to the article, the best the airline was willing to do was to put them on flights that got some of their party to their destination 5 days into their 7 day trip. If true, that's clearly unacceptable.

In the article, it actually says that splitting the party up would have gotten some of them there in less than 5 days. Having now read the comments by the daughter (below the article) it sounds like they rejected options that got part of the group there in less than 5 days.

It also says that the stepfather confirmed his seats on the flight, so I'm assuming that this did not apply to all 8 passengers - again, not clear how many passengers were actually bumped vs the total number of passengers in the party.

But did they report to the airport punctually for their flight?

Once you are at the airport with your passenger receipt, the regular boarding and bumping rules should apply. If the airline says my reservation is cancelled and I didn't cancel it, I would expect the airline to prove it.

Now, after volunteers were asked for with reasonable compensation of the airline's choice, if this party was next in line to be bumped anyway, then that's a different story.

Travel tips: http://members.aol.com/ajaynejr/travel.htm

Please continue to follow this discussion in the FT Newsstand..
Thanks..
Obscure2k
TravelBuzz Moderator

This is apparently the refugee of threads. Nobody wants it!

UA Mileage Plus -> TravelBuzz -> Newstand

Where will this thread get moved next? ;)

If your saving money or miles to fly, you better use them fast.
I personally predict FF programs will be gone in a few years and even cheap tickets in general, whoever pays the most flys, period.

http://www.signonsandiego.com/news/metro/braun/20080813-9999-1m13braun.html

Oh yes, I'm completely in agreement with you. I think all FF programs will be gone too because, hey, why would they keep the only profitable part of the business going? Look at how horrible things have been for US, CO and DL. They were distracted from the airline's core business to address getting a combined $1bn+ in prepaid miles from the credit card companies. I can't think of anything worse than that. The last thing airlines need right now is cash.

:rolleyes::rolleyes:

It's interesting that in this story, they couldn't check in online because they were IDB'd. But as I understand it, the contract of carriage states that the airline has to seek volunteers first before denying anyone boarding. It's pretty clear they didn't do that in this case. And funnily enough, it looks like they didn't do it in another IDB case, which resulted in a lawsuit.

This wouldn't be the first time. One of my good friends was stuck in LAX in the thanksgiving storm fiasco last winter. Instead of properly IDBing her with cash, they just gave her a voucher for free flight and rebooked her 2 days later.. while telling her the flight is next day.

Have you read these? Quite a few of them are just plain wrong...I'm sure he has, since that site is registered as his homepage here on FT.

That said -- some (or alot) of the pages have not been updated in 8-10 years... ;)

The story is just set up too dramatic.
If someone is in hospice care, death is imminent in a way. You don't book tickets six months in advance, and pay for a beach house one year in advance, if it's related to a hospice situation, because you just don't have that much time.

When the flights were booked has no bearing whatsover for the actions of UA.

I wouldn't accept a 5 delay either. My company won't give me 5 extra days because UA screwed up royally.