McSam18

My experience on my last round of flights too.

Jaxxon

Last week it was First/Chairman/Executive Platinum

Today it was First/Envoy..... Then All Dividend Miles Members... at two different airports.

C'mon.

The Gate Agent at DCA was kind enough to let me go down instead of making me wait.

Often1

The sole benefit of boarding early is OH space. Who ares how US breaks it up? I presume that the last elite to board (before non-elite) still finds OH space. I want to be that person.

BoeingBoy

It's said so often on the US forum that's it's taken on the aura of a truism - the only thing consistent on US is inconsistency.

Jim

Jaxxon

Honest-to-God, it has really turned into a joke.... and this is particularly painful to watch because they are just reading it off a monitor.

Robertsonland

It isn't just about getting OH space, it's about getting OH space near where you sit. I watch as preferred's board and they are seated in 5D and they put their stuff over 4C or 4D when 5D OH is totally empty. I just want to have space above me when I get on so I choose to board early as I usually set near the front of the cabin and not the exit rows.

People just don't have common courtesy anymore and don't really care about anyone but themselves. So while I don't necessarily think that is right I don't think having a consistent boarding script that people know and can follow is too much to ask. If you are going to board First/Envoy before Chairman and EXP then do it but don't swap it every other flight. have a consistent boarding process that you follow and it will at least go a LITTLE smoother than it does now.

dtremit

I really don't understand why people do this. I was in 2D a few days ago and watched as all the passengers in row 4 ignored the wide open overheads over their own seats and filled the space above mine. What on earth is the motivation?

I can sort of understand passengers at the back of the cabin not wanting to lug their bags down the entire plane -- but a bin six feet away? It doesn't gain them anything, and forces the passengers further ahead to "swim upstream" and delay the entire plane at landing.

Part of me wishes they would find a way to lock the overheads in F, and board F last.

heyeaglefn

Maybe they were hoping they would get upgraded and would be prepared if they were.

pdpgps

Wishful thinking, but I think ways that actually could be alleviated would be to standardize the size of overhead bins across all aircraft, all brands. Because they aren't equal some bags that fit straight in may have to be turned to the side resulting in less capacity in the overhead. Enforcing carry-on rules would definitely help too; Im sure all of us have been on numerous flights where you see that one passenger that clearly has a bag that won't fit, but they are determined to bring it on anyway. I know there would probably be push back from luggage manufacturers as well. But imagine if first TSA did a size check at screening, then on boarding random passengers bags had to once again go through a size check. If all bags were made "equal" and designed for the spaces they were intended to go into, would that speed things up?

BoeingBoy

The only way to do that would be to use the smallest bins as the standard - do you really want all planes to have bins the size of those on CRJs or EMBs. Differences in fuselage width, cabin height, etc dictate the max size of the OHBs.

Jim

pdpgps

But typically on the RJ's or smaller planes there isn't a FC cabin anyways (except CRJ900). I think if you're asked to put your larger carry on's on the hold below that's okay cause it applies to everyone. Just trying to think creatively to a problem we all have encountered.

pdpgps

Did they stop calling US military on some of your boardings? Last several flights out of CLT and BWI for me has been:
1) extra time
2) first class, all dividends and AA elite
3) preferred access
4) zone 1

BoeingBoy

Even for mainline aircraft, the different size OHBs criteria applies. The A320 family have a little bigger OHBs than the 737 because the fuselage diameter is larger. The A380 could have different sized bins on the same airplane - on the lower deck the fuselage sides are nearly verticle, allowing the OHBs to be deeper while in the upper level the fuselage side is curving in reducing the maximum size of bag that would fit in the OHBs. On the 737's Boeing enlarged the OHB's about 5 or more years ago, leaving many produced earlier with the older smaller OHB's. Boeing offers an upgrade package to put the new bins in older planes but how many carriers have spent the money to do it?

There's absolutely nothing wrong with thinking outside the box. Just be aware that some seemingly obvious solutions have good reasons for why they won't work.

Jim

lizs

DCA-PHX last weekend was:

1. FC
2: Preferreds, AAdvantage elites, and Preferred Access, then FA noticed 4 military in waiting area and called them too
3. Not sure but I assume regular boarding beyond that.

As you can imagine on that route it was a huge line of people boarding and we were all joking about what a mess it was. As mentioned above I did not see the wiki post order on one of my 4 segments last week.

dtremit

Heck, I believe AA upgraded its 767s with new bins in the premium cabins, but left the old ones in the back -- so there are two bin types on the same plane!

NW also used to have a subfleet of 757s they'd acquired from a different source that had weird bins -- stuff that fit on every other mainline plane in the fleet wouldn't fit on those few planes due to a ridge in the floor of the bin.