TMOliver

For the last few years, retired, far fewer flights beyond a few vacation trips and biennial jaunts to Europe, my wife of 52+ years has become increasingly uncomfortable with airports and airlines. This year, having put aside a trip to Istanbul because of Turkish unrest, we weren't planning much travel. Then our daughter called inviting my wife along on a 6 day combination business/pleasure trip to Florida which since our only (ever) grandchild was traveling along, was an invitation impossible to decline.

Well, United lived up to its current propensity for inadequate performance, likely cemented her aversion to traveling by air (and brought an end to my flying which dated back to the days when DC-3s were mainline a/c).

The trip to FL went well, like clockwork through IAH, almost welcoming arms at TSA (carryons only, but a car seat/stroller combo to raise the level of impediments), boarding and seats on sked, then on time into MIA, where (in the face of all my bad memories) even the car rental went well.

But was only on the trip home, days later, that the "Fit Hit the Shan" at UA. Unable to earlier print boarding passes, a visit to a kiosk went all wrong, no BPs. Then came a wait in line, tick tock on the clock, as UA staff seemed to fumble what should have been simple. Finally, as time grew shorter, the BPs appeared, but UA staff apparently made no attempt to contact the gate.

Our daughter put herself in "passing gear", going quickly (again, thank you, TSA!) through security, leaving my wife and grand daughter to follow (even with the sear/stroller, minimal delay at TSA!). Of course, as has been true in most of my travels, the gate in question was the 'farthest". But as she reached the gate, still before the traditional moment when the door closes. she found boarding already terminated and 1 or more of her 3 seats already taken by standbys.

Then came more UA misadventures. First, after the agent offered to arrange accommodation aboard a AA(Eagle) flight 2 hours later (w/seats available), the offer was withdrawn because no supervisor was available or willing to sign off, the best offer was at the end of a long standby list for a later UA flight. Our daughter asked for a partial refund, happy to book herself on the AA flight. No hey, Jose! Non-refundables. Well, our daughter bought tickets from AA, and they eventually returned to IAH only about 3 hours late.

The incident did bring a classic comment from our 4 year old grand daughter:
"Momie, I'll give you a dollar from my piggy bank, if you get us home tonight!"

By then, my wife, only agreeing to fly on the trip because our grand daughter was going, had reached the point of "Never again!" At 74, decisions may not always appear totally rational, but once made are graven in stone.

So, thanks, UA...You've ended my flying life (and shortened my accessible "Bucket List"). I'll never visit the Pera Palas again (along with a few other memorable stops from yesteryear). We'll drive to Beaufort in October, and take the long road up to the Greasy Grass next Spring.

I apologize for the length of this rant, but color me as displeased as Dr. Dao.

sannmann

Did Customer Care throw some miles at you for your inconvenience?

blueman2

This type of story, while not at all unusual for most of us here, is pretty much that reason why my parents stopped flying several years ago. While most of us can take the crap that airlines dish out to us every day, some (particularly elderly) cannot. Thus, many elderly are shut out of travel altogether since commercial air travel is pretty much the only way to go.

So like you, my parents have been stuck unable to travel for the last 5 years. Too old to drive, to0 afraid of the hassle of air travel, they just sit at home. They won't even fly with any of us kids because they are so frustrated by the airlines' poor treatment of customers. Even in F class.

HoyaSFOIAD

The FT'er in me wants to throw out the usual questions (how long before the flight did you get to the airport, what was the issue with the BP's, how long before departure did you get to the gate) but something tells me none of that really rises to any level of relevance here

If your wife decided that life's to short to deal with it, welp, the boss has spoken!

TMOliver

"Customer Care"? The incident happened Thursday evening (5/25). "Customer Care" is enjoying the holiday break, and wouldn't begin to dole out even a pittance before Tuesday (unless the staff return to work with hangovers, requiring a 36 hour delay in responses).

