A_Lee

Sorry for this rant, and if some of these problems have already been posted about before, without my knowing - I don't normally visit this forum as I don't fly UA very often.

I made some online reservations back in February for seven different itineraries this month and next month. I received email confirmations at the time, and I thought everything was fine until I recently got an email saying one of my flights had been automatically changed by UA. The change didn't fit my schedule so I called and they changed it to something suitable without any questions. All was fine, but I thought I'd check on my other flights...

ALL SEVEN of my itineraries had been auto changed by UA several months ago, but except for the one, they never sent out any email notifications! And get this, they changed two of them to invalid connections, ie. they had me departing on a connecting flight before my incoming flight arrives! This is a misconnect all on one ticket, not on separate tickets. I couldn't believe that an airline as large as UA doesn't even have enough IT expertise to put some simple checks into their system that would disallow such an obvious invalid connection.

Well, there were problems with each and every of the flights that they changed, ranging from mismatch to my schedule, or problems with connecting flights I had on other airlines. So I called up UA and told them that I had problems with each and every change they had done, and the totally incompetent agent couldn't do a single thing about it. Even the invalid connections couldn't be changed to anything valid fitting my schedule. It took forever to even try to explain to the agent that it was impossible for me to connect to a flight that departs 30 minutes before my arrival, unless UA has recently gone into the business of manufacturing time machines. The agent's solution was to attempt to book me on a flight that left an hour before my arrival!!!!

I had checked on both UA and ExpertFlyer ahead of time to verify that the flights I wanted had space available in my same booking class, yet the agent told me there were no seats on any of these flights. Out of 20 or more flights, not a single flight had any availability I was told. Complete idiot or liar! After telling him that each and every flight that he claimed there was no availability for showed as available on the UA website, he told me I should just go online and book the changes and then call UA back and I wouldn't be charged for the changes. Yeah, right, bozo - think I was born yesterday? I'm sure if I'd done that, and called back to UA, they'd tell me to go pound sand, and that I was stuck with all the additional charges. After spending over an hour with this fool, I finally hung up.

I called back the next day and asked to speak to a supervisor and explained the incompetent agent I got the day before. I spent another hour or so with her going over each ticket and got them changed to what I initially asked for, but couldn't get any explanation from her why the previous agent refused to correct them, even UA's blatant misconnections. Unfortunately I'm now stuck with some middle seats, because UA never informed me of their changes months ago when seating should have been wide open. But when I mentioned this, and it being 100% UA's fault that I lost my initial aisle seats, she said there wasn't anything she could do about it. I would have thought that at least they'd bump me up to E+ as compensation for their screw up.

Well, I had a fair amount of flexibility, and the new routings for most of my trips end up earning significantly more miles, so I'm not complaining too much about the need to reroute, but had my schedule not been so flexible, I would have been irate at their incompetence in changing my itineraries without informing me, like some 2-bit airline operating in a third-world country.

I'll be departing on my first of these flights in a few days, so went online today to make a printout of them all, and find again they made a change yet again without letting me know!

One further issue that points to complete incompetence in their IT department, the total travel time they show is all wrong. I normally don't even bother to check it, but for one where I was flying out of LAX and returning to LAX the next day, they had my total travel time showing as 25+ hours. Yet I arrived back the next day about 3 hours earlier than my departure the previous day, meaning the total travel time was something like 21 hours. I didn't really care, but tried to explain to the UA agent that there was a bug in their system, which was plainly obvious to see by that example. The idiotic agent tried to explain it away because I was traveling to a different time-zone. Hello, earth to UA, if you're departing from LAX and arriving back at LAX, it's the same friggin time-zone. The agent simply could not understand the concept that if you arrive back in the same time-zone, it doesn't matter what time-zones you pass through. I swear, the agent must have had an IQ less than 80.

I've seen incompetence before in various airlines I've flown on, but I've never experienced incompetence to this level before. I certainly hope the changes at UA to hire such incompetent employees doesn't spread from booking agents and IT people to their pilots.

