DELee

I'd let this thread sit for a day before I spent the past 20+ minutes going through all of the to-date postings this evening.

What I'm surprised that no one has commented on is the airport at which the wrong sequence of events began at: EWR. Spin88 did comment on the lousiness of this specific airport in keeping gate boards up-to-date.

Personally, I am not surprised that the problems began there. Sadly, I see it as emblematic of the service attitude of the whole facility. However, I am dismayed at the lack of responsiveness of the SFO ground staff to pick up the pieces once the problem was discovered.

And, yes, the traveler is herself ultimately responsible for managing her own travels. However, UACO is continuing to do poorly at doing what it should be doing correctly service wise in not only the first place (EWR) but in the second place (SFO). I really do hope that Oscar and his team can really turn this around but the lack of attention to detail and consistency across the whole UACO enterprise will likely allow these things to unfortunately continue to happen.

David

halls120

There are many airports I avoid. ORD in the winter because of the weather induced delays. ATL in the summer when there are daily thunderstorms. SFO at the moment because of the delays caused by runway construction.

I avoid EWR 365 days a year because of the nasty attitudes I encounter there from UA and airport staff in general. And this isn't an anti-pmCO thing. I enjoy the personal interactions I've had while transiting IAH.

Doc Savage

Yes, the employees at EWR certainly do seem to "enjoy" their jobs.

spin88

I too avoid EWR. I was only there because I was going to DCA and United is offering really, really, really cheap pricing SFO-DCA via PS service to EWR. $500 cheaper than Delta (also with a connection in Domestic F, adding Delta One via JFK was $1400 more than UA wanted) and $800 cheaper than VX (direct) on a single leg, plus the chance to try out the Polaris Seat on the 77W, well that got United the sale.

But I was once again reminded of what a horrible, horrible place EWR is. We arrived one hour and 15 minutes late (due to MX) and they had no one to operate the jet bridge, we sat - with people in the process of missing connections for 14 minutes. Then just casual lateness on the EWR-DCA flight, which left 1 hour and 45 minutes late.

FlyingNone

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I'll agree with you on that. Truly people have to be their own advocates and ask/ insist/ demand reasonable customer service for themselves.
I wonder though if they had to escort her to the hotel and back given her inexperience traveling and language difficulties or was this woman so elderly and incapable of speaking up that the daughter had to do everything ? Sorry, but I'm with the "passenger was fully responsible for her own error" crowd.

mr8

I have accidentally scanned a wrong paper boarding pass in the past (was at the correct gate for one of my flights but gave the wrong BP for a connecting flight), and it WILL beep/flash red and the GA will try to scan it again, and probably check the error and BP to see what is up.

IMHO, gate agent messed up and should have caught the error when they scanned the boarding pass.

docbert

Or if they aren't paying close enough attention they will ask if you're OK with the exit row and let you board... Especially if you're in group 1, and 2 of the 3 people before you had the same beep for that reason.

BeanTownBoy

I can only relay my experiences and say that this does not surprise me.

First, IMHO, the daughter's statement about terrorists misses the point--what difference does it make if someone who has already made it through security gets on one plane or the other, they are already cleared to fly somewhere. In addition, the chances of them making it past the GA and then an FA who examines the BP I have to believe is pretty small.

Several times due to gate changes, delays or flights leaving in close proximity to each other from the same gate, the UA, WN (or most recently KC, as explained below), the GA has informed me (usually alerted by the scanner beeping) that I was trying to board the wrong flight. When I am traveling a lot, sometimes now when entering the plane, I ask the FA "this flight is headed to XXXX, right? for confirmation. (After a couple of incidents of sitting in the wrong seat, now I also triple check my seat assignment!)

Gate changes frequently are not announced, or are announced in a cacophony of conflicting announcements for other flights. Earlier this week I was in the airport in Atyrau and actually down the stairway to a shuttle bus to the plane when a KC GA outside on the way to the bus informed me that my gate had changed. Since it was the only flight that day from GUW to AMS, you bet I set a record running back upstairs with a rollaboard and briefcase and across the terminal!

My guess is that this was a case of "all the holes in the Swiss cheese" lining up: multiple mistakes (including by the pax), each of which individually would not have made a difference (and if any of which were caught would have fixed the situation), but when all occurring one after the other lead to a serious, undesired outcome. Although it happens more than one would think, given the sheer number of passengers flying in the US, it occurs an exceptionally small percentage of the time.

ExplorerWannabe

There were a few places where United could and should have caught this but responsibility for the "ordeal" rests securely on the passenger in this case. Yes, I too get annoyed when gate change announcements aren't made or when the United app appears to be the last place updated (compared to FlightView, TripCase, terminal boards, etc.) but really ... the last time I checked, "S", "F", and "O" were the same letters in English and French and look nothing like "C", "D", or "G" (which coincidentally ALSO happen to be the same letters in French and English!).
I've seen many cases where there is a flood of passengers as boarding is announced and the poor gate attendant is being pulled 3 different ways simultaneously. In fact, it wouldn't surprise me if some of the people demanding his/her immediate attention were on this board.
The gate announcement says "now boarding for San Francisco" ... does that sound in any way like "Charles de Gaulle" or "Paris, France"? Do the letters "San Francisco" look anything like "Paris, France"?
Yes, United had a couple system failures in this case but they could have (and failed) to be mitigating factors. Primary cause of this was the passenger's lack of attention and non-chalance.

rickg523

Two ways of looking at this story. Passenger to blame. UA boarding system messed up.
Maybe it's just me, but, on a forum made up of expert flyers, exploring how someone with a BP to Paris ends up flying to San Francisco is more interesting than mulling over the mental capacity of a total stranger. For example, beyond the obvious issue at the gate, on an airline that's recently been in the news a lot for not having enough seats for booked passengers, and certainly one noted for capacity management, it just so happened that her seat assignment on the flight to Paris ended up empty on a transcon? No intervention by FA needed? Remarkable.

SunLover

The article states a FA did indeed look at her boarding pass before departing Newark:

Bahetoukilae's boarding pass read: "Newark to Charles de Gaulle." She went to the gate stamped on it and said a United representative scanned it. So she boarded the plane and headed for her seat, 22C.

"When she went to sit someone was sitting there already," her niece, Diane Miantsoko, said. But she said the flight attendant looked at her boarding pass and instead of questioning it, sat her somewhere else.


While this is another epic fail by United I think people need to except some personal responsibility, and travel with some cognitive awareness of their individual situations.


SL

M60_to_LGA

See, you'd like to think that - but I've been on UA flights to MEX where I swear to god, none of the flight crew (at least in coach) spoke Spanish.

Still, this is a huge black mark on United. Someone - a whole lot of people, actually - appear to have been just calling it in.