ExplorerWannabe

Just to reinforce what @WineCountryUA is saying, I had a situation a few years ago where the counter agent found me a seat as had it booked out from under her as she was trying to get some other details in order (I think it was the follow-on flight). The next flight she found me, she grabbed the seat and booked it in the computer, printing me the boarding pass before going on to the next connection to get me home. I got on my flight, had someone come up and try to claim my seat -- I showed my printed boarding pass to the FA who looked at his hand-scrawled boarding pass and he had to go find another seat.

IRROPS under any condition can be annoying but widespread weather problems make it escalate very quickly and I really feel bad for the agents who have to deal with short-tempered passengers.

spin88

Yes, a "special case" but the "special case" line draws roughly a distinction between city services (where its San Francisco) and County services (where it is not San Francisco, but San Mateo). For example the County of San Francisco has a 8.5% sales tax, its 8.75% at SFO, because it is in San Mateo County. Ditto the split between the police (SFPD) and prosecution (San Mateo County).

Air Cal addressed the applicability of the SF "living wage" law, and found that it only applied if the leases of the airlines, etc, incorporated it. But that was because it was in San Mateo County, which has never been in doubt.

There was some controversy 10 years ago or so about who gets the Jet Fuel Tax at SFO, San Francisco County or San Mateo County. My memory is that it was resolved via a split, although I may be wrong.

GregoryGardner

Good to know, but isn't the conventional wisdom here that a (good) agent is always more effective than online rebooking?

jsloan

It depends upon what you need. You asked about the simple solution of rebooking on the next flight with available space. That's something that I'd feel perfectly comfortable doing on the app (and have done so). Now, if you need something more complicated -- delaying your return by a day, changing to a nearby airport that's not available in the app, etc., then you need an agent.

emcampbe

jsloan

There is a limited set of airports included. It's a very odd one -- for example, for AUS, it's AUS/GRK/ACT/IAH. GRK (Killeen) makes sense, but UA doesn't offer service to ACT (Waco), and they're missing SAT and CLL (College Station), even though both are closer than IAH.

Clay_C.

I live so close to ORD and the fares are generally so reasonable that driving this route is never an appealing option for me in general. Having said that, I certainly would have rented a car if there really had not been a seat for me the following day or the weather had caused more problems.

I would also like to emphasize for a third time that the agent calling my destination airport by the wrong name was only an issue for me in the context of losing confidence in someone who was not aware of the time in my location. Had I been connected with someone who seemed more ready willing and able to help me solve my problem I would not remark on it.

sinoflyer

I totally understand your frustration. Under ordinary circumstances, I would just HUACA to save myself the wasted time from working with someone whom I can't trust. However, with the long queue times, HUACA isn't really a good option to suggest.

But personally I would not have bothered calling in the first place. As others have already explained above, during IRROPS, things happen quickly such that seats get snapped up within minutes of a cancellation. Those same seats may well reappear by the boatload the next day, when people no-show because they've either changed plans or already found alternate means of travel. When I worked in reservations, I always told passengers who were stuck because of IRROPS and could not find a confirmed seat to just show up the next day and ask to be placed on standby. I believe the phone agents when they say that all the flights are booked, because I had seen the same scenario on my computer screen countless times before. But the phone agents don't know what happens at the airport, nor should they. The only way to find out is to actually be there as a standby passenger. Besides, some seats may also be canceled and become available to confirm by the next day. Flux the unfortunate reality of mass weather IRROPS.

COSPILOT

It sounds like you feel a non status flyer should be treated the same as a status flyer. Adding expertise in not just the United States, but every country UA offers flights to. I'm likely to drop from current Gold to zero status next year (previous 1K), but I understand that my expectations should be lowered. I don't agree with outsourcing call centers, but it's the norm. If you think UA, DL, AA. or WN cares about you play the lottery for better odds.

threeoh

I'm pretty sure WN doesn't have overseas call centers and in general have always found their agents to be of much more even quality. HUCA is way less of a thing.

My biggest concern is when overseas agents start saying "Chicago, Illinois" -- does not inspire confidence that they have any familiarity with U.S. geography or even UA's major hubs.

COSPILOT

OK, fine. Demand every airline employ only college grads with with both geography degrees, weather expertise, and strict knowledge of company policies. I keep my expectations pretty low.

threeoh

Can't say I've met a lot of Americans or foreigners, college educated or no, who say "Chicago, Illinois". Chicago is much more well known than Illinois and most foreigners probably couldn't tell you what state Chicago is in.

In my experience if someone says "Chicago, Illinois" it is because they are rotely reading off a list and not actually conceptualizing where you're flying from/to, which leads to potential errors.

Clay_C.

As I mention, I am not any kind of status holder with anyone and haven't been for almost a full decade now...so I don't really have strong feelings about what my treatment should be compared with those who are. It is certainly my opinion that any passenger deserves better service than I received from the first overseas phone agent I spoke with. I feel there is a lot of middle ground between "expertise" and what I experienced that is not too much to ask even in an IRROPS situation.

I will also add that I am 99% sure the calls we made that day to AA and WN were not connected to overseas call centers.

And no, I don't imagine for a moment that any of them care about me.

HNLbasedFlyer

Interesting you expected good customer service with no status. I'm the opposite - If I flew AA or DAL (which infrequent, but happens) - I'd know from experience it is going to be a train wreck to recover a cancelled flight.

The non-status call center agents aren't exactly, for the most part, the sharpest tools in the shed......

Clay_C.

Well I will concede my expectations have been significantly lowered. Having said that, I do expect that when my flight is cancelled I can get someone on the phone who will at least pretend to be interested in getting me to my destination within 36 hours. I am crazy like that.