Appreciate all the responses and information so far. I will say the event occured in EWR, and would be viral if there was a video documenting the events with this employee.

I am Gold status with United, and have been for many years, so I can say this really crossed the line for behavior anywhere. I would love to tell the story, but am holding off until United responds.

The reason you might want to talk with an attorney first is to preserve the video that was likely recorded by the cameras at the counter.....contacting United first gives them the opportunity to delete or alter it

Not to sound snotty but gold status does not mean much anymore. I know a Global services customer who was treated very poorly.

I think the point OP was trying to make was that he/she flies a lot and has never seen this behavior before. This line gave it away for me: "I am Gold status with United, and have been for many years, so I can say this really crossed the line for behavior anywhere.�

Agreed. This was less a DYKWIA and more context for understanding.

The advice about what you want out of this is sound. In fact all of the advice so far has been really good. From my own experience receiving and taking actions on complaints like this I can offer the following additional advice:

• Most public companies take corporate/executive escalations very seriously
• The more effort you put into the complaint (mail > email > phone call), the more seriously you will be taken
• provide dates, times, and names
• Stick to the facts and leave out emotion or opinion as much as possible
• Kind of opposite of the effort advice above, but keep the whole thing brief. Rambling paragraphs are easy for the eye to skip. Some of the most powerful complaints I�ve seen are only a few sentences long.

Good luck!

My favorite part of this thread so far is the correct guess that this happened at EWR, without anything specific from the OP.

All very good advice.
I'd expand on that quoted line above and include: Stick to the facts PERTAINING TO YOUR COMPLAINT....
I.e. don't include any other misfortune you may have had on the way to the airport, or on a previous United flight, etc.

Forget it Jake, it's EWR.

Actually, I think you may have a better chance of being believed and getting some sympathy since they've probably heard this stuff many times.

In all honesty your not gonna get much more than a fake apology and form written responses. They dont really read any of the complaints. Unless this employee did something to break the law, uniteds not gonna really do that much. They lose and make new customers daily. Look at Spirit Airlines. Customer Service is just fake these days. Unless your a high elite (which gold is NOT) your never gonna get a real response. Tell us what the basis of the complain is and we can try to help. You don't have to give it away, or specific details but give us a clue. If your waiting for united to give you a thoughtful apology, thats not coming. The emails that even look "real" are just pre written templates they shoot out when they skim your email. Especially now these airlines are literally abandoning people all over the country with all the flight cancellations, this not the summer your gonna get a real response. They can't even timely reimburse people who had real expenses cause of issues this summer, they are not going to read a letter. They skim and send you a form written letter sorry, not the service we expect.

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Thanks, I wasn't trying to come off snooty, and that wasn't not my behavior at all. I was just trying to convey to my point, that I do about 3 roundtrips a month (travel 3 weeks a month for work), and not an occasional flyer (well maybe that's occasional to some of you guys ).

Just as an update: Its been a little more than 2 weeks since the complaint was filed. Still haven't heard anything back yet. The automatic response email I received, said they may take up to 30 days to respond.

But afterwards you'll come back and tell us what happened I hope ; )

That fact that you haven't heard anything in two weeks indicates how much United cares about the complaint.

More advice - an official letter will be taken much more seriously if you use correct spelling and grammar, so please spend the time going over it (multiple times) to make sure you have.

As stated earlier, your best course of action is a complaint to the DOT. A complaint to the DOT will trigger a response from United.

Anyone have a good idea as to how I can escalate a complaint with UA. The "ua.com/feedback" site did not seem to understand my complaint. I would like to escalate to someplace in the USA.. I am looking to know if there is an email, if should write in care of the CEO or just go directly to DOT. Irrespective of the reason has anyone had any experience with escalation. Feel free to PM me if you an an email or address at corporate. Many thanks!!