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Since UA apparently has "as needed" refueling contractors at YYR I wonder why they don't have the same for "as needed" Customer Services?
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Originally Posted by toomanybooks
(Post 24973159)
From one of the online news stories:
"Once we landed there was nobody at all from United Airlines to be seen anywhere," passenger Lisa Wan told NBC News. "No United representative ever reached out to anybody -- no phone calls, no human beings, nothing. Nobody had any idea what was going on." This is utterly unfathomable to me. How can EVERY SINGLE UA employee just ignore this and run away? UA Board of Directors should start kicking some @ss, now. And for food, I read somewhere that there is a grocery store nearby. Stands to reason, as it is a town of 7000. Does no one on Wacker have the brains to call the grocery manager and tell him, "Please box up sandwich fixings and soup and salads (and beer) and anything you can for a couple hundred people and run it over to the base. Here's a credit card to charge."? Or a pizza place? So at the cost of a few thousand bucks they worsen this gigantic PR disaster? My God, an average 12 y.o. could do better running this outfit. These people are so utterly incompetent and uncaring, the mind boggles. If they were trying to destroy this airline, they couldn't do a better job. but, that grocery store closed at 6pm (i know because we went to buy snacks and beer). the mess hall was fine. food wasn't exactly gourmet, but kept us fed. the biggest gap was between the noon lunch and the 1am boarding from EWR to LHR (where they had sandwiches and cookies waiting) |
I'm glad to read nautical's account of what really happened but UA really dropped the ball here. The crew should be ashamed they took hotel accommodations while their passengers endured a frigid evening in the barracks.
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Originally Posted by Aventine
(Post 24973207)
I'm glad to read nautical's account of what really happened but UA really dropped the ball here. The crew should be ashamed they took hotel accommodations while their passengers endured a frigid evening in the barracks.
What bothers me is not the diversion (it happens), the unorganized response (again, they dont expect it to happen every day), the poor conditions (it does beat sitting on the plane, but same as before - they were just unprepared), its the flippant response from United on Twitter and nothing else. |
Originally Posted by nautical
(Post 24972784)
for the person that asked: no, we didn't have access to luggage. that left a common level of smell, unfortunately, as most were left without deodorant and toothpaste. fortunately i had the J kit, so at least had clean teeth.
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Originally Posted by Sant
(Post 24973228)
On the ORD-LHR route, does UA provide a kit containing toothbrush and paste for Y pax?
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Originally Posted by Aventine
(Post 24973207)
I'm glad to read nautical's account of what really happened but UA really dropped the ball here. The crew should be ashamed they took hotel accommodations while their passengers endured a frigid evening in the barracks.
I'll gladly give the pilot a hotel room and stay in a barracks if it means pilot can get my butt back to wherever I need to be safely. Plus honestly, it's probably in the Pilot and FA contracts so UA wouldn't have had a choice even if they wanted to. |
Originally Posted by nyr2299
(Post 24973227)
What bothers me is not the diversion (it happens), the unorganized response (again, they dont expect it to happen every day), the poor conditions (it does beat sitting on the plane, but same as before - they were just unprepared), its the flippant response from United on Twitter and nothing else.
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Originally Posted by Cargojon
(Post 24973260)
Are you kidding me? I'd want the pilots as well rested as possible in the event that they had to pilot a replacement plane to LHR/EWR/etc.
I'll gladly give the pilot a hotel room and stay in a barracks if it means pilot can get my butt back to wherever I need to be safely. Plus honestly, it's probably in the Pilot and FA contracts so UA wouldn't have had a choice even if they wanted to. |
Originally Posted by Kacee
(Post 24972841)
Because it would indicate the company cared, that it viewed these events as unacceptable, and that it was doing something to fix them.
That's just basic. I don't think regular messages - delivered via a crew member or some other method - that effectively say, "we're sorry for the inconvenience and are working to fix the problem," would make me feel any better as long as the problem isn't fixed. |
to be completely fair, it wasn't exactly an emotional disaster while we were waiting. it was annoying, but we made the most of it. on ben's blog, there's a more detailed account with some of my pics, including the one of all the beer my barracks picked up. we became friends and sort of laughed at it.
had we known how serious the rudder issue was the night prior, perhaps it would have been more emotional. |
FYI, it isn't "union rules" that determine the work rules of unionized employees. It's a negotiated contract agreed to by the union and the employer.
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Originally Posted by nautical
(Post 24973331)
to be completely fair, it wasn't exactly an emotional disaster while we were waiting. it was annoying, but we made the most of it. on ben's blog, there's a more detailed account with some of my pics, including the one of all the beer my barracks picked up. we became friends and sort of laughed at it.
had we known how serious the rudder issue was the night prior, perhaps it would have been more emotional. |
Originally Posted by lhrsfo
(Post 24973297)
I'd buy that argument for the pilots but absolutely not for the FAs. Oddly, in another post about a week ago, I described some of the UA FAs as behaving like prison wardens - they really got to show their stripes this time around. And hiding behind union rules is adequate argument in itself to demonstrate conclusively that unions are past their sell-by date.
Sure, UA unions have half-joked for years that customers are "the enemy." But here you have a management that doesn't believe in competitive on-time performance; publishes a timetable it manifestly cannot operate, and just shrugs; does not see the business case for keeping commitments to customers; plays chess against them every chance it gets; and does not accept / comprehend the service dimension of the airline business. (Smisek thinks he's in the logistics business, like DHL.) The rest of the organization picks up on those cues and disasters like Goose Bay, where nobody seems to think 200 distressed passengers in the middle of nowhere constitute an urgent problem but failing to secure crew hotel rooms to a union-approved standard would certainly be, are the result. Yes, Virginia, there is a limit to the customer-as-boxed freight strategy. It's enough to make you root for the mobs with pitchforks. |
Originally Posted by physioprof
(Post 24973351)
Can you provide a link to "ben's blog"? I'm not familiar with it, but I'd love to read more first hand accounts. And I'm super happy to hear that you all managed to get some beer!
http://onemileatatime.boardingarea.c...se-bay-canada/ |
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