Slashdot Mirror
Why Do Airlines Overbook? (bbc.com)
From a report on BBC: A common overbooking problem on a United Airlines flight on Sunday ended with a man being bloodied and dragged from his seat and an already troubled airline earning more bad press. How did it all go so wrong? Overbooking on flights happens all the time. Empty seats cost airlines money, so they offset the number of passengers who miss flights by selling too many tickets. In this case, the problem arose because United decided at the last minute to fly four members of staff to a connection point and needed to bump four passengers to make way for them. When there's an overbooking issue the first step is to offer an inducement to the passengers to take a later flight. [...] Of the 613 million people who flew on major US carriers in 2015, 46,000 were involuntarily denied boarding, according to data from the Department of Transportation -- less than 0.008%.
They all wanna do it but they don't wanna be caught doing it.
That's the beginning and the end of this conversation.
The only way to get airlines to stop doing it is to make it unprofitable to do so either through fines and/or regulations which increase the compensation for those bumped from flights to the point where it's not worth it to do.
It may be less than 0.008% but it's still forty six thousand human beings.
#DeleteFacebook
I am willingly admitting that I missed my flight once. But no one at China Airlines made any fuss about it and I was a happy man traveling on the next available flight.
Flying is an awful experience these days because market drives price optimization above anything else. A lot of it is driven by "find cheapest" aggregators and "you must fly cheapest" corporate policies. This is actually not in the best interest of consumers. Actually, vast majority of consumers would be better off with slightly more expensive but consumer-focused service.
Security theater at the airports, outrageous fees, cramped seats, inadequate cleaning between flights. Why would anyone fly unless they absolutely had to?
Yea. If they didn't overbook they would have to come up with some other scam like non-refundable tickets. And obviously if someone had a non-refundable ticket then their seat was paid for weather they arrived or not so clearly they couldn't be bumped from the flight.
I'm an American. I love this country and the freedoms that we used to have.
an Overbooking issue.
If you want to talk about Airlines feeling they can manhandle passengers out of their seats - great, I think it needs to be discussed so airlines understand that wasn't acceptable.
But, I think everybody here understands why airlines overbook, so don't bother explaining.
Mimetics Inc. Twitter
Overbooking incidents are resolved at check-in counters. This is an incident of someone being removed from a plane to make way for employees. Not only is this not overbooking, but it's also a mindbogglingly dickish move by an airline to de-board someone already sitting and expecting to reach their destination, even more dickish that it wasn't voluntary at all.
I really wish I could boycot United, but as have already done so for years there's not much more I can do. Frankly these types of incidents only seem to happen with one carrier over and over again.
Last time I checked in at a KLM service desk they told me they were overbooked and they gave me the choice of flying 30min later and paid me €200 for my troubles. Quite a different response then "these people will need to get off the plane to make space for an employee of ours".
United should be fined hugely for this, the four removed should sue. The staff involved fired, the execs making that policy fired.
But nothing will happen, i normally fly them, but will look elsewhere.
Yes and it seems many others here are blindly commenting and don't understand what actually happened. This wasn't an overbooking scenario. This was a scenario where passengers had been cleared, boarded and seated. Then another flight crew needed to board to make a flight for the next day. No one volunteered, so they played Hunger Games with the passengers. One of the ones selected was a Dr that had patients to see in the morning and thus his refusal.
United Airlines then turned in to President Snow and had a 69 year old man beaten and drug, yes, drug, (not carried as some outfits want to say), off the plane over it.
United could have easily booked this crew later or sent them by other means. They chose to violently remove a 69 year old man like he was brandishing a weapon or threatening people.
So, people carrying on about overbooking can get bent as that's not what happened. This wasn't denial of boarding. It was violent eviction.
United is going to end up paying for this event, one way or another.
The Aviation Security officer has already been placed on leave and his outfit as publicly stated his actions were not in line with their policy (re: he's f*cked).
Now it's on to see how UA is going to handle this mess.
And yet they don't refund the tickets for the people who don't show up. What other industry is allowed to sell commodities twice? Usually that is considered fraud....
Cut and dried, really.
Palaces, barricades, threats, meet promises
It should be noted that airlines will only oversbook a non-refundable seat/ticket.
A successful overbook is one where a seat is sold to two people and one of them does not show up. In this situation, the seat is paid for twice but only used once. This is free money for the airlines.
An unsuccessful overbook is where a seat is sold twice and they both show up. The second person to check in is not assigned a seat number and told they will get one at the gate. The airline then waits to see if another seat becomes available.
They play a very careful game with this. They have to make sure the number of successful "free money" overbooks exceeds the cost of paying out incentives for voluntary givebacks.
In the case of involuntary givebacks, they also weigh the cost of losing goodwill and reputation.
All of this having been said, the United flight earlier this week was not overbooked. United had a scheduling snafu and needed to move a crew. The cost of not moving that crew was the opportunity cost of a cancelled flight, so there was NO CHOICE but to move the crew. They just made a poor "random" choice of who to boot from the flight involuntarily. In addition to willfully interfering with the rendering of medical care, they also willfully endangered the lives of any of the Doctor's patients who were at risk without his care.
The passenger should have notified the airline he was a doctor at check in, because airlines will not remove a doctor from a flight if they know ahead of time.
Statistics (and the 'free' market) are so... communist... Fuck the individual, right?
“He’s not deformed, he’s just drunk!”
"Empty seats" in the sense of the article are already profitable for the Airline, as someone has payed for the seat but didn't show. They don't "cost the airline money" except in the sense that they are a revenue opportunity to sell the seats of no-shows a second time.
Perhaps airlines should be forced to refund tickets if they manage to resell the seat - which given the way their pricing works they invariable do at a higher price anyway.
It still dumbfounds me that people/companies will spend a few hundred dollars then not show up. Granted many can get refunded/shuffled around, but still. If I spend $400 to go somewhere, I treat that as a contract between myself and the airline. You can be damn sure I'll be there.
