UAs Official Response to HKG Ticketing/IT Error: Redeem @ Correct Amount or Redeposit
Jul 18, 2012, 12:40 am
#796
Join Date: Sep 2006
Location: HNL
Programs: UA GS4MM, MR LT Plat, Hilton Gold
Posts: 6,447
I'll edit to add - I have 2 seats booked on the mistake deal - but never expected would actually happen - but who knows.
Jul 18, 2012, 12:44 am
#797
Join Date: Jul 2005
Location: Atlántida, Canelones, Uruguay (MVD) and rarely GNV
Programs: AV LifeMiles, CM ConnectMiles, BA Exec Club. Former:ex-ASGold, ex-UA1K, ex-COPlat, ex-NWGold.
Posts: 2,673
What most posters are missing is that there's a subtext to the DOT regulations, and we should be seeing it: The reason that the regulations explicitly say "mistake fares" are covered and cannot be raised after ticketing is to provide a deterrent from sloppy practices, deliberately or not, by inflicting a penalty on the airline that tries to get away with weaseling out of honoring its mistakes.
Mistakes aren't supposed to happen. That's why they're called mistakes. "Miss-takes."
In the past, airlines had impunity when the made a mistake. Now the DOT regulations say, "tough luck Charlie, eat it and let the customer fly."
If eating it causes millions of dollars in losses to the airline, than that's a darn good "teachable moment" to encourage that and other airlines to fix their business processes, controls, and systems to not do it again.
All us current or ex-UA/CO flyers are pretty disgusted with all the systems and business processes and bad decisions around IT and training resulting from the botched merger, right? Well isn't making United eat it and honor these EXACTLY the kind of lesson SMI/J needs to get about how much he screwed up? Me buying flights on Taca, LAN, and Alaska instead of UA doesn't exactly send a message the way a DOT order to honor the tickets or pay the fine does.
I didn't get in on this one, and I had no excuse, because I wasn't in jail without WiFi (to paraphrase MommyPoints BoardingArea blog.) So I don't have a dog in this race. I've never gotten this good a deal; just the Y-cabin $314 LAS to MUC and $214 LAX-LHR LH/UA combo meals a few years back, and getting screwed out of a better one on Air Canada a couple of years ago, months after booking. But this is now, and the DOT rules are now different and stronger, and explicit that mistakes must be ordered.
Those same rules also require one cash price quote, without the nonsense about what's base fare, YQ, taxes, 9/11 fee etc - it's got to be quoted as "what does the customer's form of payment get charged to be able to fly on the plane?" Put that concept together with the "mistakes must be honored" and these tickets did cost money, did have value other than the miles. A monkey could see that UA has very little wiggle room here, and that their UA Insider response was old-rules-thinking.
UA screwed up, and under the law nowadays in the USA, they have to honor their screwup. Which is a great incentive to stop screwing up.
Mistakes aren't supposed to happen. That's why they're called mistakes. "Miss-takes."
In the past, airlines had impunity when the made a mistake. Now the DOT regulations say, "tough luck Charlie, eat it and let the customer fly."
If eating it causes millions of dollars in losses to the airline, than that's a darn good "teachable moment" to encourage that and other airlines to fix their business processes, controls, and systems to not do it again.
All us current or ex-UA/CO flyers are pretty disgusted with all the systems and business processes and bad decisions around IT and training resulting from the botched merger, right? Well isn't making United eat it and honor these EXACTLY the kind of lesson SMI/J needs to get about how much he screwed up? Me buying flights on Taca, LAN, and Alaska instead of UA doesn't exactly send a message the way a DOT order to honor the tickets or pay the fine does.
I didn't get in on this one, and I had no excuse, because I wasn't in jail without WiFi (to paraphrase MommyPoints BoardingArea blog.) So I don't have a dog in this race. I've never gotten this good a deal; just the Y-cabin $314 LAS to MUC and $214 LAX-LHR LH/UA combo meals a few years back, and getting screwed out of a better one on Air Canada a couple of years ago, months after booking. But this is now, and the DOT rules are now different and stronger, and explicit that mistakes must be ordered.
Those same rules also require one cash price quote, without the nonsense about what's base fare, YQ, taxes, 9/11 fee etc - it's got to be quoted as "what does the customer's form of payment get charged to be able to fly on the plane?" Put that concept together with the "mistakes must be honored" and these tickets did cost money, did have value other than the miles. A monkey could see that UA has very little wiggle room here, and that their UA Insider response was old-rules-thinking.
