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Biggest Whopper you've heard from a UA Pilot, Flight Attendant, Gate or Ticket Agent?

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Biggest Whopper you've heard from a UA Pilot, Flight Attendant, Gate or Ticket Agent?

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Old May 10, 2012, 6:48 pm
  #1  
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Smile Biggest Whopper you've heard from a UA Pilot, Flight Attendant, Gate or Ticket Agent?

Heard a good one today.
As we sat in the penalty box for 30 minutes of my 45 minute connection time
from the Cockpit, " United only has a couple gates at O'Hare that can accommodate an Airbus"
I call shenanigans
Your turn!
I made it to my flight BTW with minutes to spare
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Old May 10, 2012, 6:59 pm
  #2  
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Originally Posted by BDLORD
Heard a good one today.
As we sat in the penalty box for 30 minutes of my 45 minute connection time
from the Cockpit, " United only has a couple gates at O'Hare that can accommodate an Airbus"
I call shenanigans
Your turn!
I made it to my flight BTW with minutes to spare
Perhaps he meant a 380 (for LH?)
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Old May 10, 2012, 7:22 pm
  #3  
 
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the airline won't allow this

I was at PHX waiting for my UA flight to IAD when the gate agent announced an oversold situation. I volunteered right away and was rejected by the gate agent who upon checking the computer said that my only alternative would be a hop to SFO and then a nonstop to IAD. I said I would take it. He said that United would not ticket a customer to go west to go east. He bumped somone who was willing to spend the night at PHX and travel the next day.
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Old May 10, 2012, 7:32 pm
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Originally Posted by zrs70
Originally Posted by BDLORD
Heard a good one today.
As we sat in the penalty box for 30 minutes of my 45 minute connection time
from the Cockpit, " United only has a couple gates at O'Hare that can accommodate an Airbus"
I call shenanigans
Your turn!
I made it to my flight BTW with minutes to spare
Perhaps he meant a 380 (for LH?)
No current gate at ORD can accommodate the A380.
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Old May 10, 2012, 7:50 pm
  #5  
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"The upgrade system is not broken, Sir."
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Old May 10, 2012, 7:55 pm
  #6  
 
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Wirelessly posted (Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; CPU iPhone OS 5_1 like Mac OS X) AppleWebKit/534.46 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/5.1 Mobile/9B179 Safari/7534.48.3)

Originally Posted by channa
"The upgrade system is not broken, Sir."
LOL. Yeah that explains my flight sitting at R5 for 3 days at T-39 with no upgrades cleared
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Old May 10, 2012, 7:55 pm
  #7  
 
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Right at the time UA got there single op cert, while waiting for Red eye P.S. flight to depart LAX the Capt came on and said he had to read a whole 400 page Manuel with new take off procedures and "did not feel it was safe to take off till he read the whole thing". He stated it would take about 3 hours to read so we would depart around 1:30AM. He welcomed anyone w questions to come talk to him but reminded us for every minute he talked to a passenger was another minute we would be delayed. People could not believe this. At least 25 people were to scared to fly with this morin and got off. He told me it was not a union thing or anger at the merger but he was so full of. Took off at 1:45am

Last edited by iluv2fly; May 10, 2012 at 8:35 pm Reason: language
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Old May 10, 2012, 7:57 pm
  #8  
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On a recent United flight from IAH to LAX the pilots thanked us for flying Continental. I said I must have flown the wrong airline to the crew when I left the plane, as I bought a ticket with UNITED.
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Old May 10, 2012, 8:17 pm
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Originally Posted by Orion
I was at PHX waiting for my UA flight to IAD when the gate agent announced an oversold situation. I volunteered right away and was rejected by the gate agent who upon checking the computer said that my only alternative would be a hop to SFO and then a nonstop to IAD. I said I would take it. He said that United would not ticket a customer to go west to go east. He bumped somone who was willing to spend the night at PHX and travel the next day.
I do this a lot and the check-in agents often notice and say something about the supposed shadiness of doing this. I was told once that it could indicate that I was a security risk--that flight was MCO-SFO-DEN. Talk about BS!
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Old May 10, 2012, 8:25 pm
  #10  
 
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Originally Posted by BDLORD
Heard a good one today.
As we sat in the penalty box for 30 minutes of my 45 minute connection time
from the Cockpit, " United only has a couple gates at O'Hare that can accommodate an Airbus"
I call shenanigans
Your turn!
I made it to my flight BTW with minutes to spare
I'm thinking it was more sarcasm.

Originally Posted by channa
"The upgrade system is not broken, Sir."
^^

Originally Posted by zombietooth
I do this a lot and the check-in agents often notice and say something about the supposed shadiness of doing this. I was told once that it could indicate that I was a security risk--that flight was MCO-SFO-DEN. Talk about BS!
I've never had an issue with that.
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Old May 10, 2012, 8:30 pm
  #11  
 
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I probably hear a good handful of times a year from a FA on a delayed inbound flight to a hub something along the lines of "don't worry about connections, all flights are delayed," or a favorite, "they'll hold flights for connecting passengers." Only once in memory have I heard the honest truth from a then-NW FA, to the effect of "we don't hold planes, you've missed your connection, see someone to rebook."
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Old May 10, 2012, 8:35 pm
  #12  
 
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Originally Posted by mbluecpa
I probably hear a good handful of times a year from a FA on a delayed inbound flight to a hub something along the lines of "don't worry about connections, all flights are delayed," or a favorite, "they'll hold flights for connecting passengers." Only once in memory have I heard the honest truth from a then-NW FA, to the effect of "we don't hold planes, you've missed your connection, see someone to rebook."
I always tell my passengers that many flights are delayed and they should not stress until we arrive at the destination, as there is very little that can be done in the mean time. Part of my welcome announcement in these situations is to be sure to check the boards as many flights are delayed and it is possible your connection has not yet departed.

Then again, I also try to gather flight numbers from my passengers and check them via my phone when we land so that everyone has a good idea of whats happening before I even get the door open.
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Old May 10, 2012, 8:37 pm
  #13  
 
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My all-time favorite from the LAX meltdown in March...

"We'd rather let someone who hasn't flown with us before have the chance to sit in a first class seat" upon being told my revenue F ticket and elite status wasn't enough to keep my reservation in the F cabin in an oversale situation.
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Old May 10, 2012, 8:45 pm
  #14  
 
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Not to ruin the fun, but the subject line for this thread is an ugly one. I hope someone starts a corresponding "Biggest whopper you've ever heard from a UA passenger" thread in the interest of fair play.

"DYKWIA?"

"I was told I had club access with this ticket"

"I've flown XX miles with this airline, I'm entitled to [insert perk here]"

And so on.

I'm not saying whoppers aren't told by employees -- or passengers. But that subject line strikes me as abusive toward the UACO employees whose posts in this forum are so valuable.
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Old May 10, 2012, 8:53 pm
  #15  
 
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F/A to me on an ERJ in cruise: "Sir, you cannot use your [Bose] headphones while seated at the emergency exit!"

G/A to me (GS, Y fare, #1 on WL): "Sir, I can't upgrade you just yet. There might still be passengers with higher status or priority than you showing up!"
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