"Empty seats cost airlines money" not if those seats are already paid for. This total BS. If the seat is paid for then less weight saves them money. Overbooking is pure greed. They know the average percentage of people who will miss the flight and they overbook to make more money but sometimes the people do not miss the flight and they do not have enough seats. It is pure greed and lies. If I have paid for a seat it should not be theirs to sell again as what they normally do is just get more strict about the check in time to reject people if they are going to have a problem. You arrive at check in a minute late (I was rejected 3 minutes late once) and they get hard arsed because they already have someone sitting in your seat. They have sold it and made money from something they had already sold to you.
I love stacking my barbecues in the shed at the end of summer - you can't beat a bit of grill on grill action.
It must be profitable even after compensating every one that they bump.
Well, we can hate against airlines all day (and I've got plenty of complaints), but I've missed flights (mostly through no fault of my own) , particularly connecting flights (often not even with the same airline), and the airlines have always been decent about re-booking on a later flight (and I've never had to pay extra). They've actually always tried to be accommodating (although I have no experience with United).
Stupid sexy Flanders.
i've done this. fly somewhere for work but it takes more than you thought it would and you end up spending the night or having to take a later flight
one time i had a government ticket and just didn't show up and forgot the day i was supposed to fly back. two weeks later Delta gave me another ticket for no charge
Actually, TFA is a bit off if they're referring to the United Airlines incident, since it wasn't simple overbooking (which would mean passengers would be denied at the gate). In that case it was four UA aircrew that needed to get a flight at the last minute, and UA decided that they needed someone to be voluntold off the plane itself.
Quo usque tandem abutere, Nimbus, patientia nostra?
You know... I would buy a non-refundable ticket in certain cases, even at a higher price... if it meant I could guarantee no bumping for that particular flight.
For some flights I care about it, for others the freebies they offer in exchange for a 6 hour delay getting to my destination are worth it.
The fair and most capitalist thing to do would be for the airline to simply have an in-cabin auction for your seat - have the captain announce higher and higher prices for your seat, and the first four call buttons to get pressed win the auction. (first N call buttons if a different number of seats than 4 are needed)
Thrown in a business class upgrade and I'm sure it wouldn't take long to get a few empty economy seats, and everyone's happy.
and dragged him off the plane should be fired and blacklisted from any job of authority or security, if they are not smart enough to think for themselves that beating up an innocent old man is wrong then they dont need to be in that line of work,
Politics is Treachery, Religion is Brainwashing
Depends on the circumstances.
I've had to re-book more than once at the last minute during business trips, and when I did, they would re-arrange the schedule, leaving a seat open for someone else. Since they couldn't re-sell the now-open seat in the few hours before the plane actually takes off, it makes perfect business sense for them to have an overbooked ticket waiting to fill that seat. Happens way more often than you think (and not always for business reasons - a kid gets real sick the night before and the family has to canx/rebook, or some other personal emergency pops up, etc.)
Airlines actually have algorithms for this and take it into account when it comes to overbooking (and in how much they overbook).
In this particular case (United's little incident), it was a last-mintue addition of four UA employees who had to be at the destination to fly another plane out the next morning (and this was the last flight of the day).
Quo usque tandem abutere, Nimbus, patientia nostra?
If you pay for a higher flight class (even preferred coach usually) you get both, super refundable tickets, AND no bumps.
So there is an option for you.
Wow, sent an e-mail as suggested when clicking on "use classic" banner, and got a fast response that addressed my msg
They did, the bidding stopped at $1,000/seat (in airline credit I assume).
Ken
United Airlines Flight 3411 is NOT a United Airlines flight. The U.S. government allows mis-labeling. Flight 3411 is a CommutAir flight.
United's CEO Oscar Munoz made the situation FAR worse by the pretend caring in what he said: United is investigating why authorities dragged a passenger off a flight -- here's what it found.
Quotes from the CEO:
"... we approached one of these passengers to explain apologetically that he was being denied boarding..."
It was not "apologetic". The passenger was already boarded. There was no "we".
"Our agents were left with no choice but to call Chicago Aviation Security Officers..."
They could have tried asking someone else, and increased the price they would pay.
To employees: "I want to commend you for continuing to go above and beyond to ensure we fly right."
That badly worded sentence also shows a lack of social ability.
The incident was like a billion-dollar advertisement saying, "Don't fly United Airlines." A New York Times story, United Airlines Passenger Is Dragged From an Overbooked Flight, now has 4983 comments! (07:48 am PDT)
The issue was not connected with anything United Airlines did. The result, however, is that the United Airlines CEO demonstrated that he isn't a good choice to lead a company. In my opinion, the United Airlines Board of Directors should consider getting a new CEO.
Background information: When airlines overbook a flight, these federal rules apply.
What else are you going to do, drive to Europe? Take a 20 hour cab ride to your meeting in New York?
At [airline] we have you by the nuts, so fuck you.
A google maps search suggests one can drive Chicago -> Louisville in under 5 hours. Was the crew needed before the following morning? United could have hired a driver for them and avoided all this (or they could have put the displaced passengers in a car with some money and still had them in Louisville before the next flight would have gotten them there).
Damn_registrars has no butt-hole. Damn_registrars has no use for a butt-hole.
When I read a story like this on Slashdot, I expect to see comments by people who are insightful enough to understand the mathematics of booking passengers on flights.
I also enjoy seeing ACs post stupid comments so I can feel superior to them.
I hope we can agree that this is even worse than overbooking...
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
And the law actually requires a minimum of $1,350 refund for the seat if forced off. The guy was still in the right to refuse to give up his seat at any price lower than that, and the Chicago police helped United Airlines violate Federal Law.
Still waiting on Serviscope_minor to wake up to fucking reality and realize that Jessica Price isn't going to fuck him.
Typically for seats that allow re-booking they charge extra, that extra is meant to cover the cost of occasionally having an empty seat.
Some articles are saying these were actually United executives going to a meeting rather than flight crew.
So if you pre-order a device and don't come pick it up, do you expect them to burn it?
09 F9 11 02 9D 74 E3 5B D8 41 56 C5 63 56 88 C0
I've never flown standby, so I'm not completely sure how it works, but I think it's a model that makes more sense.