UA screwed up, and under the law nowadays in the USA, they have to honor their screwup. Which is a great incentive to stop screwing up.
Jul 18, 2012, 12:49 am
#798
Join Date: Oct 2007
Programs: UA 1K 1MM / AA PP, Marriott Lifetime Gold
Posts: 949
What most posters are missing is that there's a subtext to the DOT regulations, and we should be seeing it: The reason that the regulations explicitly say "mistake fares" are covered and cannot be raised after ticketing is to provide a deterrent from sloppy practices, deliberately or not, by inflicting a penalty on the airline that tries to get away with weaseling out of honoring its mistakes.
Mistakes aren't supposed to happen. That's why they're called mistakes. "Miss-takes."
In the past, airlines had impunity when the made a mistake. Now the DOT regulations say, "tough luck Charlie, eat it and let the customer fly."
If eating it causes millions of dollars in losses to the airline, than that's a darn good "teachable moment" to encourage that and other airlines to fix their business processes, controls, and systems to not do it again.
All us current or ex-UA/CO flyers are pretty disgusted with all the systems and business processes and bad decisions around IT and training resulting from the botched merger, right? Well isn't making United eat it and honor these EXACTLY the kind of lesson SMI/J needs to get about how much he screwed up? Me buying flights on Taca, LAN, and Alaska instead of UA doesn't exactly send a message the way a DOT order to honor the tickets or pay the fine does.
I didn't get in on this one, and I had no excuse, because I wasn't in jail without WiFi (to paraphrase MommyPoints BoardingArea blog.) So I don't have a dog in this race. I've never gotten this good a deal; just the Y-cabin $314 LAS to MUC and $214 LAX-LHR LH/UA combo meals a few years back, and getting screwed out of a better one on Air Canada a couple of years ago, months after booking. But this is now, and the DOT rules are now different and stronger, and explicit that mistakes must be ordered.
Those same rules also require one cash price quote, without the nonsense about what's base fare, YQ, taxes, 9/11 fee etc - it's got to be quoted as "what does the customer's form of payment get charged to be able to fly on the plane?" Put that concept together with the "mistakes must be honored" and these tickets did cost money, did have value other than the miles. A monkey could see that UA has very little wiggle room here, and that their UA Insider response was old-rules-thinking.
UA screwed up, and under the law nowadays in the USA, they have to honor their screwup. Which is a great incentive to stop screwing up.
Mistakes aren't supposed to happen. That's why they're called mistakes. "Miss-takes."
In the past, airlines had impunity when the made a mistake. Now the DOT regulations say, "tough luck Charlie, eat it and let the customer fly."
If eating it causes millions of dollars in losses to the airline, than that's a darn good "teachable moment" to encourage that and other airlines to fix their business processes, controls, and systems to not do it again.
All us current or ex-UA/CO flyers are pretty disgusted with all the systems and business processes and bad decisions around IT and training resulting from the botched merger, right? Well isn't making United eat it and honor these EXACTLY the kind of lesson SMI/J needs to get about how much he screwed up? Me buying flights on Taca, LAN, and Alaska instead of UA doesn't exactly send a message the way a DOT order to honor the tickets or pay the fine does.
I didn't get in on this one, and I had no excuse, because I wasn't in jail without WiFi (to paraphrase MommyPoints BoardingArea blog.) So I don't have a dog in this race. I've never gotten this good a deal; just the Y-cabin $314 LAS to MUC and $214 LAX-LHR LH/UA combo meals a few years back, and getting screwed out of a better one on Air Canada a couple of years ago, months after booking. But this is now, and the DOT rules are now different and stronger, and explicit that mistakes must be ordered.
Those same rules also require one cash price quote, without the nonsense about what's base fare, YQ, taxes, 9/11 fee etc - it's got to be quoted as "what does the customer's form of payment get charged to be able to fly on the plane?" Put that concept together with the "mistakes must be honored" and these tickets did cost money, did have value other than the miles. A monkey could see that UA has very little wiggle room here, and that their UA Insider response was old-rules-thinking.
UA screwed up, and under the law nowadays in the USA, they have to honor their screwup. Which is a great incentive to stop screwing up.
Jul 18, 2012, 12:52 am
#799
FlyerTalk Evangelist
Join Date: Jan 2002
Location: Canada
Programs: UA*1K MM
Posts: 23,301
Wow lots of bitter people here who didn't get a ticket and now pulling the ethics card!
But more importantly, why do I keep reading about UA F?
I purposely avoided UA flights! Am I the only one?
But more importantly, why do I keep reading about UA F?
I purposely avoided UA flights! Am I the only one?
