dsquared37

Was this a serious stab at an excuse?

Plane-is-home

Why should he? There should be no excuse for that UA employee power trip.

bldr1k

I've certainly been in this lounge when traveling domestically but I'm guessing that it was overcrowded and that was the basis for her comment. She should have said" we have another lounge at gate XX that has more seats since this is a peak time for international flights".

The IAD lounges are all a disaster at peak times. Even on weekends I have a hard time finding a seat sometimes.

Miles Ahead

He won't get it. I was once denied entrance, and getting even an "oops" out of UA was like pulling teeth. They understood I was paying for something and not getting it. They just didn't care.

JetAway

I feel pretty confident this is what happened. It was a well-intentioned, poorly executed effort at space management.

FlyWorld

The thing I find most bizarre about this is the fact that two employees (a.k.a. "co-workers") refused entry to you and apparently made up the notion of an "international lounge."

It leaves me scratching my head and wondering where in the world did this concept originate?

How, when, why, and how did someone invent the notion that a regular RCC (a.k.a. UC) lounge is now for international flights only?

And, perhaps more significantly, if they adopted a position that the lounge was only for international flights, unless the "co-workers" invented that notion exactly the moment you arrived, they must have refused entry to others, as well, before you, since a majority of UC members are probably on domestic flights. Assuming that's so, isn't there some point where someone would start to question the situation as to why an endless stream of UC members are showing up and asking to use the membership they paid for, all day long, day after day?

1KPath

This is my thinking as well! I have spent 100s of hours in UCs (RCCs) over the years at IAD and there have been times that C8 is so crowded with int'l C customers that I have had my PC "angels" tell me I would be better off not even going in...and he/she was right!!

After saying this, however, there is no excuse in preventing a valid UC member from accessing the club at any time that it is open...save a fire marshal enforced occupancy limit, where UA should provide alternative benefits (which pmUA did a number of times when the D club was too crowded, in the form of meal/beverage certs and wireless access codes and $ certs!...the good old days)

CCIE_Flyer

Unless you have a serious affinity for carrots, the moat dragon probably did you a favor - easily one of the worst, most over-crowded clubs in the system.

But I would most definitely complain. Loudly.

hobo13

So if something has never happened to you, it must not be able to happen to anybody else?

Passmethesickbag

Well-intentioned? Turning somebody away who has a flight in 45 minutes from the gate next door would be bad enough, but doing so by lying through your teeth makes good intentions a fairly far-fetched interpretation, IMHO.

LilAbner

I must agree with the last several posts. It is my guess also that the club at C-8 was jammed and the guards were manufacturing a reason to prevent too many more people from entering. The OP wouldn't know this because he was probably turned around upstairs, and even if he managed to get down below he needed to get past the second line of defense (perch).

Instead of telling folks that other clubs are available they simply manufactured a story and from what I've seen throughout the years they love doing this crap.

After the OP spoke to a second employee about wanting access to the club the patented answer should have been,, "We'll make a one-time, life-time exception this one time", especially when he was demanding to speak to a supervisor and stood there for over 10 minutes.

These people are almost all top seniority employees, and lack direct supervision, and get their kicks playing "GOD"!

What really pisses me off about this incident is that the OP paid extra for this membership and got screwed by a pair of "Gate Keepers" that need to get off their a$$es and stand behind a podium at a gate for a few months to get their heads straight.

Nothing is ever done, it seems, to rectify these complaints and that's why they continually pull crap, over & over.


Btw, most of these UC people at IAD are pmUA employees that are still learning Shares after 1 1/2 years and where better to improve their knowledge than outside at Gate #8.

boss315

ain't no cure for stupid, is there????

sammyindc

That's why I tend to use the LH lounge in the B terminal when flying out of IAD.

KevinB

There was a basement? Maybe I'll get to see it some day....

Just realized I'm flying through IAD two times in August... I"m looking forward to stopping in again and "visting" with the same agent if she's working...

catocony

There was no reason to lie if the club was full. A very simple "Sorry Mr. Flyer, we're full in here at the moment. There's another, bigger club 3 minutes away at C17."

That's all it would take, and I doubt if anyone would complain about that response. That's why I think it was pure laziness or ineptitude on the desk person at C8.

The C8 club is my least favorite of the three regular clubs at IAD. Personally, I prefer to fly out of D since I think that club is the best of the admittedly downtrodden bunch. Also, I don't have to take the Train To Nowhere and walk back to C, which, after the Chutes and Ladders routine to get down to the train from the Pre-Pass checkpoint, is at least 5 minutes longer and a lot more walking that the old people mover to the D concourse.