Let's say a plane has 100 seats. The airline knows on average there will be 4% no-shows. What if, instead of selling 104 tickets at full-price, they sold 100 tickets at full-price, and 4 at a discount? Those people with the discounted tickets would usually get to fly, but would understand they might get bumped.
If you contact the airline, they will pretty much always credit the ticket price to another journey within 12 months, even if the ticket was in a non-refundable fare class.
And yet they don't refund the tickets for the people who don't show up. What other industry is allowed to sell commodities twice? Usually that is considered fraud....
Typically, if you show up to the airport within two hours of the flight departure time they will rebook you on another flight for free. If you do not show up at the airport at all, and your ticket was non-refundable, you're screwed.
He was upgraded to a security risk.
They were crew for a flight that would be cancelled if they weren't there. What this is, in addition to a PR foulup, is a logistics screwup. The crew should have been booked on a flight already.
Best Slashdot Co
I've never managed that in the UK / Ireland.
For the same reason it's not arson. It doesn't fit the definition. https://definitions.uslegal.co...
09 F9 11 02 9D 74 E3 5B D8 41 56 C5 63 56 88 C0
And the law actually requires a minimum of $1,350 refund for the seat if forced off.
Maximum is 4x the cost of seat or 1350
The guy was still in the right to refuse to give up his seat at any price lower than that
The whole flight declined the lower offers. When he was forced off, he was presumably going to get the amount required by law. But staying on that flight was worth more than the money - and even being dragged off the plane shouldn't result in a concussion.
Whichever is lower
I feel no sympathy or mercy for them. It's under five hours to Louisville from Chicago DRIVING, and they sold those seats to paying customers. Then United violated their contract for a *very* minor purported savings, which is going to cost them untold millions now. You may say that under a capitalist system, they can do what they did and it's expected. Perhaps it *is* expected at this point, but it certainly wasn't *rational* of them to do if they were acting in their own best interests. After all, failing to live up to your agreements given that you have the ability to do so is normally pretty damning, whether you're an individual or business - just look at Sears, where upon merely the FEAR that they won't be able to pay their suppliers we find that their suppliers are reducing shipments.
If it was SO important to have those employees in Louisville, BUS them, or rent a car, or ANYTHING but what they did. It's fine to *offer* to have people give up their seats - see Delta instead when they had storms and issues - but United showed horrible judgement and exemplified just how atrocious they can be (link).
https://www.forbes.com/sites/l...
I continue to hope that United becomes embroiled in a messy, public lawsuit where the public sees how they behave and they suffer dearly for it. We'll see how negative the amount "saved" by flying those employees can go.
Gamingmuseum.com: Give your 3D accelerator a rest.
There are people that don't show up, there are people that re-schedule their flight in advance, and there are those that miss their flight.
Don't show up, lost your ticket fee UNLESS you bought a refundable ticket.
Want to reschedule your flight? Under certain circumstances you will get a refund (type of ticket, proximity to flight time, etc.)
Simply miss your flight, they will typically make every effort to reschedule you on the next available flight for free.
Airlines also frequently offer you to use your unused ticket as credit for a later flight, provided you pay a rescheduling fee.
Ken
The fees, and the extra cost of booking tickets that can be changed are intended to cover occasionally having the empty seat. If those fees aren't covering the cost then they should be raised to the point that they do.
Plus, to add insult to injury, they branded him a "disruptive" passenger after the fact to justify it. Until a computer decreed he should be removed and he refused (with good reason), he could not be described as such.
"Wait. Something's happening. It's opening up! My God, it's full of apricots!"
Clearly UA had no idea that UA staff were going to be needed to fly on a UA flight down to another airport in order to work on a scheduled UA flight.
Airlines shouldn't be allowed to ask for name/ID. You read that right. I should be able to anonymously buy plane tickets. It's none of their business where I go and if I actually take the plane myself or give the ticket to someone else. There are security concerns, but the government/airport security handle this part. I have no problem with the government knowing that I am flying (so they can check I am not a terrorist/whatever) but I should never have to present an ID to an airline employee.
So since the ticket should be mine, there would be no overbooking since I could sell the ticket on eBay myself if I can't board the flight.
Right now the rebooking fees and cancellation fees are so atrocious, people whose plans change simply abandon the ticket. If the government declares these abandoned seats as "lost, unclaimed or abandoned property", then the airlines have to send the fare they had collected to the State. This will make the airlines reduce the cancellation fees to make it worthwhile for people to actually cancel their tickets. And this will definitely reduce their profits, from status quo. But status quo encourages them to abuse it without any restraint.
sed -e 's/Chuck Norris/Rajnikant/g' joke > fact
Obviously the airline handled this poorly. Having said that:
> telling a plane full of people that your convenience as the company who took their money is more important than theirs is colossally stupid. ...
> The only possible acceptable answer for **someone** in the decision making chain to have made there was "our customers come before us".
The crew was needed to fly another plane with 500 customers on it. So the airline's choice was between these two:
A) Inconvenience four passengers on this flight, by rescheduling them on the next flight.
B) Greatly inconvenience 500 passengers on the other flight - and they won't all fit on the next flight out.
Customers of the airline were best served by getting four of them off that flight, though that should have been done by offering them $1,200 each. (I understand three people took the offer at $800, they needed one more.)
The airline was not overbooked. All passengers had seats. Due to a management issue 4 airline crew had to inserted into the flight. It was bad management planning that either had not reserved the seats for crew movement or had the crew in the wrong place.
The airline needed to move the crew as they were need on another plane that would depart from the destination.
This was not overbooking. Either the airline needs to leave seats open all the time for crew movement or it needs to better plan crew movement to not interfere with paying passengers. This was not an operating issue with the flight so captains orders to remove the passenger were not valid. This was purely a management snafu. And management tried to fix their problem by bumping paying passengers.
Sounds like they're trying to have it both ways.
They would lose a lot of revenue from empty seats if they absolutely had to guarantee a seat to everyone who bought a ticket.
They would gain a lot of revenue if they overbooked and then -- in the 0.01% of cases where the overbooked passenger showed up -- they got a passenger to give up the seat by auction, for as much as it cost.
