Why can’t the people that trained HNL carry that same spirit to the rest of UA? I had a very bad day in SFO today (Thursday 7/19). I was on the SFO PIT via IAD and when we pulled back they said seven of the toilets were not functioning on the 767. The Captain said we would need to go back to the gate but the problem was a quick fix. It turned out to be a long delay and the copilot decided to leave the flight because it would make him illegal so they ended up cancelling the flight. They made an announcement that only GS and 1K go to a specific gate number and everyone else had to go to customer service. I went to the club and the lines were pretty long so I called the 1P desk and they told me the earliest they could get me back to PIT would be 9:00 PM on Friday. I had a meeting Friday morning and a wedding Friday night. At that point it didn’t make sense to go to PIT. My itinerary had a continuing segment from PIT ORD for Sunday. I was offered a hotel in SFO. I suggested since I won’t make my meeting or wedding in PIT if they can just fly me back to SAN and then continue my trip to ORD on Sunday. I told them it would save them money for a hotel and having to pay Frontier to reprotect me. The 1P Desk said they could not do anything like that but to contact and airport supervisor. I went the RCC desk and she also told me they couldn’t do that and I would need to speak to a supervisor. Actually the SFO RCC’s agents appeared useless to anyone that was asking for help. She called the supervisor and they said it would take 20 minutes for one to arrive. To make a long story short he was a poor excuse for a manager (can I mention first names?). I was very friendly with him and explained the cost savings to UA to reroute me back to SAN and then to ORD on Sunday. He said no way am I not giving you a free ticket back to SAN. I said I don’t want a free ticket I want a reroute that is acceptable to me. It is not my fault the toilets were broken. Why I should I be punished for the poor state of UA aircraft? I told him If I can’t go to my meeting why go to PIT. He refused and said if I want to go to back to SAN Thursday evening it would cost me 317.00. I told him that is ridiculous. I said Southwest is advertising 39.00 fares with new service to SFO SAN. He said that doesn’t start for a few weeks and that is the best he can do. I told him you can’t be serious and finally got him down to a 100.00 fare. After he took my credit card he said all the flights to SAN were full. He oversold a flight and I waited in SFO for over five hours. I had no protection on the other flights and he said he wouldn’t touch anything else on the record. So I called the 1P desk and got an incredible angel on the phone. They spent over two hours to get me from SAN to ORD on Sunday and reissued the ticket. They were apologetic about what happened and they made a bad day not so bad. My frustration level with UA the last few trips has been very high. The number of irregular opps is just becoming ridiculously frustrating. I hate US but I never had this many irregular opps in two years that I have been with UAand by the end of the day I really wanted to switch airlines. Of course HNL saved the day and a customer. I will write to get my 100.00 back but no biggy if I don’t at least I will get another days work done at the office.
I don’t think I was unreasonable and UA management has got to use common sense. I told the guy that his exact attitude is what caused UA to go BK in the past. I said you are willing to spend all this money on a hotel and Frontier but not fly me back to SAN and then to ORD and not lose a cent in revenue.

End of rant. While waiting in line for the SAN flight I was telling a guy about my experience and another guy turned to me and said I had it with UA and then another one started complaining. I think UA got on a lot of elites nerves today. HNL RR has the customer service down and when you talk to them it is like another airline.

Anything I could do better in the future should something like this happen?