Stop being nice guy......
UA screwed a paying Business class passenger and they are trying to get away with a $1200 voucher.
I agree that if you would have been more vocal at the airport, somebody that was upgraded would have been sent back. It has happened to me and I am sure to many more.
Do not accept it; do not write a "what's up??" letter.
Email, call and send a snail mail to UA customer service and demand a refund. Do not expect an answer on your first attempt.

There were at least two supervisors involved fwiw. As I mentioned I was not willing to raise a stink to inflict misery on someone else because on some other flight it would be me in their situation - bad karma, right?

I certainly agree that checking in before you get to the airport helps; perhaps that is the lesson here although I was a shade over two hours early for the flight. On the other hand I have had trouble with online check-in to GRU/GIG in the past because the online visa verification doesn't seem to work well. In any event, I was coming directly from a meeting and did not have a chance to stop at the office and print a boarding pass.

Did they treat you like you were still in Business Class (drinks, meals, amenities)

Got a blanket and an offer of free drinks. No special meal though...

Yes UA is worthless and yes I will demand a refund. But rather than getting myself all worked up I would prefer just to not fly UA on competitive routes if this is the way they do business. I don't need the hassle of writing letters and emailing and calling. Next week I will give TAM my $6600 rt.

This is the only sensible way to go. I fully understand your frustrations and why you don't want to cause misery to someone else. The strange thing is that the recent changes to operating procedures (effectively clearing very few GPUs in advance of the gate) should have eliminated this problem, which can happen even to well run airlines.

If it makes you feel any better, I got downgraded once from full fare C to Y on BA - the refund went to my employer and I was SOL.

Wonder if all the upgrades were for $, and they didn't want to refund the transactional / marginal revenue?

I have no idea what the comparison of $ is for refund of an involuntary downgrade versus refunding an upsale. Just a thought.

Kudos to the OP for not wanting to inflict a downgrade on anyone else. Hopefully your good wishes will be rewarded.

If only karma was real.

Good advice if the OP is p**sed off and wants to pursue this further, which does not seem to be the case. But in any event, is being a nice guy a bad thing? :D

Makes a lot of sense to me. In addition to the nice guy factor, this way you're saving yourself a lot of potential aggravation and hassle of dealing with today's UA. If you felt differently about this, I'd say full speed ahead with the complaints. But given how you feel, your course of action sounds reasonable. (And anyway, even if it didn't sound reasonable to me, it's your call after all.)

I dont understand??? Why was he downgraded on a D fare and not an upgrade or someone on a Z fare? He should call his credit card company and deny the charge. Once UA figures out he did that they will contact him for payment and be willing to deal. Similar thing happened to me a few years ago (not a downgrade from a FF ticket) But I declined payment with Amex. When they asked the reason I said "did not get service I paid for" UA called me 2 months later demanding payment but when I explained why I put the stop on the charge they were more then happy to do what was right and get some money back

Some things are just unfathomable and make no sense.

If I was upgraded to business and the FA said I had to be downgraded because there was no seat for a full-fare customer, I would not be happy but I would understand and be agreeable.

If I had a full-fare ticket and they did this to me I would not accept it - period. I would ask for a refund and find another airline - probably for good.

IMhO.... (if those involved wants to do this):

chinatraderjmr, could you PM KPhill the SMI/J address you used for your "cancelled ticket" issues?

E-mail SMI/J your TAM receipt for next week, along with your original UA receipt, and the a brief description of the downgrade. BAsicaly, to show SMI/J the real $$$ he is losing. @:-)

I understand the OP deserved alot better treatment, but in no way should anyone who was UPed prior to the time the OP purchased their tkt be Downgraded so that the OP could fly in BF.

I do agree that anyone that on the day of flight was UPed using any item to do so is a candidate for Downgrading.

Otherwise if I was the last person that was UPed and if that was say 3 weeks ago and since CO oversold BF and they downgrade me as the last person who was UPed , CO would basically be saying well we UPed you but its not a gauranteed thing till the door is closed would drive most people away from ever flying CO

Here is the problem I have with this statement.

Why does the customer HAVE to be proactive, he bought a Business Class ticket, in what world should a customer have to worry about this except in the airline industry... it seems like bait and switch to me especially if I understood correctly that he bought it same day. UA should have offered to fly him business on another airline at the very least.

But I agree with the OP that is the right answer, fly the competition. I've started doing that with AA and I have had WONDERFUL experiences as an ExPlatinum, its how 1Ks used to be treated.

I like this idea. Can't hurt, so why not?

I would definitely make sure UA knows you have decided to book with other carriers and show them proof via actual paid receipts. I guess they just downgraded the last few to check in as opposed to making offers to people to downgrade. Would think there would have been a few upgraders willing to take a downgrade voucher of $1k+....but what do I know.