4/1 - EWR SFO - Trays of Water/Prosecco offered. 777 with rear facing seat - not bad to fly backward actually!
4/2 - SFO LAS - same as above - 737-800
4/3 - LAS LAX - nothing offered, in bound flight was early, boarding started about 2 minutes early. Lazy. Max 8
4/5 - LAX EWR - Trays of Prosecco - with glasses fill to the tippy top! 787-9. Great crew.

Should this thread be closed now?

PDBs are back on all flights. During short turnarounds or when catering is delayed nothing is offered.

Why should the thread be closed?

PDB is back in the policy, but in practice the reality is all over the place. Some like to report the actual experience on the ground.

Because lazy UA FA's keep it real with worthless excuses and laziness. And...UA still only serves a swig of cabin temp water or cheap Prosecco while Delta is an open bar.

I’ve actually found PDB increasingly rare - more so than ever before. I’m 1/6 in my last three round trips, and there’s been no catering delay or overall delay. We’ve gone from open bar > pre-pour water + juice/prosecco > often nothing.

I’m also increasingly having my first beverage + nuts served all at once on the main tray. Last three flights this has happened, all 5+ hours in length and no turbulence truncating service.

I was reflecting lately that service has never been so consistently bad overall - it used to be 1 out of 10, now it’s 50/50.

nope. Unclaimed ones go back into Y as “ see how the other side lives” incentives

My experience over the last year has been greater than 90% success at obtaining a requested "open bar" PDB cocktail.

IAH-TPA 10am dep— water or bubbles
TPA-IAH 7am this morning, SO reports water or bubbles, but was able to request a mimosa

I have seen that happen, but in my experience it's not the norm. More common that I've seen is do a partial second round in F until taken, dump, or even pour back into the bottle.

This past Friday, I was upgraded to F for COS-DEN. The flight takes less than 20 minutes so I always get a laugh over the upgrade notification but I will note that we were offered water or champagne as PDBs. I think the FA spent more time on our drinks than we spent in the air.

Water or "champagne" on TPA-IAH yesterday evening. The bubbles were particularly vile this time :(

5/25 UA 208 BUR-SFO A320. Tray of water & OJ. Politely asked for a Buffalo Trace which was warmly acknowledged with a smile and a “sure” — only to be ignored / unfulfilled during boarding. After door closed, as FA came around to ask for drink order in the air, she then re-acknowledged my request.

Not impressed.

5/24 COS-DEN E175 (SkyWest/United Express) - "Can I get you something to drink before departure?" Water ordered and delivered.
5/27 SEA-DEN 737-800 - not offered.
5/27 DEN-COS 737-900 - not offered.

Was this a junior or senior FA? Short-term memory loss from a senior FA is more common.

I fared pretty well during my recent flights, but on my way back from BTV the other evening, via EWR, the FAs apparently made it as far as row 2 (on a 752) before stopping. They spent the rest of boarding chatting in the front galley. No service done during the flight, either (well, it's 45 minutes in the air, so no big complaint there).