FlyWorld

Article talks about disappearing upgrades. I wasn't surprised to discover they focus on UA.

"What he didn’t expect, though, was no refund of the $1,200 he paid United in advance for the possible upgrade. The miles required for the upgrades were returned to his account, but not the cash “copay’’ of $600 each way. He called to complain and United put through the refund, with an airline supervisor telling him the system had been broken for several years."

http://www.wsj.com/articles/a-disapp...ior-1422468467

channa

So refunds don't always come through with CO's technology. What else is new?

At least it's getting some WSJ coverage. Maybe some DOT coverage will be next.

edcho

This is interesting... and scary...

FlyWorld

Hasn't DOT already fined them for refund fraud? I guess they didn't look at this case.

http://www.dot.gov/briefing-room/dot...urate-and-late

Hartmann

Agreed.

But maybe they'll just take away the option to upgrade when there is no seat available for a paid seat.

mgcsinc

This is why people need to get it through their thick skulls that no matter how nice the agent who ultimately fixes the problem was, no matter that it didn't take "that much work" to finally get the refund, people should always, always, always, always, always report refunds that required manual intervention to the DOT. It's the only way to keep getting UA fined so they finally put an end to this stupidity.

Starman

With the last fine being $350K, it's not obvious that future DOT enforcement actions are much impetus to COdbaUA to change anything. That amount is probably equal to hiring 3 new employees (including overhead and fringe benefits) for one year into the refund department. DOT found about 8-9,000 late refunds during the audit, so it might well take even more than 3 new hires to keep up with the backlog. Therefore as long as they are not fined more frequently than once per year or so, COdbaUA comes out ahead by paying the fine, doing nothing, and remaining tardy with refunds.

IAH-OIL-TRASH

Well, there is value to United in keeping the upgrade process the way it is. Anytime someone gives you money for nothing immediately in return is a good deal, especially so in higher interest rate times. UA would be better off in the long run (for itself) by fixing the refund system rather than doing away with taking cash for non-existent (at the time of booking) upgrades.

Hartmann

No argument there. I was just looking at the quoted comment and interpreting that as refining the upgrade offers to be more accurate.

entropy

Well, 9000 refunds, and IDB/VDB reporting, and likely vastly underpaying IDB passengers who don't know their rights, as well as offering measly $150-200 funny money VDBs and then not bothering to comp IDBs.

Then there's the PestPlus program, which has had many documented cases of a lack of any sort of care for the animals entrusted to them.

spin88

United...

and the comments are priceless:

"After a year of zero upgrades on United (I do miss Continental), ditched them and now exclusively fly Southwest."

"I give little consideration to my elite FF status with United. Loyalty is a worthless currency to them these days and the customer experience in first class is poor - so I no longer stress about an upgrade. Instead, I've been seeking out other carriers that simply appreciate their customers."

"I just flew from Newark to San Francisco and the first class cabin had 8 seats in it, no entertainment and no power. Flying hub to hub there is no chance of an upgrade and they make it harder by flying aircraft with limited seating and amenities.

We are all re-thinking our loyalty to an airline that doesn't reciprocate."

"Since the merger, not only has the quality of the service declined significantly on board the aircrafts, the treatment of frequent flyers who aren't 1K (100,000 annual air miles or more) is not customer friendly. I'm still flying a lot - just no longer on United."

I could go on, but instead I will say that people are FT are odd ball whiners that are best ignored as people buy on (1) price and (2) N/S, and an airline should simply focus on gouging the N/S folks.

west_end_NYC

In some cases, I have found that purchasing F can merely be a few dollars extra versus economy. Case in point, I was looking this morning for a one way ticket on UA to go NYC-MSY for Jazz Fest w/e on 4/24 (using some extra JBLU points for the return). Non stop EWR-MSY in Y priced from $386 to $563 (depending on departure time on 4/24). Started looking at different options with a connection and and lo and behold was able to book a first class Z fare LGA-ORD-MSY for just $419 - an extra $33 over the lowest EWR-MSY non-stop which really didn't work anyway as it gets in to late.

Cargojon

I still don't see how UA is allowed to hold people's money for months at a time with no guarantee of service. Just seems something in contract law that ought to forbid that. Although I'm no lawyer.

dmodemd

I hope they eventually address the policy where you do NOT get refunded the co-pay: buying up to use an SWU.

A few years back I documented the buy up cost at time of booking. When my upgrades did not clear (me and my wife), I complained and asked for a refund of the buy-up. I was given the amount in UA credit.

I suggest others do the same and if not granted a refund, file a complaint with the DOT. See other threads for prior debates on the issue

bmwe92fan

It's simple - you are literally "opting-in" for what is essentially a lottery process... No one is making someone pay - individuals decide to pay for the "opportunity" to upgrade - which is essentially a placeholder - and completely legal....