Jul 18, 2012, 1:18 am
#800
Join Date: May 2011
Location: HKG, ORD, and BOM
Programs: 1K
Posts: 110
What most posters are missing is that there's a subtext to the DOT regulations, and we should be seeing it: The reason that the regulations explicitly say "mistake fares" are covered and cannot be raised after ticketing is to provide a deterrent from sloppy practices, deliberately or not, by inflicting a penalty on the airline that tries to get away with weaseling out of honoring its mistakes...
Just another self-serving rationalization for taking advantage of other people. I'm not surprised when folks take advantage of others' mistakes, but the self-righteous justifications that people manage to talk themselves into after the act are pretty funny.
This law was clearly not intended to promote glitch-free computer systems. It was intended to protect consumers.
By taking advantage of the legislation and applying to the government for this law's enforcement in a situation where the consumer is clearly taking advantage of the airline, rather than the airline taking advantage of the consumer, one makes it less likely that everyday consumers will be able to find protection from similar laws from in the future, and one wastes our community's resources by requiring bureaucracy to address these frivolous complaints.
Jul 18, 2012, 1:22 am
#801
Join Date: Oct 2009
Programs: UA 1K, Hilton ♦ , Hyatt Carbonado, Wyndham ♦, Marriott PE, "Stinking Bum" elsewhere.
Posts: 4,998
Topical column in NYT today discussing the sorry state of American "individualism" (read: apathetic self-entitlement)
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/07/17/op...me&ref=general
I wonder if the internet, and particularly forums like Slickdeals, Flyertalk Mileage Runs, etc. contribute to this - communities full of people perfecting and idolizing what at best amounts to wasteful miserliness and at worst amounts to theft.
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/07/17/op...me&ref=general
I wonder if the internet, and particularly forums like Slickdeals, Flyertalk Mileage Runs, etc. contribute to this - communities full of people perfecting and idolizing what at best amounts to wasteful miserliness and at worst amounts to theft.
It's amazing how truculent some of these deal grabbers here sound.
The truth is, nobody owes them anything, not UAL, not the world.
What will happen, will happen, and all the whining in the world will not change that.
But you are still right.
Last edited by iluv2fly; Jul 18, 2012 at 7:14 am Reason: merge
Jul 18, 2012, 1:23 am
#802
FlyerTalk Evangelist
Join Date: Jan 2002
Location: Canada
Programs: UA*1K MM
Posts: 23,301
Jul 18, 2012, 1:41 am
#803
Join Date: Oct 2007
Location: Dubai / NYC
Programs: EK-IO, UA-1K2MM, ETIHAD-GOLD, SPG-PLAT LIFETIME, JUMEIRAH SERIUS GOLD
Posts: 5,220
I have no problem w the people that got this deal. My problem is with the ones screaming DOT this and LAWSUIT that. They should have known from the beginning this would happen. They talk a good game of teaching UA a lesson but that's garbage. We may all be hurt by these few selfish OVER ENTITLED people. What happens when UA now refuses to ticket awards without 48 hour notice or has each one reviewed etc etc. With all of UA's problems. Milesge Plus is still pretty good. But it would be UA's right to take a lot away from the program leaving it not any better then Deltas. (That is what the legacy of this mistake may leave us with)
What most posters are missing is that there's a subtext to the DOT regulations, and we should be seeing it: The reason that the regulations explicitly say "mistake fares" are covered and cannot be raised after ticketing is to provide a deterrent from sloppy practices, deliberately or not, by inflicting a penalty on the airline that tries to get away with weaseling out of honoring its mistakes.
Mistakes aren't supposed to happen. That's why they're called mistakes. "Miss-takes."
In the past, airlines had impunity when the made a mistake. Now the DOT regulations say, "tough luck Charlie, eat it and let the customer fly."
If eating it causes millions of dollars in losses to the airline, than that's a darn good "teachable moment" to encourage that and other airlines to fix their business processes, controls, and systems to not do it again.
All us current or ex-UA/CO flyers are pretty disgusted with all the systems and business processes and bad decisions around IT and training resulting from the botched merger, right? Well isn't making United eat it and honor these EXACTLY the kind of lesson SMI/J needs to get about how much he screwed up? Me buying flights on Taca, LAN, and Alaska instead of UA doesn't exactly send a message the way a DOT order to honor the tickets or pay the fine does.