Since it only happens 0.01% of the time, and they save a lot of revenue by overbooking, they would still come out ahead if they auctioned it for whatever it costs. For $10,000, they'd almost certainly find somebody. http://heelsfirsttravel.boardi... Hell, you could take a cab from Chicago to Louisville for $10,000.
But United cut off the bidding at $1,000, and then called the Chicago cops, who are trained in de-escalation (just kidding).
It's like what the gambling casinos do when a really good poker player comes in and wins a lot of money. They say, "You misunderstood. This is just a game. We're not really playing poker for high stakes (unless you're losing)." And they kick him out and bar him from casinos ever again.
Or it's like what the insurance companies do when your house burns down. They say, "We only collect money. We don't like to give money back. It's in the fine print in your contract."
And this is where it gets interesting to me, and is worthy of a /. post.
If indeed they overbooked the flight by 4 seats, AND they had the plane full, asking for volunteers, and indeed got 3 volunteers, this is all over one passenger, already in their seat.
What would United be gaining by removing a passenger from a seat to grant passage to another? A single passenger is that valuable to them? Really? Why?
I get that overbooking makes money - some of the 5 digit /. users here will recognize the parallel with oversubscribing any data service, you make your money on the 60-90% of the time the service isn't congested, balancing that with pain and subscriber loss. For an ISP, this is de rigueur.
But for this instance, this is clearly NOT just about filling seats, rather there is something else going on. United wanted another passenger in that seat. Why? Loyalty member? Crew being shuttled? Executive? A favor?
So is anyone asking about this? Will we get an answer?
deleting the extra space after periods so i can stay relevant, yeah.
And yet they don't refund the tickets for the people who don't show up. What other industry is allowed to sell commodities twice? Usually that is considered fraud....
Every other industry. There only is one commodity which is why being sold something and then not getting it is covered under compensation rules.
In what industry do you get forced a refund if you yourself change your mind for whatever reason? The airlines even go out of their way providing flexible ticket offers for this reason.
It's entirely consistent. You as a passenger fuck over the system you part way with your money. If the airline fucks over the system they part way with their money.
It was NOT a United Airlines flight.
But the cost to United is HUGE: United's stock is falling 3.7% and wiping $830 million off the airline's market cap.
As the first link shows, United handled the situation badly.
The "other means" would have cost the airline actual cash, the $1,000 airline credit/seat is essentially free.
It is a four hour drive (Chicago to Kentucky) - United should have hired a stretch limo to drive them the four hours to the KY airport, then the four hour return drive empty for less than $1,000.
Ken
While a lot of what you said is correct, it appears that flight 3411 is actually a Republic Airline flight. And really, it appears it's not so much a mis-labeling as it is outsourcing/contracting. United is correct in sharing the blame for this in choosing to partner with them.
This was the last flight of the night (on United at least). The next flight was the next afternoon. United probably couldn't have booked the crew on another flight, but they could have offered the passengers compensation and a limousine, since the flight is only 300 miles, and the Google maps estimate of trip time is about four and a half hours.
United should pay for this, but they only do if we (all) change our behavior and they can feel it.
Could the FAA step in and create regulation preventing an airline from ejecting an already cleared and boarded passenger, unless:
- volunteering for another flight, with compensation
- life threatening situation
Sure it comes down to the decision of the pilot, but there should be a culture of customer service and if the paying customer is getting shafted then there is a problem. It shouldn't matter that they are in 'cattle class'.
Clearly staff shouldn't have been treated as VIPs and the screw up happened because people had already been allowed to board.
I hope this passenger gets more than just a flight home as compensation, since the way he was abused should never been permitted. I am thinking of an all expenses trip to Hawaii?
BTW with the attitude of the current administration towards any form of regulation, I am not too optimistic that the FAA will do the right thing.
Jumpstart the tartan drive.
Bucko? I feel like the Fonz is about to walk in, elbow the jukebox and two cute girls will appear, one on each arm.
The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
The market drives price optimization above anything else because that's what customers prioritize above anything else. If people didn't care about saving a few bucks on a plane seat ($5 * 130 pax = cost of an extra seat), airlines wouldn't need to overbook. But because they will buy from a different airline if the fare is $5 cheaper, airlines have to play the overbooking game to reduce the fare a tiny bit more.
Markets are like computers. They do exactly what people want. The problem you're citing comes about because of a mismatch between what people say they want, and their actual behavior. Not because of a problem with the market. Everyone says they want bigger seats, shorter lines, "free" checked bags, better food, no bumping, but their purchasing behavior clearly indicates they'd rather save a few more bucks than have those things. The media listens to what people say, not what they do. The market doesn't care what people say, only what they do.
Security theater is mandated (and run by) the government, not the airlines. Outrageous fees were another cost-cutting move - to reduce the fares for customers who didn't need to check in a bag, or didn't want the in-flight meal service. Cramped seats are yet another way to reduce fares for people who don't want to pay a little extra for larger seats (Economy+). Inadequate cleaning is also a consequence of reduced fares - by reducing the turn-around time to the absolute minimum, the airline can get more miles out of its equipment each day, reducing operating expenses thus allowing lower fares. It all boils down to customers prioritizing ticket prices above all else (and a disproportionate fear of terrorism fed by the media which runs terrorism stories because they catch more eyeballs thus leading to more advertising revenue).
For 4000 dollars, they could have put all 4 employees on a chartered turboprop and had them in Louisville in 90 minutes.
they sell refundable tickets all the time for every seat. people choose the cheaper option
You don't travel enough ....
In some instances it's cheaper to buy 2-3 tickets and only use the one you buy and let the others drop, compared to buying flexible tickets.
In other cases, stuff comes up last minute, and you cannot make your scheduled departure - think everything from traffic, to customer requests, to partner asking you to stay a few more days.
There's ample reasons for not showing up, you just need to travel more often, and more on customer's bill :)
It depends on why you didn't show up. Most common reason would be a missed connection. In that case, they get you to your destination so there is no reason to refund anything.
