I don't know how much you fly UA but this is par for the course these days. You were wise to be proactive, which should've been a plus, but probably would've had better luck calling the CS or Baggage Tracking phone numbers. My baggage went missing due to IRROPs at IAH, resulting in a re-route to LAX instead of SNA. I clearly told the agents re-routing me to LAX that I would pick up my baggage there. When we arrived at LAX, I waited about 30 mins at baggage claim before approaching the desk, telling them that my bags were missing. I gave them my bag tag numbers and they promptly looked them up and told me that they had arrived with my flight but that they were being routed to SNA for pickup? I asked them why, if I was having to provide my own transpo to OC, they would do that. They had no answers so I asked if they could recover my bags from the baggage holding area. They told me that it would take hours, which I found hard to believe but then, another pax who was standing within earshot told me that he'd been waiting 4 hours already for his bags to be found. Well, it was already 10:00 PM, so I accepted their offer of bag delivery to my in-laws' house in Laguna Beach, which they promised by the next morning. Nothing arrived by then so I called the baggage tracking phone # and was told that everything (5 larger bags) would be delivered by that afternoon. Afternoon passed to evening so I called again and was told it would be by the next morning. I'd been without clean clothes, etc. for 24 hours at that point. I woke up the next morning to find one bag sitting on the front porch. Needless to say, I called again and again, ad nauseum, over the next four days, only to be lied to in every instance. We finally got our last bag 5 days after we landed.

At United, "Good Leads The Way".