I didn't get in on this one, and I had no excuse, because I wasn't in jail without WiFi (to paraphrase MommyPoints BoardingArea blog.) So I don't have a dog in this race. I've never gotten this good a deal; just the Y-cabin $314 LAS to MUC and $214 LAX-LHR LH/UA combo meals a few years back, and getting screwed out of a better one on Air Canada a couple of years ago, months after booking. But this is now, and the DOT rules are now different and stronger, and explicit that mistakes must be ordered.
Those same rules also require one cash price quote, without the nonsense about what's base fare, YQ, taxes, 9/11 fee etc - it's got to be quoted as "what does the customer's form of payment get charged to be able to fly on the plane?" Put that concept together with the "mistakes must be honored" and these tickets did cost money, did have value other than the miles. A monkey could see that UA has very little wiggle room here, and that their UA Insider response was old-rules-thinking.
UA screwed up, and under the law nowadays in the USA, they have to honor their screwup. Which is a great incentive to stop screwing up.
Mistakes aren't supposed to happen. That's why they're called mistakes. "Miss-takes."
In the past, airlines had impunity when the made a mistake. Now the DOT regulations say, "tough luck Charlie, eat it and let the customer fly."
If eating it causes millions of dollars in losses to the airline, than that's a darn good "teachable moment" to encourage that and other airlines to fix their business processes, controls, and systems to not do it again.
All us current or ex-UA/CO flyers are pretty disgusted with all the systems and business processes and bad decisions around IT and training resulting from the botched merger, right? Well isn't making United eat it and honor these EXACTLY the kind of lesson SMI/J needs to get about how much he screwed up? Me buying flights on Taca, LAN, and Alaska instead of UA doesn't exactly send a message the way a DOT order to honor the tickets or pay the fine does.
I didn't get in on this one, and I had no excuse, because I wasn't in jail without WiFi (to paraphrase MommyPoints BoardingArea blog.) So I don't have a dog in this race. I've never gotten this good a deal; just the Y-cabin $314 LAS to MUC and $214 LAX-LHR LH/UA combo meals a few years back, and getting screwed out of a better one on Air Canada a couple of years ago, months after booking. But this is now, and the DOT rules are now different and stronger, and explicit that mistakes must be ordered.
Those same rules also require one cash price quote, without the nonsense about what's base fare, YQ, taxes, 9/11 fee etc - it's got to be quoted as "what does the customer's form of payment get charged to be able to fly on the plane?" Put that concept together with the "mistakes must be honored" and these tickets did cost money, did have value other than the miles. A monkey could see that UA has very little wiggle room here, and that their UA Insider response was old-rules-thinking.
UA screwed up, and under the law nowadays in the USA, they have to honor their screwup. Which is a great incentive to stop screwing up.
Last edited by iluv2fly; Jul 18, 2012 at 7:15 am Reason: merge
Jul 18, 2012, 2:11 am
#804
Join Date: Jun 2012
Location: SFO
Programs: United MileagePlus
Posts: 55
The local CBS station in San Francisco, KPIX, piled on to this fiasco.
http://sanfrancisco.cbslocal.com/vid...kong-a-glitch/
In general, I have little to zero faith in local television reporters when it comes to doing stories about aviation. This report was absolutely *horrendous.* It fabricated some generalization that the airline's "legions of frequent fliers" were upset by this obvious glitch that United Airlines isn't making good on.
I'm glad UAInsider cleared it up here for us FTers, but the best part of the CBS "news" report was the fact that the reporter never bothered to get the other side of the story from the airline itself!
DOT rules or no rules, common sense needs to prevail once in a while folks.
http://sanfrancisco.cbslocal.com/vid...kong-a-glitch/
In general, I have little to zero faith in local television reporters when it comes to doing stories about aviation. This report was absolutely *horrendous.* It fabricated some generalization that the airline's "legions of frequent fliers" were upset by this obvious glitch that United Airlines isn't making good on.
I'm glad UAInsider cleared it up here for us FTers, but the best part of the CBS "news" report was the fact that the reporter never bothered to get the other side of the story from the airline itself!
DOT rules or no rules, common sense needs to prevail once in a while folks.
Jul 18, 2012, 2:18 am
#805
FlyerTalk Evangelist
Join Date: Sep 2002
Location: Between AUS, EWR, and YTO In a little twisty maze of airline seats, all alike.. but I wanna go home with the armadillo
Programs: CO, NW, & UA forum moderator emeritus
Posts: 35,415
In general, I have little to zero faith in local television reporters when it comes to doing stories about aviation. This report was absolutely *horrendous.* It fabricated some generalization that the airline's "legions of frequent fliers" were upset by this obvious glitch that United Airlines isn't making good on.
