Houston: You have a problem
 

Just went thru IAH tonight mainline to UAE. Waited an hour for a gate after enduring one of the most unfriendly crews I’ve seen in awhile. If I forgot what it was like to be spoken to like a kindergartner I remember now.
On arrival my golf clubs appeared to have been taking a detour showing dropped at wrong gate. Connecting flight was delayed so about 40 min before boarding, I approached an agent to see if they could tell what was going on. 3 agents at the desk where you enter the B Express gates - 1 helping someone and 2 on their phones as I stood there. Finally one looks up and says “do you have a quick question?” I didn’t realize my question had a time limit. Anyway - I explained what I was reading on the app and she could not have been more disinterested. No attempt to help just “they will be loading bags in about 25 min”…not what I was asking. Down at the gate as I boarded…no sign of the bag via scan and Air Tag still not close. Agent who was “lead/supervisor” according to her tag barely spoke English. 🤷‍♂️. She didn’t understand what I was asking and after another try, she tells me I should’ve asked about this earlier up at the other counter 😂😂 perrrfect. Thanks for that UA your IAH operation is truly first class.

Was your bag loaded or not?

It was not.

If it makes your feel better, I had almost the same experience in ZRH (would think more polished operation than IAH) with LX a week ago when my bags showed on the other side of the airport (via AirTag) from the gate we were boarding at. By the time I was on board (a remote bus gate) FA had no clue what could be done. Bags didn't make it to KRK, was fun to buy underwear and toiletries in Poland at night.

It can happen anywhere but I tried to address it early on and the uninterested UA agent would not even pull up my record to see the scans…which normally then would’ve precipitated a call to baggage to investigate. It’s my golf clubs so not hard to spot at the wrong express gate. The total connection time at IAH was right at 2 hours.

Bottom line is UA hires a lot of people that suck. At what customer facing job is it appropriate to sit on your phone like a zombie while the people you are paid to assist stand there? IAH is becoming the cesspool of indifference that EWR was famous for. They probably need to transfer John or Joe? down to clean house once he’s done in Jersey.

I have had really bad experiences too in IAH. They can be really rude and unknowleadgle there. It is amazing how untrained and unprofessional some United employees can be. It definitly has gotten worse since COVID and the agents don't seem to know much more than what the app tells them. It is sad United spends so little on training employees on basic customer service. You can tell!

100%.

Sorry about your bad experience. While UA staff training does indeed leave a lot to be desired, I don't find IAH to be materially better or worse in this respect than other hubs. Of course, even otherwise good, well-trained agents can have a bad day or interaction (not that that helps the subject of the bad interaction). One thing I'm generally curious about though: did you really have to wait one full hour for a gate, or did perhaps the crummy crew on the inbound make the wait seem longer than actual? In literally hundreds and hundreds of arrivals at IAH, I don't think I've never had to wait more than 15 minutes tops for a gate (barring the extremely rare post-landing thunder-related ground stop).

If you think IAH is bad wait until you try EWR 😅🫣

Honestly based on my past few transits of both I'd take EWR over IAH. Maybe it's because I've learned to speak Newyahk since I'm there more often but while they may not be the most 'social' they tend to do what they need to do without being overtly rude -- they just don't do saccharine and "above and beyond" is rare.

Houston agents tend to be passive aggressive and unmotivated in addition to "write your own policy day" every day. The Express gates are particularly unpleasant in both physical and staff atmosphere so that certainly doesn't help things.

(I also feel like the Newark of the last ~12-18 months is markedly better, customer service wise, though that doesn't keep the occasional rogue apple... I remember about two years ago I had asked for a supervisor and the agent told me "There are no supervisors after 6PM, they've all gone home" (At Newark? I.e. a major hub for a major airline...How stupid do you think I am) and when that answer didn't change being polite, I said "Wow, I'll send an email to (local management I know)--they should probably do something about that, but thanks for your help" suddenly they "thought" they "might be able to find someone who's still here"... I politely declined and sent the email. Surprise: Per the reply United does Newark does, in fact, have supervisors after 6PM. Probably my one DYKWIK moment so far.)

Unfortunately I don't like the customer service deemphasis trend system wide though -- the blasted QR codes and the company's insistence that "Agent On Demand" is a reasonable substitute for face-to-face customer service I feel like is an empowerment of the lazy.

Sitting 🪑 n the IAH Polaris Lounge now. Most Houston problems can be abated with a well-made margarita :)
https://cimg7.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.fly...488506156.jpeg

Might they had been working on another customer's issue?

I believe the typical customer service training is to acknowledge the person waiting and then finish. "I'm just finishing something up and will be right with you" doesn't take that much effort (People watching at gates I've heard probably hundreds of agents say some variation of "Just give me a minute to get signed in and I'll be right with you")

As the OP reported they did

Ok, now I know what to do on my next date night.

I said that before every flight I worked today. I show up 10 min before I'm assigned (when not on another assignment) and the line forms immediately. Log into a shell (spinning wheel while the remote computers off site load the software) then launch and sign into 3 pieces of software, initialize them for the current flight, then do the same on my work phone with 4 pieces of software, check out the jetbridge for safety issues, look over the flight for anomalies/things the crew needs to be made aware of, scan the crew down (if they're present.) THEN the "I'll be with you in about 5 minutes" is done and I can start assisting customers.