Sorry for the rant, just had to get it off my chest about how low this airline has sunk to.

andrewwm

Definitely rant worthy (particularly the no notification of changes), but I wonder how much you've flown if you haven't encountered a clueless phone rep on other airlines

chinatraderjmr

I would have simply demanded a refund on every single ticket. It may have been easier to start from scratch

Palal

While I feel your frustration, have you ever heard of flyertalk rule no.1: if you don't like an agent, hang up politely and call again

LilAbner

Rule #2 (which could actually be moved up to rule #1)

ALWAYS -ALWAYS check your itineraries at least once or twice a week (or daily as I do --- BUT DEFINITELY EVERY SATURDAY MORNING).

Waiting months, like he did the first time, and weeks later the second time is a receipt for disaster!

In his defense, the Op, didn't know as he normally doesn't fly UA, but from now on he needs to keep a closer eye on em, especially if he doesn't want to receive the rhetoric from an incompetent res agent later on!!!

keisari

This is really sad; having to baby sit my reservation, then triple check to make sure that I am on the upgrade list, then keep checking until the door is closed. Neither CO nor UA was like this before the merger. Why has this gotten so out of control?

The OP has the right to be upset. He made a reservation, he paid for it and I am sure they already got their money and he has the expectation that the reservation will be there. He also has the expectation that they will notify him if there are changes, especially significant ones; it is obvious that they know how to get hold of him.

TWA Fan 1

I'm sorry I couldn't respond to this thread earlier (or do anything else, for that matter), as I have been checking my upcoming itineraries constantly in real time for the past 48 hours.

So far no changes, phew!

But seriously now...

Yes, passengers should occasionally check their itineraries. But that in no way removes the very basic customer service obligation from the company to keep its customers reasonably informed as to important events (such as itinerary changes) in their relationship with the customer.

This is a feature that CO brought to the table and it's clearly one that is pretty rotten.

It is entirely inexcusable and the fact that the airline did not inform its customer about the changes is in absolutely no way the passenger's responsibility.

This year so far I have had itinerary changes on AA, DL and UA. The only one that has not informed me about the changes is UA.

I wonder what is so hard about sending an email?

I know you have been successful in getting major sums refunded from CO dba UA (but then again you were buying full retail).

Have you ever dealt with CO dba UA CS in trying to have a non-refundable fare refunded, even after itinerary change?

Good luck!

I'm not sure how much CO you flew before the merger, but this was most definitely a recurring (if not chronic) problem on CO.

A_Lee

I fly extensively, but have never come across such a clueless agent as this UA agent was. Clueless in all aspects of his job. Most problem agents I've run across just have a problem with not knowing a particular rule or wanting to do one particular task. This guy seemingly didn't want to, or know how to do a single thing in his job description.

And much more expensive. I bought the tickets back when they were much cheaper, and with the rerouting that was necessary (due to some of my flights being cancelled), would have likely added much more additional costs, beyond just the fare difference.

In hindsight, I should have hung up much sooner than I did, and got a different agent. I had it in my mind though that he ought to be able to help me with at least one change, then I could hangup and get another agent to fix some of the other changes. In the end, in spite of being very frustrated, I kept going because I kind of just wanted to see how utterly incompetent the agent was and if he was going to continue his procedure of denying there were any flights whatsoever to fix their screw up.

Well, most all of my flying experience is with Asian based airlines, so perhaps that's one of my problems. I was expecting too much from UA. Of course I know the service on-board doesn't compare, but I was at least expecting UA would have their act together with their IT department. I fly UA rarely, at most a couple times a year, and all previous bookings with UA were made at the last minute, so there was no need for me to be checking constantly. I guess the other factor is that this was my first experience with UA since the merger. Based on some comments here, sounds like that may be at the root of the problem.

Anyways, wondering why they informed me of one of the changes, albeit very late after they made the changes, but not of the others. All the bookings were made with the same email address. To me it just smacks of a completely incompetent IT department. And the part of how there system allows for them to book onward connecting flights that depart prior to your arriving flight, it just boggles the mind how their IT department doesn't even program the system for such checking. What if I didn't spot the error on my own, and arrive at an airport only to find my connecting flight left a half hour prior? Wondering if anyone ever experience that sort of thing before? I've never in all my experience ever run across an airline that doesn't do even such a basic check on bookings.

