ElieW

Hi All,
Hope you can help with some suggestions. Sorry for long post, but I want to be detailed for others who may encounter this in the future. I had a TLV-EWR flight over a month ago that was canceled about 15 hours in advance. The inbound flight to TLV was canceled and UA did not see it fit/could not When I called UA to be re-accommodated I was told they cannot add me to any other flights on any other airlines and that I need to wait until the next morning to get another UA flight. Ok, I did that. (The new flight gets in 4 hours late, but that's another story). My connecting flight to LAX then had to be pushed off a week.

About a week after the flight I was offered a $175 voucher (previously I was offered $300 vouchers). I declined the offer when I learned that under Israel Aviation law I should be eligible for approximately $800. As such I responded to UA via email that I would not accept that in lieu of full compensation. of A copy of UA's Policy with regards to that law is here.

UA responded with giving me 5000 bonus miles, which I also declined. So now the fun starts… 3 weeks go by and UA does not respond to further emails or voice mail left on their “Customer Care” line. I then started tweeting to UA and was told to expect a letter in the mail. Got the mail last week, it was just the same offer of the $175 voucher and a form letter (with incorrect information) about why I’m not eligible for additional compensation.
After further back and forth with the great UA Twitter staff, I received another email today (26 days later) denying my original claim. Here is what UA says:

My understanding is that a canceled flight due to technical failure of an inbound aircraft 16 hours prior is not “force majeure”. In fact, this is the exact case the law is intended for. UA could have reasonably made other accommodations and not left customers hanging.

Here is what really bugs me… A friend of mind in nearly the exact circumstance, who has NO STATUS with UA was initially offered $600 in vouchers. After he declined, he received a call from someone at Corporate and was eventually offered a $1000 voucher. Yet all I get as a platinum (3 years previous 1k) is $175 + 5000 miles. Suggestions?

Thanks!!!

mherdeg

Interesting, I wonder if your next recourse is to follow up with Israel's Civil Aviation Authority?

Someone more cynical than me might argue that UA's generous treatment of your non-elite friend vs. its stingy treatment of you indeed reflects the fact that you have high airline status. A cynic might read this as UA saying "well, as a high-status elite, we bet you're usually pretty happy, yeah? I bet we don't need to spend very much money at all to avoid losing your future business."

A more likely explanation is that you and your friend just randomly reached different customer service reps who gave you low/high compensation values and that the helpfulness of the very first person you talked to is reinforced by each additional person who responds (CS reps tend to back one another up).

Please do follow up after you've reached out to Israeli regulators and let us know how things go from there.

transportprof

United will resist paying all the way to the Israel Supreme Court. Here's coverage of a class action lawsuit that demonstrates their approach:

http://www.vosizneias.com/191269/201...erusalem-post/

Good luck! You'll need it.

{Moderator Note -- this site throws up multiple pop-windows / ad tracking}

Often1

I wonder whether OP's friend made a demand for compensation under Israeli law. Once that happens, a different (and tougher) team handles the claim.

UA and other US carriers have adopted a tougher stance here and under EC 261/2004 for xEU flights regarding force majeure incidents where the carrier asserts that everything had been done right and the part still failed.

They appear to be looking for the right cases to litigate.

If you do complain to ICAA, please let us know how it goes.

transportbiz

The best part of the story: "When approached by the Post for a reaction, a spokeswoman for United Airlines said that the company had no comment at this time."

mduell

Same story without the crazy level of advertizing on and over the page: http://www.jpost.com/Israel-News/New...flights-387782

joshwex90

If you, or someone you know, can read/write in Hebrew, I suggest complaining here: http://www.consumers.org.il/category/complaint-form

luckypierre

Did the awarding of pay to former TWA workers by an Israeli court establish this heightened adversarial attitude?

Not that one could readily distinguish it from standard UA customer service responses.

bocastephen

Not sure if these folks can help: https://www.getairhelp.com/en

OP needs to escalate to the Israeli govt, or if such an option exists, file a small claims court case there if it's convenient to do so.

PTahCha

This is similar to their response to EU 261 reimbursements - won't pay until they have to.

Xrikcus

For EU reimbursements they will happily say no repeatedly, then if that doesn't work they will pay a barrister to say no in the hope that that puts you off. Anything to avoid setting a precedent of payment.

ElieW

I am more of a cynic so I assumed it was part of the treatment I've received for being demote to Platinum! I was also very harsh with them last year on twitter and Facebook. Who knows if that figures...

I think you could be correct in that his claim perhaps just got attention of someone else. The only other thing I see is that he had upgraded to a business class seat, and was already at the airport before his flight was canceled.

Friend and I both claimed for compensation through the US website as instructed in the PDF file. We both used similar language. The response we both got was pretty much a form letter. In my case the form letter was incorrect because it references "technical issues prior to departure". In my case there was no aircraft at all so how did it have technical issues?

He was for some reason escalated to "impasse" and I think that's what got him the call from someone in the corporate office.

Perhaps you are correct that they are picking and choosing instances of when to litigate.

Thanks guys. I'm aware of the class action and I mentioned it several times in my correspondence with UA

This is a response someone got from El Al:

"Due to the fact that there was a sequence of delays and not one extended delay..."

I will probably try this.

I wonder if I can file a complaint with the BBB for this?

bmwe92fan

As supposedly one of UA's best customers I feel your pain - after a massive screw up on UA's part I had to fight for months to get EU compensation which I Was rightly entitled to - don't give up - that's what they are counting on - so sad but so true....

ElieW

What did you end up doing to get the money?

bmwe92fan

I refused all of UA's ridiculous offers of compensation and repeatedly noted European law - eventually they relented and gave me what I deserved - this took months but in the end they paid....