fearziz

Get on plane, 1 seat wont recline, everyone off the plane for 1 1/2 hours. I miss my connection, no flights to my destination till tuesday. I ask for a refund, they say no, 2 hrs later I get my refund and my bags back. Why is it so hard to get a refund when I cant get to my destination for 4 days later. What a joke! Goodbye United

Landice

I'm sure it's more than a malfunction in a seat recline (at least I hope). Just doesn't make sense to lose so much revenue on something so small.

uwr

Sorry to hear you had so much trouble.

If you include specific details in your story, it could be much more useful to understand what happened.

LilAbner

Like in what cabin wouldn't the seat recline, and if it was your cabin why didn't you or any other passenger volunteer to sit in that seat, so ya'all could go?
Me thinks, however that perhaps the seat wouldn't stay in an upright position, especially during take-off.
In any case there is something fishy as there is always a possibility to VDB one passenger so this flight can go out on time. There is way more to this story than "Another United Fail"!

Jorgen

While all these events may have happened in the order mentioned, "someone's seat wouldn't recline" and "everyone off the plane for 1 1/2 hours", I rather doubt that there was a causal relationship between them. I've seen a lot of seats with broken recline, but never heard of them holding a flight to repair it. (Heck, it's pretty rare to find out you have a seat that won't recline prior to takeoff anyway.)

"I ask for a refund... 2 hrs later I get my refund and my bags back. Why is it so hard to get a refund...?"

How much easier would you like it to be?

"no flights to my destination till tuesday... I cant get to my destination for 4 days later."

Where on Earth are you flying to that is serviced by flights four days apart?

schneider4

I was on a UA flight (SFO -> IAD) in January 2011 that was held for 45 min for repairs at SFO because...ready for this...one passenger's reading light didn't work. This was on top of another 45 min mechanical delay.

Coincidentally, many of the other 150+ passengers missed their connections at IAD. When I later relayed this MX delay story to a friend who works at UA, he told me that these types of incomprehensible holdups are mini labor actions, designed to cost the airline money and show the unhappiness of staff (often by the pilots).

TravellingMan

I reckon the standard answer from any harried GA is to state that the next available flight is 3 days from now. Just to shock you into sticking with the current delays. if the OP had done his homework on the next possible flights and suggested it to the GA, it could have been done and dusted.

LilAbner

I've faked it several times also so we can get going, but some people don't realize that tipping off a f/a can lead to a delay!

Regarding causes to ground an aircraft, just wait and see! We'll see very soon, me thinks!

MSPGabe

Depends. You come to PWM in the summer and it's not uncommon to have zero seats for a week or more.


Last summer we had a cancellation to Chicago. That same day, US had a cancellation on their A319 to Charlotte, and Delta had a cancellation on their MD-88 to Atlanta. PWM literally had 0's across the board, all airlines for 9 days. We had people driving to Hartford to get out of New England.

aacharya

Why is it so hard for people to write decent posts with details and not just rants about leaving the airline?

As others have noted, OP's route, the specific scenario, etc, would have helped.

username

I don't think the OP was trying to get help fixing the problem.

I am not surprised that it is not possible to get to a place for 4 days. I was stuck in LAX 1.5 weeks ago for PHX - with 5 carriers serving the route and 2 of them (US/WN) higher frquencies. Capacities are cut so much and planes are full, especially on a holiday weekend.

How about the trip in vain clause? Wouldn't that apply in this case?

AA_EXP09

You got to your destination. You paid for transportation to your destination. You got what you paid for. How are you entitled to a refund?

LilAbner

"Trip in Vain" is when you take one segment (or a few) and UA can't get you to your final destination in a reasonable time. You then chose to return to your starting point and get a partial refund for the segments not flown.

Just reread the OP's original post and I truly don't have any idea what happened to him, and where he missed his flight's as I'm confused because he asks for a refund and is denied then he says he gets a refund--- I don't get it???

Perhaps this is his solution --- "Goodbye United"

BillBauman

The OP didn't GET anywhere. Based on the initial mechanical delay, he realized he wasn't going to make his connection. When he asked about alternatives to getting there, according to the OP, he was told it would be 4 days. He decided not to take the trip and asked for a refund. They initially told him no. When they finally agreed, it took an exorbitant amount of time to process said refund.

I don't understand why posting displeasure with this situation has brought any backlash to the OP, yet it has. People here wanting more details so they can "help". Chastising him for not sharing enough information. What are you going to do to help? Charter him a jet? Send UA a letter on his behalf insisting on additional compensation? It's over. OP didn't get there and UA customer service did a poor job of handling it.

It seems that the customer service at UA has declined significantly under the new regime. This is one more of many, many examples. The details aren't even that relevant. Why are people so unhappy that the OP is unhappy? For that matter, why is it not okay to some of you for others to post these experiences?

fastair

The reason is the OP posted in the way Frankenstein talked in the movies. A series of clauses that don't transition well instead of complete sentances constructed to be read. It reads more like the notes one would write to yourself on scratch paper. When posting a public forum, it helps to convey what you wish to convey. In order to do that, a complte, well constructed post gets far better results than a scanned copy of your scratch paper, run thru OCR software, then cut and pasted in a public forum.