jsloan

Fair enough. And, FWIW, the only time my personal item ever goes in the overhead is if I'm in the bulkhead. And I'd hope that any passenger, BE or otherwise, would be polite enough not to use shared space when it wasn't necessary, unless they were quite certain that it wasn't going to be needed by anyone else.

Still, nothing in the rules says that a BE passenger can't put a personal item in the overhead -- nor does anything say that a group 1-4 passenger can't put both bags in the overhead. It's impolite, and I hate seeing it (bulkhead excepted), but it's not against the rules.

Tizzette

A few agents enjoy wielding their little bit of tin pot authority entirely too much. Maybe OP could have asked for a supervisor sooner, but she could not simply agree to pay $25 to check because her computer, protected by nothing but her cloth bag, would have been destroyed.

Mike Jacoubowsky

Wow. Over 200,000 people fly through LAX each day. Perhaps 10-20,000 are flying United. And we're shocked that out of those 10-20,000 people there's one bad encounter that rises to the level of, dare I say it, clickbait?Look at the other UA "story" on FT's home page. Sounds like UA paid someone $1000 to move their feet, but if you read the story, it was about a passenger who claimed she was paid, but was spinning a tale.And what do moles really think of the mountains we build for them?

kb9522

The front page is nothing but faux journalism from hack reporters that must get paid by the click.

Mike Jacoubowsky

But what does that say about us, giving so much attention to the rogue UA employee?

It's been a quiet day here at my shop, but we've greeted every customer with a smile, including one who definitely came in with a real attitude, looking for an issue that didn't exist. My unofficial sampling would suggest that, out of 10-20,000 UA customers heading through LAX on any given day, a small number are looking for an excuse to give someone a bad time. Doesn't mean you have to react to it inappropriately, but sometimes the stories people tell can be very different from reality.

PacificClipper

Loren Pechtel

Huh? If it fits into the space it fits into the space. If you can fold it into the sizer then you can fold it under the seat also.

khkchan

I once also entered into an argument with the rebook agent at NRT UC. There was a weather waiver issued for my onward itin after arriving IAD from NRT and she refused to rebook me because the flight leaving NRT is on time. I kept telling her it's not about the flight leaving NRT and she didn't listen or change mind. Asking supervisor didn't help because she said there is none.

I ended up rebook at the transfer desk outside after a 10 minute wait because UA computer froze.

It certainly left me a bad taste about UA service. However, I arrived at my destination in some okay shape and with minimum amount of money spent. Thats UA service isn't it?

​​​​​

Kacee

You could just as well say that's Japanese service culture, because you might as well argue with a brick wall. A very polite brick wall.

Loren Pechtel

It shouldn't be allowed. Yes, it fits the sizer but only by going diagonally both ways--and on the airplane there's no back edge to the box and thus no way to make it stay put. It's going to stick out into the footspace. (On the other hand, I think something like that should be allowed if you have a non-exit window seat. So long as it's on the window side of your foot space it's not a safety issue.)

onthesam

I agree with you but just because a bag fits under a seat doesn't mean it complies with UA's clearly stated and well publicized rule restricting the size of carry on bags based on their dimensions.

The following screen pops up during online desktop site (non-BE) check-in. I'm not sure if it could more clearly state, in words and pictures, the rule and the consequence for not complying:

j8s8er

Usually where there's smoke, there's fire. Chances are there's way more than 1 in 10000 people having a bad encounter. In fact, I pretty regularly see pretty horrific treatment of passengers by United staff and fight attendants which likely go unreported.

That said, I also do see other staff/FA's/pilots go out of their way to help/assist passengers, which also often go unreported, which is a real pity too - just as we highlight the poor treatment by some staff, we ought to recognize the commendable behavior of others with kudos.

mherdeg

I actually witnessed this logic firsthand at DEN today.

In the Special Services check-in line, several patient pax watched as an unaccompanied minor unpacked a few items from a small backpack, including a helmet and a large, roughly 96 inch by 120 inch by 0.125 inch blanket.

The pax chatted among themselves, saying roughly "Oh my gosh, is that a blanket?" "Wow, that's big" "I don't know how that fit into that bag, that's amazing."

I was confused at why these pax were so surprised.

But reading this chain of posts I now understand. These pax were astonished that a 96"x120"x0.125" item was allowed to be carried aboard an airplane in a folded-up configuration. These pax clearly took the view that if an item needs to be "flattened" to meet the allowable sizes it is not a permissible carry on item; these pax must indeed have been astonished that the UM was allowed to fly. A fair point and a fascinating one to ponder.

roadkit

Why are you being obtuse? It's obvious the OP did not want to include the details of what the individual looked like in her post -- but which she included in the message to UA. Perhaps she couldn't get the name -- or didn't think to do so under the circumstances. SMH.

username

To me, there are 2 angles:

1 - it is not all about money for many of us. If it is, why are you wasting your valuable time posting on FT on something you deemed irrelevant, time-wasting and generates no money for you
2 - if it is all about money, buying a BE then getting asked to pay the bag fee breaks the math

I hate complaining to UA about bad employee attitudes but sometimes the behavior is just way too outrageous...