If you arrive at the airport late most airlines will get you on a later flight.
If you have a refundable ticket and let the airline know you want a refund (before the flight), you get a refund.
If you have a non-refundable ticket and let the airline know you don't want it, they will let you exchange it for another flight (for a fee)
In no case is there even the slightest hint of fraud. If every case the airline fully intended to get you to your destination, and in every case except the one where you just didn't bother showing up, they will get you to your destination. And that last case is 100% on you.
Actually there are other industries that will not refund money if you fail to turn up, though usually they will refund you a percentage or keep the deposit.
At the same time, you accepted the terms when you bought the ticket. The forceable deboarding is not a set of terms anyone agrees to.
Jumpstart the tartan drive.
Because they have sufficient political power that they can commit fraud with impunity.
The problem with what happened with United wasn't overbooking. It was how they handled overbooking. They could have taken the seats at the gate for their people and decided who wouldn't board at the gate. But instead they let everyone board, let everyone sit down and THEN pulled out the "we need your seats" thing. THAT's the problem.
Or more specifically A problem because dragging someone out of the plane by their arms is ridiculous. He's not a sack of wheat. There were three dudes there and they couldn't grab his feet?
And that doesn't even touch the extreme escalation of violence visited upon a Doctor who had purchased a ticket and was already seated.
No they did many many things wrong on this flight but overbooking doesn't even come close to being one of the major ones.
Just another second banana
Airlines overbook because people cancel, and they make more money if they run their planes full.
AKA "Profit"
"File to fit, pound to insert, paint to match" - Aircraft Maintenance 101
Folks, there are a few important facts about this incident with Asian (Chinese?) doctor:
1. He was already boarded on the plane (along with everyone else) That suggest Airline poor management. Typically being denied boarding happens BEFORE you are on the plane. So once everyone was on board, that creates the possibility of using force. once force is an option, people are even more likely to use it in and with no restraint. Just like police forces in parts of the USA and Canada
2. Passengers are basically the are told they can be ejected "for any reason" that is way too much power. that needs federal restrictions on the cause. The Federal Government in Canada is preparing some new regulations to add the bill of rights right now (although I suspect it have token effectiveness at best without more public protects).
3. True to form with security forces in North America, the security officers were not well trained in unarmed confrontations. A well trained professional shouldn't be giving a non-combat trained doctor a bloody nose or knocking him out.
4. This is so out of control that some media (see Canadian Globe and Mail) feel free to suggest that paying extra fees will reduce your chances of being ejected. That is a dangerous possibility. suggest grey are blackmail potential and that possibility shouldn't be there. (There is no proof but it has been suggest this doctor and the other 3 were chose because they paid less).
http://www.theglobeandmail.com...
Want this potential abuse and cause exercise in ejection to stop? Write to your Seneator (in the USA), or government representative in your country. China seems to be making the biggest impact because the people are showing their outrage. Perhaps it's time we did the same and get all the airlines on a leash. The security offer who was suspended is only a symptom of the philosophy which lead to the problem in the first place.
"Imagination is more important than knowledge" - Einstein
The Aviation Security officer has already been placed on leave and his outfit as publicly stated his actions were not in line with their policy (re: he's f*cked).
Security and police are just about never f*cked. The first rule of a police state is that you don't throw the police under the bus. They may get bad press but where the rubber meets the road, or perhaps I should say where the baton meets the suspect, they still have free rein. Virtually all suspensions result in a slap on the wrist are are in effect paid vacations.
They keep mentioning he's a doctor as though that gives him more rights. I'm not a doctor, but I'd be just as upset if I were told to get off the plan in such circumstances. Doctor or not, United is in the wrong here.
As for the article, it has a wrong conclusion saying "if you face security then just comply or you get a fat lip". Well, everyone complying is the reason the police shoot unarmed people on the streets, passengers get dragged off the plane after paying full price for the ticket and so on. Compliance is not the way to deal with assholes like United.
We have a simple implied contract:
I give you the amount of money you stipulate as a fare for travel from A to B starting at a specific time.
In the absence of uncontrollable exigent circumstances, you carry me from A to B starting at or very close to that time.
Being kicked off because of a deliberate overbooking policy or a bureacratic screw-up in aircrew accommodation is simple breach of contract.
And it should be up to a civil law proceeding to determine the value of compensation due.
If government has set max compensation (at the ridiculously low levels that they have), that's just evidence of a corrupt government system that works for large corporations via lobbyists. Americans really should fix that.
Where are we going and why are we in a handbasket?
It says technically it was in United's right to remove the man. No, there are at least 3 parts of contract law that not only make this illegal, but another part that makes this a criminal offense.
Just because airlines and the TSA constantly break the law, does not make it their right.
Federal courts are constantly towing out FBI cases because of criminal acts FBI officers commit to get evidence.
For some reason airlines, the TSA and private guards that have no more legal power than you, or I are being treated like they are above the law.
Microsoft, Apple, Google, Amazon what's the difference? All steal money from devs and control with walled gardens.
Are they subcontracting the flight, or is the leg with a partner airline?
Charge storage fees or re-fund the purchase amount.
For 4000 dollars, they could have put all 4 employees on a chartered turboprop and had them in Louisville in 90 minutes.
For the amount of the resulting lawsuit or settlement they could have bought a Gulfstream to fly the 4 employees to anywhere.
The tech news part of this story is that the United computer system actually has a function for "click here to randomly select N passengers to boot off".
Because the definition of overbooking is BOOKING too many passengers on a plane. Those employees weren't BOOKED, they were tossed in because someone screwed up, and the airline wasn't willing to pay up handsomely to just mitigate the issue and move on. They may lose millions for want of a few grand.
Gamingmuseum.com: Give your 3D accelerator a rest.
The Aviation Security officer has already been placed on leave and his outfit as publicly stated his actions were not in line with their policy (re: he's f*cked).
Now it's on to see how UA is going to handle this mess.
I think the former statement answers your question. They'll say "We asked Aviation Security to remove the passenger in accordance with our policies that he agreed to when purchasing the ticket, and they screwed it up. Not our fault."
