whipwhitaker

findark

I'm not sure I follow... you were originally flying from DFW to somewhere in G (deep discount Economy) and got rebooked directly into First? Why? I feel like there is more to the story here.

whipwhitaker

goodeats21

There have been reports of United not allowing "Protecting" on separate flights. They want to keep as many open seats as possible to accommodate other passengers, especially in periods of high irrops.
Seems like someone was monitoring overall re-bookings and making updates based on overall situation.

My guess is you were placed in First due to no economy seat being available, and then were put back into economy when a seat opened up.

mr8

RobOnLI

I'd bet the gate agent working the flight you got booked into moved you back to coach to allow someone who was on paid F back into F.

-RM

IAH-OIL-TRASH

Not sure what the complaint is here. There was weather and you got where you were going in the class of service you paid for after a little delay.

whipwhitaker

sfogate

The UC agent made a major error by booking you into an F seat when you were only holding a Y ticket. Someone corrected this error.

LIH

I have had issues, at times, even getting the GS line to protect me. It's uncommon, but happens maybe 10% of the time -- where I just HUCA. I always call back whenever my flight does go to cancel those protections though, which the agents always appreciate. United's system does scan for double-bookings to kill them but not on as narrow of a basis as the few hours you were sitting at DFW.

The most likely thing here was the gate agent working the flight you were put into F on was holding that F seat for another passenger that was rightfully due it based on their booking class and they knocked you out of it after seeing that the UC agent had taken the inventory. I'm willing to bet that the cancellation of your protected leg was an accidental/incidental result of that same work to get you out of the F seat and re-booked into steerage.

I'm not as outraged as some of the others here that you would have been bumped to F as a 1K during irrops but I would note that I am probably kept in first only ~75% of the time as a GS during irrops when I am booked into F. So you certainly should have viewed that as a pretty outstanding kindness from the UC agent.

IAH-OIL-TRASH

Fluid situation. "Odd" happens when IRROPS occur. I'm sure you would have been happy to keep the F seat, but the person who actually paid for one might not have been. Looks like UA sorted it out.

whipwhitaker

exerda

This, or perhaps someone off in the bowels of UA.

I had irrops a couple of months ago where some magic fairy at UA kept moving me around (from seat to seat, as well as from flight to flight), and at one point, I had multiple segments on my record. They were largely applied correctly, with the protected segments placed at the end of the sequence so that if we made the original flight, the rest of the record wouldn't be cancelled. The magic fairy at one point decided there was no way we'd make our original connection and removed it from the record; I was able to get it put back on after we sprinted for the gate and made the flight (the GA re-added it).

This was clearly someone other than the GA messing with the record, as the GA said she thought we were going to make it and were glad that we did. (Of course, after that, upon arrival at our destimation I had to call and was on the phone for 45 minutes while the grumpy 1K agent worked on cleaning up the PNR, which now had one protected segment placed before the return trip, meaning we'd face auto-cancellation for "missing" that flight; she said, "This is why they're not supposed to protect people anymore," which IMHO is bogus but understandable.)

The return trip also had irrops, and the UC agent, the 1K res line, and someone else (maybe a GA?) messed with the res and seat assignments.

Often1

1. Revoking the uncalled for UG was likely the product of availability opening in Y.

2 Once there was positive space, there really was no reason to protect OP on an even later flight.

Protecting on multiple flights really should be done away with entirely. It is a zero-sum game in IRROPS. While it might have helped OP out, it would have meant that some other passenger can't obtain positive space when there really was space to be had. If you are the guy who benefits from the multiple protections, it's great. But, if you are the guy who can't get positive space until it is determined that the other passenger made the earlier flight, it's not so good.

findark

I disagree - while it is a zero-sum game in most respects, I think it's reasonable to provide extra benefit for 1K/GS in IRROPS. You could just protect into overbooked space and then the "loser" is taking home a VDB.