Ugh.

I was on UA63 to IAH connecting to UA129 to GIG tonight. UA63 was delayed because incoming flight crew were delayed due to maintenance in LAX where they were coming from. We left at 615 (give or take) then taxied around until 7. Got to IAH at 8:24 and the GIG flight was gone. A few observations - am I crazy or does this seem like UAL dropped the ball all over the place??

* Why don't they have a standby crew for a flight from hub to hub where CLEARLY most passengers connect??? Most all of us to many destinations missed their connections
* Why didn't they hold the GIG flight when 15 of us were on it with many in business? We showed up at 8:24 and it left at 8:20. Dont the gates communicate with each other? And since we all know the Rio aircraft sits all day in Rio and we all noticed that it had expected arrival 20 minutes early - why not just wait if you know incoming pax are en route? And only by 4 minutes!
* IAH service center only had 3 people working to handle this?

On top of all else, the AVOD on UA63 was broken too. Ugh. Are these the new changes Jeff promised?

In my mind, not holding the GIG flight knowing there were so many of us on it, knowing it sits for 12 hours and knowing that it was ahead of schedule is almost unforgivable. I've seen AA do the same thing, Lufthansa, etc. Its almost a standard thing. Oh, and at the last minute they changed UA 63 from E to C concourse costing us the 4 minutes!!!

If you let UA129 go, why not let us know at the gate so we all didn't run? These all seem like very simple customer service tasks.

I'm so irate, I nearly cut my platinum card at the service center but luckily I ended up with a sweetheart associate. If I ended up with the woman the other GIG passengers got, I'd probably go AA and never come back. It was that disgusting an experience.

Oh and by the way, for the IAH staff, whoever "P***y" is... This guy has the worst attitude and openly greeted the out-of-breath group that ran to the gate with compete disrespect. He should be relieved of his duties, ASAP.

Goodnight from IAH!