bocastephen

I am really perplexed by this decision-making process. Today's noon LAX-IAH flight was a 739 inbound from CUN last night, yet this morning the aircraft was swapped with a 738 (fewer F seats too) inbound from MEX, which even if it arrived on time, would create a 90 minute departure delay from LAX. Additionally, the posted arrival time in IAH was physically impossible given the new departure time. At least I was able to rebook, but it needed to be for tomorrow, necessitating additional costs, and given the number of aircraft available at LAX, SFO or even IAH if the CUN inbound had an issue last night after arrival, I can't quite understand why the aircraft was swapped with something that would guarantee a 90 minute delay vs another aircraft available earlier, which could then swap with the MEX inbound creating a much shorter delay for another flight.

sbm12

You rebooked to a day later to avoid a 90 minute delay?

Beyond that, where did the previously assigned plane go? Is it possible that the company needed it to help a different flight that was more significantly impacted? How many people on the LAX-IAH flight were connecting onward versus finishing at IAH? Of those, how many could be easily accommodated on later connections or reroutes versus other options for the aircraft swap?

I can promise you that the decision wasn't made just to piss you off.

laxmillenial

Agreed. We're probably not seeing the whole picture here and I'm positive UA has a department (operations?) that deals with these plane swaps. I'd chalk it up to, they needed the plane for another flight that would've inconvenienced more passengers. We only tend to notice things when we're the ones being inconvenienced, but it goes both ways. I've seen a delay posted and then gotten a plane swap which allowed us to depart on time. Do I question where the aircraft came from and who UA inconvenienced? Definitely not. But I'm positive UA does.

bocastephen

Flying from west coast to east coast, noon-1pm is the last departure option to make a connection back to Florida - so yes, because I had no other option. I am not taking a short hop redeye, sorry.
The inbound from CUN is #3249 , but I can't see where it went after arriving at 1045PM last night - and if it was needed for something else, or went mechanical overnight or early this morning, there was certainly time to find another aircraft to lessen the delay on the outbound to IAH. How many are connecting? I have no idea, but given it's a flight to a hub, I would assume quite a few.

findark

A little bit confused here, but let me see if I can unravel what happened. I assume you were on UA1963 LAX-IAH today. The tail assignment history is

The first frame was swapped early on, and went IAH-SAN-IAH instead; presumably there was light enough load on the flight they felt they could downgauge.

N14249, the ex-CUN aircraft, arrived last night but is now scheduled to sit at LAX all day before continuing to MEX tomorrow morning. To me, this smells of MX. The final frame is indeed flying MEX-IAH-LAX, and is presumably what they could come up with on short notice.


The tl;dr here is that there is a room full of people in Chicago whose full-time job it is to make these kinds of cost/benefit tradeoffs and reassign the fleet accordingly to adapt to changing conditions.

bocastephen

I agree that there are people who make these decisions, but it doesn't mean we need to like them - in this case, I am probably not the only person inconvenienced on that flight - 4 people needed downgrades to Y with the swap, others will misconnect aside from me, and I need to modify my plans and incur extra costs they won't reimburse me for. Now I will say the rebooking process was handled quickly and professionally, even the second one when the first agent put me on a routing with a 38 minute connect in IAH he failed to mention, so the recovery was fine - but I just find it hard to believe a better option wasn't available that would have allowed travel today.

laxmillenial

But the thing is, if you 'misconnected' and told them you'd want to be accommodated the next day (and stay in a hotel for the night), they'd reimburse your costs.
You proactively chose NOT to do this. Hence why you're incurring your own fees.

Often1

It doesn't make sense that UA would pull the inbound from CUN and have it sit at LAX for 24 hours and swap in a smaller aircraft unless there was a reason. The only good reason I can think of is MX and in that case, finding another aircraft and getting that out with only a 90-minute delay is pretty good.

Of course nobody likes it, but the better question is what else there is to be done when repairs are necessary, the aircraft is at a station capable of performing them and there is an aircraft capable of performing the flight readily available.

UA won't likely reimburse hotels either at LAX or IAH in this case. While OP doesn't like the micro-red eyes (who does?) the fact is that there was a viable connection which he chose not to take.

Imstevek

I'm sure if they knew you were on the manifest, they would made a much more "sensible" decision and aren't using all of the resources available until then.

txaggiemiles

I find it hard to believe also. You don't say your final, but did you check routing through ORD or DEN? SFO could have been an option too depending on where in FL you are going.

Also, there was a way to travel today, it included a 38 minute connection at IAH. The weather is fine here today you probably would have made it. You chose not to, so now you pay that cost. You would have been provided a hotel in IAH and been able to make it to your final much earlier in the day tomorrow (and avoided a cross-country trip w/ connection Day 2 where this could happen again).

bocastephen

Yes, we checked flights ex-SNA instead of LAX, and via DEN/ORD and SFO - everything was sold out or it wasn't possible to make the flight in time. I would never do a 38 min connection, even at IAH - if I arrive in the low Cs and leave from the high Cs, then I'm looking at a mad scramble through the terminal to be at the gate before my seat is gone, and who knows where my checked bag ends up.

flyerbaby19

I don't see the downside. So you end up overnighting with a hotel paid by UA in IAH. But you chose not to take this routing and you chose to stay an extra day. I'm not sure why you feel UA did something bad here since it was really all your own choice.

milepig

Tough crowd today, but I agree that a 90 minute delay is well within my window of tolerance. I recently suffered a 6 HOUR delay SFO-ORD with zero compensation, and fail to see why they couldn't have swapped a couple planes around to get a Hub to Hub flight off the ground sooner.

mahasamatman

And that's why you don't work for an airline.

aacharya

Let's ease off on the OP a little - while I also would have taken my chances at IAH (having a Centurion lounge there helps), every traveler has his/her own idiosyncracies (I think there's an FT-er who won't fly Airbus planes).

However, MX and subsequent swaps are a part of life. One has to assume Chicago Operations factored in all the variables (crew, passenger, misconnects) and made the call that mitigated the situation as best as possible.