jsloan

Huh. Somehow, I've never seen a red mist when I've been asked to move. And, yes, I've been asked to give up better seats for worse ones.

I've also had my seat assignment changed after I had already printed out a boarding pass, both for better (upgrades) and worse (moved out of the exit row), which is why I stated earlier that a boarding pass proves nothing.

Seat assignments are not guaranteed. Sometimes that works in your favor, as somebody else loses a prime seat and you get it. Sometimes, it works against you. Either way, everyone gets to the destination at the same time.

IAH-OIL-TRASH

Just because the experience just sticks in my memory. Some of the older ladies were the most aggressive in their pushing/wedging. The good thing was, everyone knew the shoving/aggressiveness was expected.

cerealmarketer

I wonder if the Group 5 duplicate was a nonrev employee

And Flight Attendant B was trying to keep the nonrev employee in the better exit row seat

If this had happened to me I would have pulled up the app to 1) show my seat assignment, and 2) check the cleared standby list - if that person was a standby there's a chance (but not sure) it's a nonrev

Although given the other passenger was seated elsewhere and the issue resolved before it escalated it seems taking the time to make the point to the flight attendant that the seat was the trigger, and one that couldn't have resulted in any upside other than educating the flight attendant.

The pax do great work though and doubt they were belligerent, maybe a bit terse and frustrated.

94010flyer

Only half-seriously there's no detail on how tall or how OLD the flight attendant was. . . She might have been OLDER and frailer than the passenger. This is United, after all. . .; )

But seriously, Im pretty sure it was more than a tap. . . Im guessing grabbed at the flight attendant as she was passing by to show her the boarding pass. When I want to get a flight attendant attention, I use my voice and hand signals. After 9/11 I don't blame a flight attendant for reacting to physical agrressive contact to get their attention.

physioprof

Now imagine what would've happened if as part of the FA investigation, the FA lost track of one of the pax boarding passes & then accused the pax of lying about their seat assignment. I think that is what the professors are asserting happened to them?

narvik

Ha!

...has been [somewhat] confirmed by OP though:


-----


In the meantime, regrettably but with much time saved, I have now conformed!

Jessie and Guill

Indeed that was the case. We gave the FA our paper BP, she apparently dropped it two rows back. Passenger sitting in 23C found it and passed it to passengers in 22D and 22C (22D and 22C are the parents of a family sitting one row behind us) when or shortly after the FA started the confrontation (FA also lowered her face close to mine) and threatened to remove us from the flight.

To clarify, the FA and GA were discussing removing us from the flight, claiming we sat in the wrong seat and refused to leave. That is why we tried to show her the recovered BP, as a way to stop them from carrying out their threat. I tapped the elbow only after they refused to acknowledge my verbal attempts of getting their attention.

Being called liars, in the middle of a fully packed plane, was not a pleasant experience.

To summarize, we sat in our assignment seats. 20 min later another passenger showed up with the same seat assignment. We gave our paper BP to the FA, who looked at it (should have recognized then we were sitting where we should be), took it to the back, lost it and then called us liars and threatened to throw us out. After the BP was recovered by other passenger and handed back to us, FA and GA refused to look at the recovered BP, continued to work on kicking us off the plane, eventually succeeded on getting us to voluntarily leave (to spare other passengers from further delays due to deplaning and re-boarding). The FA/GA further initiated the PIRC review. PIRC gave us 96 hours to defend ourselves, took 2 months to investigate, and then decided to label us as belligerent, etc, without giving any evidence to support their accusations/conclusions. We do not believe that air passengers should be expected to accept these practices as the norm.

jsloan

You continue to assume that your boarding passes were more valid than the other passengers'. If the other passengers had the same seat assignments, by your logic, if they showed the boarding pass to get FA, you were sitting where they should have been.

There is only one system of truth, and it's the flight manifest. Where did the FAs tell you to sit? Did you refresh your boarding passes on the United app? (Had they disappeared?)

HkCaGu

You’re still not reading it correctly. Only the two of them got off.

Jessie and Guill

You can find the new and improved UA rules after the Dao incident in multiple websites. Here is one of them: https://www.eonline.com/news/846487/...moval-incident
United Airlines Announces 10 Policy Changes in Response to Passenger Removal Incident by FRANCESCA BACARDI | Thu., Apr. 27, 2017 8:30 AM

The ten changes UA promised to do after the Dao incident are as follows. Please note #2 and recall that we had been seated for 20 minutes before the other BG5 passenger showed up.
1. Limit use of law enforcement to safety and security issues only.
2. Not require customers seated on the plane to give up their seat involuntarily unless safety or security is at risk.
3. Increase customer compensation incentives for voluntary denied boarding up to $10,000.
4. Establish a customer solutions team to provide agents with creative solutions such as using nearby airports, other airlines or ground transportations to get customers to their 􀃘nal destination.
5. Ensure crews are booked onto a flight at least 60 minutes prior to departure.
6. Provide employees with additional annual training.
7. Create an automated system for soliciting volunteers to change travel plans.
8. Reduce the amount of overbooking.
9. Empower employees to resolve customer service issues in the moment.
10. Eliminate the red tape on permanently lost bags by adopting a "no questions asked" policy on lost luggage.

jsloan

You leave me no choice but to assume that your seats in the manifest did not match what was printed on your boarding pass, and that the FA told you as much.

If that is the case, you were not being asked to "give up your seat involuntarily," but rather to take your assigned seat.

The fact that your assigned seat had, at one point, been different is, in my opinion, irrelevant.

Imstevek

What is your true agenda? A fair amount
of folks here have been in your situation and have resolved it rather simply.

Coming here to follow up on your situation and quote these rules and regulations and “legislation” is starting to look strange to me.

Jessie and Guill

We told you our goal repeatedly. It is up to you what you wish to believe.

I have experienced seat assignment mix-up before and all were resolved amicably. This was the first time that the FA first misplaced our BP and then blamed us for her mistake and had us removed.

To the other contributor, we have no idea why a manifest is and have never seen one.

CIT85

Have you been in the situation described here?

A lot of people have encountered issues with duplicate seating when 2 passengers have boarding passes with the same seat. The problem here is that the situation escalated and OP was ordered off the plane and found herself on UA's list.

How many here have been placed on UA's "Do Not Fly" list? I see OP trying to to get UA acknowledge they over reacted and restore her ability to fly on UA without being harassed. If the article was published, UA wouldn't have cared what they have done, whether it was reinforcing a probable FA over reaction or legitimate action if OP lied. Waht would you do if you were to find yourself in OP's situation?

jsloan

The manifest lists, among other things, the passengers who are expected to be on the flight and each person's seat assignment. A passenger wouldn't normally see the full manifest. However, the FA has access to the entire manifest in their version of the United app, which is available on the phones/tablets they carry with them.

More to the point, you had access to your seat assignments -- the only part of the manifest that's really relevant here -- on the mobile boarding passes in the United app. If you do not have, or do not use, the United app, the FA would have been able to look up the correct seats for all parties.

Your story seems to be missing that step, where the FA determines whose boarding pass is correct and whose is not. For a disinterested observer, this is the crucial point.