No Chinese will fly united now.
That's (A) inconvenience four passengers - and compensate them. The airline did that for the first three of four seats needed, I understand. They offered $800 and three people took the offer. They manner in which they handled the fourth passenger was obviously not very good.
United is proud to offer their new Thunderdome fare class. They divide the cost of one ticket among as many people who dare book it, and then the prospective passengers fight to the death in a steel cage on the tarmac. On the positive side, if you do not get a seat on the plane, they will still allow your remains on the cargo hold as long as you submitted a notarized certificate to United's corporate office three days in advance.
What other industry is allowed to sell commodities twice? Usually that is considered fraud....
ISPs who oversell? Or, even worse, ISPs (to grab a random one from a hat, let's say Comcast) who accept payment from subscribers in exchange for delivering the packets their customers request at the fastest available speed, and then also charge another company (again, grabbing a random company from a hat, let's go with Netflix) a fee before they actually deliver the packets their customers request at the fastest available speed.
EXACTLY!!!! An auction would have been the most sane way to do it. They could have done it in reverse. Just think, they could have started the bidding at $5k (or whatever the value of having their four people in the right place was), and then the people would work their way down from there. The lowest four bidders "win". The way they did it was stupid. The value of the four seats on the plane was clearly more than what they were offering. It was also "worth it" to risk bad PR in order to get those crew members where they were going. Now they will spend hundreds of thousands in PR, when they could have made 4 lucky "winners" very happy.
Exactly. Once the passengers are boarded, you can't deny them boarding (which is what the airline is authorized to do when they're overbooked), so the aviation security officers had no business being on that plane unless a passenger was posing a security risk. The airline is trying to suggest that the passenger became belligerent when asked to give up his seat, hence why security became involved, but reports from other passengers seem to indicate that other than refusing to deplane, everything was civil until the officers started shouting at him to get off the plane.
If the reason for removing him was because he was belligerent, but the reason he was belligerent was because they were trying to remove him, they have no leg to stand on, in much the same way that you can't (legally) arrest someone for resisting arrest. It's no surprise, then, that the department is throwing the officers under the bus, with at least one already being placed on leave pending an investigation, and the department making it clear that the officers acted contrary to standard operating procedures.
This whole whine session is silly. I fly all the time. I see VDBs once every month or so. I try to get them if I can! Your loss is my gain, airline. I have seen an IDB once. Once. Airlines have stats on this. They have to report it to the FAA. IDBs are so rare and affect so few people, its just not something to even think about. And certainly not something you would want to pay more in every ticket to avoid. In fact, we know for sure the market doesn't want to do this, because airlines would love to remove overbooking and just charge everyone more. It would simplify operations and their systems and their risk. So why don't they do this? Their customers WANT THEM TO OVERBOOK.
Apparently the bidding was halted at $800, since the news reports don't tell of any higher offer prior to UA Express resorting to the computer random selection. This was a long simmering process failure, it should have been decided long before boarding time so that customers could be inconvenienced - aka reaccomodated - without their knowledge rather than be forced into a stalemated auction. The result would have been similar, four people would be pissed off to stay in Chi-town overnight, but no bloodshed would have been required.
Have a Day!
And yet they don't refund the tickets for the people who don't show up. What other industry is allowed to sell commodities twice? Usually that is considered fraud....
It's not exactly the same, but how about doctors who charge you for being 15 minutes late and yet give no compensation (and often no apologies) for making you wait an hour.
In a way, it's a matter of an unequal relationship between producers and consumers. If all the producers have the same policy, then change is impossible through market mechanisms and instead requires outside movement by government or the mass media. Furthermore, the small percentage of impacted customers can be written off by the producers as statistical noise, even though the causal impact can be tremendous for that particular customer.
It's also interesting that the airlines in this case have actually "convinced" ( out of an overabundance of logic, of course ) the government to place a maximum on compensation for being bumped from a flight. That's obviously a favor to the airlines, especially since the compensation is not mandated to be in cash but can be in vouchers for future flights with blackout dates and restrictions.
Someone on a reddit thread yesterday said that this happened to them, they were offered $600 to leave the plane. However when they did leave the plane, they discovered that the $600 was not actually CASH money but rather 12 $50 vouchers for air travel that could not be combined and expired one year from the date issued.
So yeah, people assume that this is all cash money being offered to the patrons but i bet it wasnt.
As a potential lottery winner, I totally support tax cuts for the wealthy
Some people do not show up. But that is not the reason for over booking.
If a theater owner sold more tickets than there were seats, he would be in jail.
So why do airlines over book? Because they purchased a special law allowing them to overbook!
I'll see your senator, and I'll raise you two judges.
250.2a Policy regarding denied boarding. In the event of an oversold flight, every carrier shall ensure that the smallest practicable number of persons holding confirmed reserved space on that flight are denied boarding involuntarily.
Obviously, IANAL, but reading the source code (the CFR), it appears they yanked this guy off to make room for flight crew. Do crew have a confirmed reserved space?
I have. On one occasion I even turned up a day late for a flight to San Francisco because I asked the company to book it on a Sunday and they booked it on the Saturday instead and I didn't check the date on the ticket when I was given it. In spite of the fact that being late was entirely my fault, the airline put me on the flight I thought I was booked for without argument or extra charge.
This was in the good old days before Easyjet and Ryan Air. The cheap tickets are always non refundable because, of course, they can effectively sell the seat twice if you don't turn up. However, on the airlines that purport to be more than budget, you can usually pay a little more and get a flexible ticket.
All I want is a secure system where it's easy to do anything I want. Is that too much to ask ~~ Randall Munroe
The contract [with Unite Airlines], worth $2.1 billion, tasks the airline company with locating Assad, grabbing him from his seat in the presidential palace, and “dragging him out of Damascus by his arms.” The contract also notes that Assad should be “asked several times, politely” to give up his seat of power, though if he refuses, United workers should bloody his nose up a bit, according to the posting at FedBizOpps.
It little behooves the best of us to comment on the rest of us.
