Originally Posted by
spin88
It is all the passenger's fault and if that is not the ticket for you, then the passengers are plotting to rip off United. Shadows of Jeff's comment about ending the "excessive" compensation UA was handing out when things went wrong still permeate United's toxic culture.
Jeff's long gone. I suggest that we all move on.
Originally Posted by
mauve
The $1000 was the refund. She's getting the price of the kid's ticket she wasn't allowed to use anyway plus a travel voucher.
It's got to be a pretty nice travel voucher to seem like a worthwhile payday.
You still don't have it right.
She completed her travel. So she already gained the value of the ~$1,000, minus the subjective value of losing the second seat for a minority portion of their long, likely 4-part journey. The refund is nearly all gain for her. Then it sounds like she got extra compensation on top. Heckuva of a payday.
Originally Posted by
blueman2
THIS. Agree with wetrat0. The most important point here is that an important FAA safety reg was violated, and the FA/GA and United are 100% responsible for enforcement of this reg and 100% at fault for failure to comply. The intents or actions of the passenger do not seem even remotely relevant here.
So if someone simply lies about their kid's age when travelling, is it still 100% the airline's fault? Are the passenger's actions relevant?
Originally Posted by
blueman2
Story was featured on ABC's Good Morning America program today.
The media is absolutely pathetic. A simple mistake by all parties, one no doubt made on occasion in this industry, is national news, but other 100% airline mistakes that strand and rip-off hundreds of thousands goes uncovered. No wonder their reputation is in the tank.
Originally Posted by
spin88
A piece like this will cost united millions and millions in lost bookings.
I remember you saying something similar would happen with the Dao incident. You really think this honest mistake will when that one didn't?
Originally Posted by
luv2ctheworld
You have a flaw in your plan... children cannot have a ticket purchased separately under a certain age unless they also have an Unaccompanied Minor fee added. As an Unaccompanied Minor, the child would be assigned a seat and FA's are notified as such. So in this case, you would not even be able to buy a ticket for a 2 year old without an accompanying adult ticket.
I meant it as a buying a separate seat. Sorry for the confusion.
Her situation exposes a flaw in the government's rules and airline procedures that could be easily exploited for personal gain.
Originally Posted by
tarheelnj
Keep in mind on UA we have "actual age" and "claimed age." When they announce boarding for families with children under 2, I see a lot of <2 yr olds that look much older boarding with their parents & extended families. Maybe a GA taking the boarding pass of someone carrying a child during pre-boarding assumes it's a lap child and only looks for one BP (bad decision, but possible). It's not unusual for inexperienced flyers to hand a GA both their current flight and connecting BP's, so that the GA just scans the one for that flight.
If a parent with a 2+ year old child preboards, perhaps that parent would be reticent to admit to an FA that the child is >2 years old, thereby further cementing the idea that the child is a lap child.
Just thinking of other possible considerations.
Good point. It tells of another scenario where the passenger makes a mistake and put the agents and crew in a tough situation where they may not catch the passenger's error. We all know chaotic it is at the gate. I'm surprised errors don't happen more often. Just the other day my wife saw a person trying to the board the wrong DL flight. Thankfully she was caught at the scanner this time. But you can't expect an airline to be 100% effective in its defense of passenger mistakes. PAX these days seems to shut their brains off when they travel.