WashState

I have been a loyal United customer for the last fifteen years, flown well over a million miles and have maintained 1K status for a decade. Now, I dread flying United. Their service is terrible, the flight attendants are rude and the merger with continental transitioned them from a once great airline a tier two or three carrier.
They have lost the commitment to their high mile flyers they once had and seem to be more interested in promoting their explorer card. I recently flew Alaska Airlines across the country. It was a great experience, reminded me a little of the United of the past – but their routes are limited. The good news is they are partners with both American and Delta. I am switching to one of them. I’m done with United.

StingWest

I'm sure that many will agree with you strongly, and many will disagree with you strongly - most will come out in the middle somewhere. Also, there's the subject of the "race to the bottom" that most major airlines are guilty of to some degree. Things like charging for checked bags, change fees etc.

I come out in the middle. For a "higher mileage" (1K) flyer who travels mostly TATL, I'm pretty happy with UA now. Love the C and F seats for comfort which compare favorably with anything out there for example. Service out of SFO has been on the upswing lately, after a less-than-ideal 2012. And finally, MileagePlus award redemption is really quite good - I've even been able to schedule close-in (<60 day) confirmed upgrades to European destinations pretty often - can the other airlines do this as well?

People who fly mostly within the USA will often have sharply lower opinions of UA than me though, depending a lot on where they fly.

Perhaps you've had a bad experience lately?

cyber1k

I don't need to agree or disagree. Your experience is your experience. I understand and felt similarly last year. So glad we made the move to AA. Sure, no carrier is perfect, but I sure do love how AA is focused on a customer experience. You can feel it and it makes a difference.

I had no idea I would enjoy the overall transition to AA from years at UA. When I got on AA's new 777-300 business suite flying to LHR.. OMG.. they nailed it and I love it. Now I just wish they'd hurry up adding new planes... but even on one of their oldest, I'd pick the service and experience of AA over UA any day.

dcpdxtrans

That says a lot. We are at the cusp of switching to AA, and I keep wondering what our trepidation is, esp since I can status match (the Mrs., unfortunately, cannot). I was just thinking about this just a few minutes ago about whether to switch about whether AA's FF program is worth it and some of the things I'll miss from MP...

seanp7

There's an entire thread on those that moved to AA and don't look back, so I don't think we really need to go through it all again.

As StingWest indicated, if you use UA internationally in C/F, and service isn't near the top of what you value (it's not up there for me), they can be very decent. Saver Award redemption is usually good, the ability to GPU, etc, the list goes on.

I think those who primarily fly domestically and want outstanding food / service / upgrades / experience, probably are better off at AA. I don't demand wifi or DirectTV on every domestic flight (sure it would be nice), so I don't view UA as the worst because of that, a few cranky FA's, or a rather disgusting inflight cheeseburger. Just my preferences and opinion though.

Red Raider LV

This is an interesting thread. The OP really brought a perspective we haven't seen yet.

PV_Premier

5khours

I fly mostly international.

Hard product is decent. It used to be the best, but it has fallen behind the competition (especially foreign carriers.)

Soft product is mediocre. OK... but all the competition is better.

I flew 350k miles and spent $100k each of the last two years.

The only reason I'm still with UA is because Mileage Plus is still a good program. I expect they'll probably degrade this as well and then I'm gone.

Jorgen

Indeed. I thought it could have used more direct attribution of blame though. Perhaps a discussion of the role of Jeff Smisek? You could even replace the letter "S" in his name with a dollar sign to illustrate the point that because money and stuff.

I'd also like to hear more about this broken cashews issue.

MrMarket

I'll take the data-point. The only way you can discern any even marginal "reality" from FT is via a very very very large N to drown out all the rest of it.

Thanks to the OP for sharing.

JetAway

It is what it is. We've reached the point where each has to decide whether to take it or leave it. This poor horse was beaten to death long ago.

Kacee

Don't forget reference to "another change I'll like."

btw, the cashews aren't "broken" they're carefully halved to ensure UA's highly valued customers don't suffer an in-flight choking incident

DWFI

Customers told us they wanted more cashews. Because we value our customers, we doubled the quantity of cashew pieces we serve to each passenger! Another change you'll like!

Mats

I flew United yesterday from Seattle to Tel Aviv via Denver and Newark. We were 20 minutes late into Tel Aviv, but everything else was on time.

The planes were spotless.

Each staff member: check in, United Club, in flight was friendly and professional. Service in BusinessFirst was synchronized and polished. I enjoyed the mustard rubbed chicken with pickled cabbage and the sundae.

I slept well too.

The only downsides: the lunch from Denver to Seattle was an especially tragic chicken salad. I also like the erstwhile tradition of referring to passengers by name. It never happened on this trip.

I have no doubt that I would have had equivalent service on Delta or US Airways. In fact, United mat have been better. I don't regret flying with them, and I hope the trip back to the US is as comfortable and seamless.

mbarreto

Instead of having a new thread about this every week, can't we just merge all into a "United is the Worst" thread? That would clean things up and allow for easier access to actually helpful and informative threads.

On a positive note: one more 1K MM leaving UA, so yay for increased ug %