I'm glad UAInsider cleared it up here for us FTers, but the best part of the CBS "news" report was the fact that the reporter never bothered to get the other side of the story from the airline itself!
I'm glad UAInsider cleared it up here for us FTers, but the best part of the CBS "news" report was the fact that the reporter never bothered to get the other side of the story from the airline itself!
me to FlyerTalk!The quotes from the 'expert' who was interviewed were so generic and cut up into pieces that one could not really be sure that he was even speaking about this issue. Furthermore, his last comment about the DOT not wanting to have anything to do with mileage tickets was quite clearly at odds with what was printed in the Useless T
day regarding this story.
Jul 18, 2012, 2:45 am
#806
Join Date: Oct 2007
Location: Dubai / NYC
Programs: EK-IO, UA-1K2MM, ETIHAD-GOLD, SPG-PLAT LIFETIME, JUMEIRAH SERIUS GOLD
Posts: 5,220
The local CBS station in San Francisco, KPIX, piled on to this fiasco.
http://sanfrancisco.cbslocal.com/vid...kong-a-glitch/
In general, I have little to zero faith in local television reporters when it comes to doing stories about aviation. This report was absolutely *horrendous.* It fabricated some generalization that the airline's "legions of frequent fliers" were upset by this obvious glitch that United Airlines isn't making good on.
I'm glad UAInsider cleared it up here for us FTers, but the best part of the CBS "news" report was the fact that the reporter never bothered to get the other side of the story from the airline itself!
DOT rules or no rules, common sense needs to prevail once in a while folks.
http://sanfrancisco.cbslocal.com/vid...kong-a-glitch/
In general, I have little to zero faith in local television reporters when it comes to doing stories about aviation. This report was absolutely *horrendous.* It fabricated some generalization that the airline's "legions of frequent fliers" were upset by this obvious glitch that United Airlines isn't making good on.
I'm glad UAInsider cleared it up here for us FTers, but the best part of the CBS "news" report was the fact that the reporter never bothered to get the other side of the story from the airline itself!
DOT rules or no rules, common sense needs to prevail once in a while folks.
Jul 18, 2012, 2:55 am
#807
Join Date: Jan 2010
Location: valencia ca
Programs: Hyatt Diamond
Posts: 244
it looks like air china had the same problem last week
http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/china/2...t_15577414.htm
http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/china/2...t_15577414.htm
Jul 18, 2012, 2:57 am
#808
FlyerTalk Evangelist
Join Date: Nov 2009
Location: Northeast Kansas | Colorado Native
Programs: Amex Gold/Plat, UA *G, Hyatt Globalist, Marriott LT Gold, NEXUS, TSA Disparager Unobtanium
Posts: 21,603
it looks like air china had the same problem last week
http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/china/2...t_15577414.htm
http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/china/2...t_15577414.htm
On July 12, Air China announced on its micro blog it will cover the losses caused by the booking system error and passengers could travel for the price listed.
Jul 18, 2012, 3:00 am
#809
Join Date: Jun 2006
Location: Asia
Programs: RVT 1K
Posts: 883
A great supplemental read to this is reading Seth's blog on his take-
http://boardingarea.com/blogs/thewan...zies-come-out/
83 comments and counting on Seth vs. FTG
http://boardingarea.com/blogs/thewan...zies-come-out/
83 comments and counting on Seth vs. FTG
Thanks for posting that, just unreal, frugal guy...
Jul 18, 2012, 3:10 am
#810
Join Date: Mar 2009
Location: DC
Programs: Hilton Diamond, Marriott LT Titantium Elite
Posts: 144
I love FTG, and still do, but I also admit that saying it's discrimination, of any kind, because others got to go is pretty absurd. It reminds me of a child on a playground saying "That boy got to do it, so should I!" ..
Or in a more real perspective - it's like if Best Buy advertised a price mistake, and a few folks were able to purchase the product before they caught on and corrected it. You can't go to Best Buy saying, "Hey! Other people got to buy it for $1, why do I have to pay $100? That's discrimination!"
It's an argument that holds no water at all, and does defy logic, and it was disappointing to me to hear this from FTG. But hey, I've said many, many stupid things myself!
Or in a more real perspective - it's like if Best Buy advertised a price mistake, and a few folks were able to purchase the product before they caught on and corrected it. You can't go to Best Buy saying, "Hey! Other people got to buy it for $1, why do I have to pay $100? That's discrimination!"
It's an argument that holds no water at all, and does defy logic, and it was disappointing to me to hear this from FTG. But hey, I've said many, many stupid things myself!