Originally Posted by
Scropsey
We have not had anyone reach out from United with any sort of apology or offer of refund of our flight. Maybe they are working on it and I just need to reach out. They did give us some vouchers for food in the app after the 2nd cancellation but we honestly didn’t have time to use them.
For our refund, I was on the phone with an agent a few days ago they made it sound like I would need to submit documentation to a certain department that would determine how much of a refund for the flight I would be entitled to and that it might take up to a month to make a decision and process the refund. This was before the 2nd cancellation so maybe it will be more automatic now that the entire thing was cancelled. It is frustrating that the burden is put on the customer. I haven’t had the mental bandwidth to deal/call today and hope to sit down and figure it out tomorrow. Do you know if I should just call the main United phone number or is there a specific number to call or department to ask for? I hope to speak to someone that actually has the authority to help us sort it all out.
Glad to hear you finally made it home.
I would recommend waiting a couple of days before contacting United (I'm assuming you don't need the money urgently for financial reasons). The fact that this became a trip in vain makes a huge difference for how this is handled, and it is a very straightforward case of refunding the entire ticket. However, this won't update in the UA system until you have flown home and the ticket is closed.
The first step if nothing happens would be to submit a refund request from UA here:
https://www.united.com/en/us/refunds
This will get the right people at United looking at the case. You may need to contact them directly if you also want a refund of consequential expenses directly due to the break in travel (meals, hotels, ground transportation). I generally recommend doing this in writing (email or otherwise), as there is no point calling to request something that the person answering the phone cannot authorize.
Originally Posted by
Scropsey
I honestly don’t think we will be flying United anymore though unless they come through for us in some big way in the coming days. We know stuff happens and flights get cancelled, but I don’t feel like they have been particularly kind or helpful in the aftermath.
I'm not going to stick up for United here
per se, but I do want to stress that this sort of experience could happen on any airline, especially any US airline. The fundamental issue is always underpaid and understaffed customer service, so that when things go wrong it is nearly impossible to reach someone well trained, pleasant, and motivated to help you (rather than motivated to end the service interaction ASAP for their metrics). This issue is common to nearly every company, let alone every airline.