No one except airlines WANTS THEM TO OVERBOOK, because the only entity that overbooking benefits is the carrier. Overbooking does not benefit the customer (no, overbooking does not "help them keep fares low", competition does). The obvious solution in this case was to continue offering higher and higher incentives until they reached the point where people were willing to give up their seats. Dragging a bloody paying passenger off the plane is going to end up costing them far more than just raising the offer until they got enough volunteers.
In this case overbooking wasn't even necessarily the case. The plane was fully loaded when 4 employees showed up and told the gate agent that they needed to be on that plane, because it was the last plane to their destination that day. They weren't booked for the flight, they just showed up and said they needed to be on it. Overbooking doesn't even apply to this case. The problem is how United handled the situation, by deciding to call in the police and drag a paying customer off the plane instead of just offering whatever it took to get 4 people to agree.
This whole whine session is silly.
I'd like to see if you still feel that way if you decide that getting to your destination is worth more than $800 to you and instead the police come on board, bloody your mouth, and drag you off the plane.
"Our two-party system is like a bowl of shit looking at itself in a mirror." - Lewis Black
By "the company" I mean the one I worked for, not the airline or travel agent.
All I want is a secure system where it's easy to do anything I want. Is that too much to ask ~~ Randall Munroe
Did the gate agents handle the situation? The reporting of the incident is incomplete.
1) Class wars. The "rich", which may include your company, who agree to pay full fares and get little or no discounts are allowed to cancel up until just about the very last minute at no penalty or almost no penalty. I have a friend who owns his own business and he runs just about every charge he has through an airline credit card. This gives him some kind of super elite status with the airline in question and they allow him to book flights months in advance and cancel them with no penalty at all. He's a big fan of the NFL, so during the playoffs he booked flights for cities his favorite team might have to go to for a playoff game and he canceled the ones he didn't need. He didn't pay anything for the cancellations. Letting people do this leads to ...
2) Empty seats. Airlines want to avoid this. So they overbook to increase their chances of selling out flights.
The airlines are kind of stuck because letting people cancel for free or almost free is big part of why overbooking is needed, but if they punished people for doing that, people would likely take a harder line on price. Right now a minority of customers are willing to pay really high charges in exchange for free (or almost free) cancellations. The airlines depend on this money and it helps the rest of us pay less for our seats, although in exchange for a lower price we often get severe restrictions on changes.
It's obvious why airlines overbook- it's a worthwhile gamble, given how frequently people can't make their flight.
But it's also obvious that if no one is taking them up on their compensation offers when the flight is overbooked, they aren't paying the social costs of their gamble, and so they're getting away with defrauding people.
The solution is obvious. Especially if people have already rightfully boarded the plane, they should only be removed voluntarily. Everyone on board turned down $800 compensation for missing the flight, but I'm sure somebody would have accepted $2,000 or less. If once in ten thousand flights nobody accepts an offer less than $20,000, the airline will just have to take that risk into account when they decide how much to overbook.
It doesn't take a great economist to come to this obvious conclusion; it was my immediate reaction and many others'. But I'll mention that a great economist has posted the same thing.
In this case, where it wasn't really overbooked but the airline needed to transport employees, already at $800 it's odd that they didn't just find another way to get one of their employees there (even by taxi).
but is it real random or psuedo random!?
It's the maximum compensation that the government can force them to pay to the complainant if a complaint goes to the government for resolution. They are not prohibited from paying more to avoid a complaint from going that far.
I used to work for Continental (pre United ... 2003-2005) and here's how I recall it all works to the best of my 12 year old memory of it all.
A given flight would have PBTs ... Passenger Boarding Totals. It broke down into Available Seats, Seats Sold and Maximum number of seats that can be sold. A given flight early in the AM might have 100 seats and they might be allowed to sell 120 seats where as a similar flight later in the day might have 100 seats and only be allowed to sell 105 or 110 seats. It's all based on data that predicts when people are more likely to not show up to a flight for any given reason. The goal is to send that flight off full at 100 seats. If 105 show up then 5 people are going to be bribed to volunteer to give up their seat and on rare occasion that no one will do the numbers dictate someone isn't going.
Then you got the stand by passengers (non revenue pass riders) ... there are employees, limited vendors, familites buddies, retires and so on. They can book beyond the maximum of seats because they don't count to that. They only get a seat if at the end of the day less people show up then seats available.
Then you have the positive space non revenue riders. These are people who are officially conducting company related business. Various policies and procedures govern this and some abuse happens here and there at management discretion. When I first came to the company I flew back and forth between DCA and IAH every week for 3 months on positive space non rev passes. Officially this was against policy (I was supposed to pay so much money a month and fly non-rev as a 'commuter' but my management chain allowed it.
Finally when traveling on a positive space pass you have the ability to declare "must ride" status. In that scenario it's as if you are a paying customer and you are no longer standby. You better have a pretty good reason for it though because a full "Y" fare is going to be charged back to your department and your manager / director / VP is going to want to know what gives. Good reasons exist like hey I need to courier this part to fix a plan or I need to get to that city so that plan full of 200 people can depart on time. It kinda sucks but it's a Spock needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few.
It would seem that this flight wasn't "overbooked" in the classical sense more that they had a bunch of must rides suddenly show up that caused the overbooking. That simply can't be predicted ahead of time.
That said, the practice of getting the police involved and do what they did is completely repulsive to me. United should be ashamed on this one IMO.
As for that girl that was denied boarding for what she was wearing... get over it. That's the terms she agree to when she got that pass. I knew the rules and I knew it was responsibility to make sure my guests knew to follow them and to never embarrass me. United should get slack on that one IMO.
Make me wonder though. Lets say you bought a business class ticket to Hong Kong from the US. It costs 8 grand. So now the airline then pulls you off the flight due to "overbooking" and put you on another flight that gets to Hong Kong within 2 hours or so. They give you 675 bucks but they put you in COACH. So coach would be 1300 cost, so now the airline just made 6 grand and can overbook all the business/First class flights they wish to do so.
So they can? pull you from a higher class and put you in a lower class seat.
I can program myself out of a Hello World Contest!!