TWA Fan 1

Notwithstanding the UA apologists on this board, the way UA treated you in this circumstance is completely unacceptable and not in the least the norm for U.S.-based airlines either.

It's a problem that has been chronic with CO for years and which has now gotten even worse when CO's systems were applied to the entire UA network.

It is absolutely not your responsibility to be vigilant for the changes the airline makes to your itinerary. It is their responsibility to inform you in a timely and pro-active fashion.

When I have had itinerary changes on other U.S. carriers, I have been pro-actively notified immediately, either via text message, email or phone, occasionally all three.

It does seem to be a fairly simple item to manage for the world's largest airline, but for whatever reason the problem continues.

svancleavemd

My experience with CO, pre merger, was almost 100% notification of schedule changes. Since March 3 of this year, I have not received any notification from UA about schedule changes. Their computer system is just plain horrible! My trip to MUC in November has been changed several times. When I view the reservation, I have to acknowledge the change in order to continue. I do that and nothing happens. Even called the 1K line and they could not fix the glitch. And by the way, my itinerary shows me on UA 902, IAD-MUC, 11/23, on an ERJ-145, in BF no less!

Bottom line, ALWAYS check your reservations, at least weekly. You should not have to, but that is the way it is. Now that UA is the biggest U.S. airline, they are a semi monopoly. They know it and act accordingly. If they really cared about customer experience they would be bending over backwards to make it better. Instead, you get a lame, half hearted mea culpa in the current Hemisphere magazine.

TWA Fan 1

Agreed with all, except that my experience with itinerary change notification on CO was close to 0%.

This problem appears to have grown worse since the merger, but it is definitely a CO problem at its root.

A_Lee

Wow, I had no idea this is such a huge system-wide problem. If this is the case, then it's certainly costing consumers some big money for missed connections, needing to pay extra for hotels, new flights, and all sorts of other expenses related to simply not being informed of the changes UA is making. Why hasn't there been some legal action being taken against the airline? Isn't there any way to bring a huge class action lawsuit against them and make them pay till it hurts for their incompetence? Or is there some law that protects the airlines in this case? Had they caused me any significant expense due to their not notifying me of the changes, I'd be knocking at their door demanding compensation and if not forthcoming, looking to file a lawsuit.

star_world

Given a dysfunctional system, why is it that people who (helpfully) post tips for how to work around its limitations and arrive at a relatively successful outcome get branded as apologists? You can post all you want about how many things are wrong with UA's systems and it's unlikely to change it. Should people be told *not* to babysit their reservations just because they shouldn't have to? That makes zero sense.

^ to the people offering constructive advice on how to work around the limitations of the system we have to deal with. I agree with the post above that this was not the environment that existed on either of the pre-merger entities. I had 100% notification of schedule changes on CO and at least 50% on UA, both of which seem to be better than what exists now.

DeaconFlyer

In case you haven't noticed, no posters on this board are decision-makers at UA. Therefore, criticizing posters for giving practical advice on how to best work within the existing system is pointless and mean spirited.

Sure, you can spend all your time on 1000 word posts on how UA is garbage. That's your prerogative. Other's feel like their time is better spent helping others overcome a systems limitation.

TWA Fan 1

This was most certainly not my experience flying on CO. My notification rate was a virtual zero.

As far as being helpful, if only a fraction of the energy spent berating passengers because they don't check their itineraries constantly were devoted to affecting change by making it clear to the airline that these significant failures on such very basic customer service issues are totally unacceptable and need to be remedied, I think that would be truly much more helpful.

Finally, the tome of these "helpful" posts, while providing a work-around, always come off as blaming the passenger for a supposed failure to stay on top of an issue which is, after all, the airline's responsibility (as in "if you don't check your itinerary constantly, you shouldn't be surprised if you will have a problem.")

That's just plain wrong. While I'm not saying passengers should be 100% passive, a major issue like itinerary changes is entirely the airline's responsibility, and just as the airline has the responsibility to rebook passengers, assign them seats, make sure flight crew are available, informing passengers is a basic and absolutely necessary part of the process.