SFO777

Just dispute the RT charge, and fly another airline home. Where are you now? I'm sure there are few of us that could help you find J space back home. Probably too late now but DL 877, the 7:50pm IND-LAX nonstop is showing F3.

weero

I guess that they did not really plan on canceling the flight.

It's not such grand planning as QF did inflict upon me when I OLCIed for a SYD-MEL only to be unable to use the bag drop with a very young agent insisting that I "booked the wrong ticket".

The sup then explained to me that the flight was canceled but that QF would accommodate me on a later flight free of charge. How generous.

Other than Oz generally having great weather, I have no clue how that story is related to the US in any way.

mobilebucky

Can you make UA route you through Europe?

azepine00

When you book a complex multiconnection itinerary ahead of your transpac you take your chances. I am sure you are aware that ORD is often impacted by weather so if you absolutely must make a connection you better give yourself enough wiggle room.

Speaking of "detest flying in this country" - didn't QF recently cancel all their flights in SYD stranding folks for several days due to ash while NZ and other carriers continued flying there?

ua1flyer

Over 200 flights back and forth from Australia and only 2 screw ups...and United handled them perfectly! Soory you had a bad situation, but that is not the norm.

emcampbe

Sorry to hear there weren't options that were to your liking. But try to be fair. Of course you would have liked to know another hour earlier, or another five hours earlier (or whenever). On the other hand, did you think they only gave you three hours notice to spite you? It's probably a conspiracy - they only gave three hours notice so that enough people would miss their connections, and therefore prevent oversold connections, therefore saving UA money. C'mon please. Stuff like this happens when you fly. Rather than simply complaining about a flight that was canceled due to WX, how about spending the energy in working with the airline to get you reasonable accommodation.

Most agents (at UA or other carriers, at least here in NA) do not proactively provide solutions outside of their airline or alliance, and usually, only on obvious routes. I'm not sure how much you travel (or at least, in the US), but most of us who fly frequently here know that we are probably better off having different options to provide to the agent. In irrops, even in weather, UA has never turned me down when I've suggested alternates, even on competing carriers, and even when the irrops was not their fault. They are not always proactive, but will almost always check out the options provided to them.

But Channa, they have. Maybe not in so many words. But they've given you the fares, and you've given them your yes, I'm willing to pay that, or no, I'm not willing to pay that, by either purchasing the tickets or not. That times thousands of customers does make a difference. And that's why the carriers go raising fares when they think they can get them (when people are saying "yes"), and lowering them when people say "no" by not buying, until they change their answer.

emcampbe

Why is one of the first things people suggest always this silly, yet still fraudulent option.

When you buy the ticket, you agree to the CoC, which never guarantees the time you'll get in, or even the flight. Stuff happens. The CoC doesn't even guarantee you carriage on an alternate carrier if you miss your connection, even when it is UA's fault - it only gives them the option. Usually, they are pretty generous with this, but they use the word "may" rebook you on an alternate carrier. It is very carefully chosen language.

If the OP can show that UA ignored their responsibility under the CoC (and refuse to refund the ticket based on their failure to live up to it), then yes, by all means dispute the charge on your CC. At least based on the OP's post, it really doesn't sound to me like this is the case.

SFO777

Who said anything about not paying based on a late flight? The point was (1) buy a new ticket home on another airline and (2) cancel the UA return. OP seemed reluctant to do this out of concern that he would have trouble getting a refund from UA.

dinoscool3

Always nice to see the UA defenders "attack" QF, Australia, and the OP . UA screwed up, accept that.

zrs70

Well, if the ticket were non-refundable, the OP would still have no problem getting a refund, because of the delay.

But to make matters easier, the ticket is refundable. In my experience, the refunds happen without any delay.

lhrsfo

This, of course, is the crux of the matter. Airlines in the US seem to be happy to take the money and then not give a damn about delivering the service. This is expected of Southwest or Ryanair but full fare carriers in Business Class? We all know that stuff happens but the test of an airline is how it then deals with its customers. Weather often happens in ORD but its UA's choice to route everyone through ORD so it should have a recovery plan. It should have agents available to put that plan in place. It should immediately figure a way of ensuring everyone gets home on time if humanly possible. Regular and predictable bad weather is a pathetic excuse for lousy service and total service failure. This would apply even if the OP were in discounted economy, let alone in full fare Business.

UA may consider itself a leading airline, but this tale is a clear demonstration as to why it still ranks at the level of a third world carrier.

weero

"Defending" is by definition not "attacking".

And QF had it coming. Big time.

I got disserviced a great many times by different carriers ... but the North American ones - UA in particular - never let me down. I have no idea where this mantra of the bad US carriers comes from, seriously.

Now LH, SQ, and QF are very different stories where customers get systematically tricked out of their money IMO.

dinoscool3

That's why I put quotes around attacking, it's not true attacking.




Yes, UA/CO has never let me down in IRROPS, but on foreign carriers, I've never had IRROPS, so I'd say that LH, SQ, etc, can be said that they are better.



Plus, most people consider foreign carriers to be generally better in service, which if you start argueing about that, I'm going to do some major .

malgudi

Not a fair comparison ... the peasants don't have a plane named after them

zrs70

Fwiw, I've found US carriers (well, United) to be much better when it comes to irregular operations than European carriers. Multiple times on multiple carriers, agents in Europe have wanted to charge me a change fee when their delays caused missed connections.