This happened to me on a recent flight from ORD to SMF. I got myself an upgrade on flt 515 and boarded the flight with other first class passengers. I was in seat 5D (of a 757) which I chose while doing OLCI. There was a group of 4 travelling together and 3 of them were sitting in 5 A, B and C and one was sitting in 1A.
Once I settled my bags in the overhead bin and sat on my seat, my neighbour asked me if I could switch the seat with their guy in 1A. I politely refused saying that if it was any other seat I would have but I don't like the bulkhead seat on 4+ hour flight and all was OK. He laughed and joked about all flyers having their favorite seats....
As is my ritual, since there was still time for the flight, I decided to call my wife on my cell phone. Now, I am an Indian (from Punjab) and wear a turban and was talking in my native languauge with my wife. While I was talking I saw that the guy in 5B walked up to the FA and started talking. I did not bother about until they started looking in my direction and pointing towards me. I thought they were complaining about me not giving up my seat for their buddy and may be they are trying to make a 3 way move asking somebody else to move to 1A and I move to another seat (non bulkhead). Anyway, I did not bother to think about it further and continued with my discussion with my wife. After a while I saw the captain came out from the flight deck, talked with the FA and the passenger from 5B and all of them walked out to the jet bridge. the captain gave me glance while walking past me and I could feel something was not right. After about 5 or so minutes the FA walked over and asked me if I could come with her outside to the podium. She asked me if I could get my bags as well and thats when I told my wife (who was still on phone with me ) to hang up and I asked the FA why I was asked to remove my bags. The FA said that captain wants to have a chat with me but its up to me if I want to take bags with me and I told her I don't want to lose out the overhead bin space and will walk with her to the captain.
We came out of the jet bridge and I could see the the Y passengers were still boarding and giving me looks as if I had done something wrong.
After reaching the podium outside, I saw the captain was standing with the GA and a TSA man with sniffer dogs. The captain first thanked me for being cooperative, and then said that there are passengers on the flight that do not feel comfortable me riding with them and that they had reported suspicious behaviour on my part. The captain also acknowledged that I am a 1k flyer and that he was required to report this matter to TSA and hence the TSA officer....
The TSA officer then asked me questions about the call I was making (to my wife) and wanted to see my cell phone. I handed over the cell phone to him and he fiddled with it for a few minutes looked at my calls dialed and received calls asked me about the number I dialed (my wife's cell number) and took a note of that number.
The captain then asked me since there are more than one passengers that are uncomfortable with me flying on the plane, if I would be willing to get off the plane and board another flight. He said we will arrange for you to stay in Chicago overnight and book you in first flight to SMF the next day. Being a true flyertalker, the first thought that came to my mind was will you give me a free ticket (VDB) and will I still get my upgrade on the flight
But then I realized this is more serious than I thought. I told him that I don't want to do this unless I am forced to but told them that I would cooperate with whatever thay want to do. At this point the TSA agent asked one of the GA to go get my luggage from inside. i explained to her what my bags looked like and she went inside. All this while I acted calmly thinking that I have nothing to hide.
After a few more nervous minutes my bags came out and the sniffer dog started to sniff them. By this time another TSA agent had arrived and he started opening my bags (both carry on and laptop). They asked me if I had any checked bags too and I said "no".
By then the boarding had almost completed and the captain wanted to go back in the plane. He once again said that I will be taking the flight next day and wished me good luck (for what ?). By then I was starting to get angry and asked the pilot why the people who are uncomfortable with me not leave the plane instead of me. He looked at the TSA agent who had just finished checking my bags and the TSA agent gave him the ^ and said something like "he is good to go". The captain then went back in the plane and minutes later I saw the 3 guys in 5 A,B and C come out with their bags. The GA then asked the TSA agents if it was ok for me to borad the flight and they said yes. They thanked me for me cooperation said sorry for the incovinience . I also politely said thanks to them and told them that they were doing their job and if they don't do their job we all are at risk. The GA then asked me to follow her into the jet bridge and as I am walking with her, she says sorry to and mentioned to me that one of the 3 guys that de-boarded was a GS and that they were all on paid F. She also mumbled that now she will have to deal with them and their refund.
Once I got back in the plane I noticed the guy in seat 1A is still sitting there but the seat next to me is now empty. They had already assigned the seats 5A and B to someone else from Y and soon after they were occupied. The plane left 5 minutes late and we all arrived at our destination safely (10 minutes early).
All through the flight I kept thinking about the incident that happened and weather my reaction to get them off was excessive. The more I think about it, the more I feel I did the right thing but after I narrated the incident to my wife, she was upset and asked me to report the incident to UA and ask for compensation for public humiliation....
Anyway, I don't think I felt humiliated and don't think they owe me anything more than an apology for the incovenience, but I did feel the captain should have asked the other passengers to leave before asking me. Can a pilot ask a passenger to leave a plane if other passenger/s ask him to ?
I wanted to share the story with FT community and ask for your opinion of what happened and how should I have handled it.