Our daughter has some connections in the travel industry, and I suspect she'll be pursuing a refund, etc., with all the persistence of a rabid wolverine. Miles? 6 figures or so (more than unlikely) and she might not start rumors that UA sucks aigs, runs rabbits, and maintains a storage facility for the remains of unhappy travelers who simply died of frustration while in transit.

EricH

The most interesting fail here is "no supervisor was available or willing to sign off." Didn't UA say that they were going to fix that?

AndyPatterson

As you (and I) have found out the hard way, waiting until you get to the airport to print out the boarding passes is TOO LATE. As the result of a similar experience (on AAnother airline) I have since forced myself to schedule some time at a copy/print shop (usually FedEx Office) to print out the boarding passes before heading to the airport. Doing so avoids the cascading sequence of events outline here -- which were deja vu to me.

IAH-OIL-TRASH

There's a bunch of info to be provided here to make travel easier.

1) Arrive at airport 2 hours ahead of time if you're dealing with children. By airport, that means check-in lobby.
2) You must be at the gate 15 minutes ahead of time or your seats may be given away (why you should be at the airport 2 hours ahead of time).
3) United provides auto check-in for remainder of domestic itineraries, w/ BPs sent to your cell phone or tablet. No need to print.

Lani1

I see it daily - crazy how people are treated by ALL airlines, those of us who have to do it deal with it , have status, etc deal with it - others I feel are taking a beating.

username

Gate agents' incentive is to depart the flight on-time (T-15). So, they won't proactively hold the plane unless they are told by higher authority (i.e. not the ticket counter agent).

As the population grows older, I wonder if airlines would pay some attention to the elderly segment. The cost is probably higher than the profit though so no one will do it?

halls120

I doubt it. As people get older, they fly less. Last time my parents flew, it was for my daughter's wedding 13 years ago. My mother was 73 then and it was her first experience with the TSA Gestapo, and she said afterwards she would never step foot in an airport again. And she hasn't.

iahphx

I hate to be unsympathetic, but what time did you get to the airport for your flight home? Why did you not pre-print your boarding pass? If something has gone wrong and you can't pre-print a boarding pass, that's a HUGE sign that's something wrong. Regardless, if you don't have a boarding pass, you really want to be at the airport early, because things do go wrong. As they did for you. Without being there, I'm not sure who bears the most "fault" for your problem, but I am almost 100% certain that you were contributorily "negligent" : that with more planning, you could have avoided this disaster.

BTW, a similar thing just happened to me last month with Delta. I was travelling with my family back from Hawaii, and my kids' boarding passes wouldn't print out on the computer. Turns out that there was a glitch in the way DL matches middle names with TSA pre-check to known traveler numbers. It took more than a half hour to get the boarding passes at the airport, with plenty of confusion. But I arrived 2 hours in advance to straighten it out. Was it absurdly annoying? Yes, but things sometimes happen. Should DL have done a better job with this? Yes, they should have. But with some pre-planning, I was fine. I will certainly fly DL again. I would suggest you should also give UA another shot, too, but that's your call.

mduell

This seems like a kneejerk overreaction, and after reading the entire thing I'm unclear why it's being posted here. I'm not even going to ask the usual timing questions and just assume it was poor planning.

But I would say consider flying private, and just doing less of it, rather than giving up air travel altogether.

username

I would say we want to try to have some empathy. Not everyone travels like we do and all these rules, problems and unfriendliness can be overwhelming to a lot of people. OP said it was a struggle to start with and now this - I can understand it.

GrayAnderson

The underlying problem here is that the ability to print off a BP at the airport in a timely manner, regardless of the reasons, really needs to be a "basic function" of the airline. I cannot say if OP was "cutting it close" or just got horridly unlucky (that's sort-of another discussion) but, particularly with the IT meltdowns in the last few months at DL and BA (that I remember because of their...spectacular...scale) there comes a point that I'm inclined to put fault at the feet of the airline(s) for relying on IT to save on costs but not being able to recover when their complex systems have a hiccup.