Try spending a minute reading my comment for comprehension before drafting a long reply that misses my entire point. No, overbooking does not benefit the carrier compared to operating flights with the same profit margin (ie charging more to compensate). Overbooking benefits consumers. It's part of why you can spend $300 to fly anywhere in the US.
People claiming overbooking is an airline conspiracy to abuse its customers have no idea what they are talking about. These people are imagining a nonexistent magic unicorn scenario where the decision is whether to overbook at current prices or not overbook at the same prices. Like I said, silly.
However, government (because it enriches cronies and the airlines were the cronies in this case) placed a limit on the compensation.
Not entirely accurate, before the government made this rule the airlines were bumping people without compensating them at all. The trouble is that airline lobbies prevented laws from going far enough.
Here are the actual statistics. https://www.rita.dot.gov/bts/s...
If it's such a small percentage, you'd think they could have auctioned off the seat before calling security. There aren't many cases, in my life, where I wouldn't have taken $2'000 for a 1-day delay. It's an airline. Just stand there and raise the award until someone says yes.
I'm sure the time-delay to call security cost the airline more than $2K.
This wasn't an overbooked flight, it was the airline wanting to transport its employees on a flight where all seats were taken by paying passengers. Auctioning seats may be "capitalist", but the only course of action that measures up to the standard of "fair" is for the airline to bend over and take the consequences of going short staffed at the destination where the employees were needed.
Is it more or less silly than suggesting that customers want to buy tickets for a flight that they aren't going to take?
"Our two-party system is like a bowl of shit looking at itself in a mirror." - Lewis Black
People like to live more than they like to suddenly and inexplicably die.
Twitter supports and protects racists - by smearing their critics with the "Hate Speech" label.
You are having difficulty with this concept of tradeoff, aren't you? There is no free lunch. People don't want to pay significantly more to eliminate the 0.1% change they are voluntarily or involuntarily denied boarding. I bet you think Uber surge pricing isn't a consumer benefit, too.
drug, yes, drug
No, dragged.
From TFA:
USA Today reports that the flight was not overbooked. United Airlines staff wanted to fly and apparently United Airlines chose staff over their customers:
Also, contrary to the entry currently pinned to the top of United Airlines' twitter.com feed from United CEO Oscar Munoz which looks sympathetic, "The truly horrific event that occurred on this flight has elicited many responses from all of us: outrage, anger, disappointment. I share all of those sentiments", he told staff a completely different story:
This would seem to answer the question the BBC pairs with their apparently hastily-drawn conclusion: "How did it all go so wrong?": It went wrong because United Airlines flight crew favored United Airlines staff over paying customers. None of the 4 customers asked to give up their seats should have been asked to give up their seat. Stop letting staff have privilege to fly at the expense of paying customers, apparently going so far as to assault customers. Stop taking the company's side of events seriously: Dr. David Dao, the customer dragged off of United flight 3411, wasn't "disruptive" or "belligerent". Even while being dragged, the video (easily found online) shows the worst he did was to say no (along with other passengers who saw him being dragged past them), which is completely understandable. Staff can coordinate their flight schedule, reserve a ticket, and board the plane just like everybody else apparently boarded flight 3411.
Contrary to Munoz's words in the letter, I sense United Airlines is now looking for new flight crew and a new CEO, assuming they're able to survive as a company (which I'm not sure they should be allowed to because I think we can all do with one less business that physically assaults their customers; we should make room for a professionally run airline that won't instill fear when company representatives ask customers to do something like an preflight offer for deplaning). This also connects very clearly to why employees need more power in the businesses they work for—apparently you can't trust some of your colleagues or high-ranking management to make the right call. This certainly gives anyone, worldwide, pause to consider what power one is giving others when one agrees to fly on their plane (this got violent even without the plane taking off!).
Digital Citizen
So he was bumped for company employees. It still creates no story worth reporting on /.
Anyone still flying United simply doesn't learn. It's not like this is the first time they prove that service is something they might do to their planes but not their customers.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
To determine the amount of overbooking, one would need to know the total amount of people who could not use their originally booked flight ... ... that way, they could more or less auction off seats on the flight ... just make the airline increase the payment they offer until the required number of passengers agree to postpone their flight ... yes it will be more expensive for the airline, but at the moment the airline is the only one that has advantages out of the current system (apart from possibly lower fairs)
Anyway, the reason for over-booking is understandable (and also makes sense from more than just the economic PoV), but airlines should be forced to NOT involuntarily deny transport to passengers
For 4000 dollars, they could have put all 4 employees on a chartered turboprop and had them in Louisville in 90 minutes.
For the amount of the resulting lawsuit or settlement they could have bought a Gulfstream to fly the 4 employees to anywhere.
For the drop in share price United wore the day after, they could have bought each employee a Gulfstream and still finished ahead...
Overbooking on airlines seems to be a Catch 22 situation.
Airlines overbook because a certain percentage of passengers just do not show up and request refunds. ( The refund insurance is usually relatively inexpensive.)
Because the Airlines overbook, a certain percentage of passengers make more than one reservation for a flight to avoid being bounced from a flight and having a delay in arriving at their destination. This results in the airlines experiencing a higher rate of empty seats (usually) and therefore they over book at a higher percentage.
That being said, there should never, outside of something like a National Emergency, be a reason to kick a paying customer off a plane for a non-paying one. Standby is Standby- if the seats are filled then there are no available seats - seems like logic to me.
If i buy a seat at a concert and fail to show up will that seat go to someone else? Might i get bumped from the concert if they overbooked it?
While this particular situation was vile.... and had nothing to do with overbooking-
This is incorrect. Yes, overbooking allows the carrier to maximize profit, but the flier *does* benefit. Lower prices are a side effect of seat use efficiency. Furthermore, consider the alternative: you buy a ticket, and that's the end of it. If you miss your flight, you forfeit the cost.
I recently missed a flight on Delta due to traffic and the dumbass TSA. Delta shrugged and plunked me on the next flight, no fees, no worries. I have no way of knowing, but given how long it's been since I've flown on a non-capacity flight, I'm sure my seat didn't go unused. If they didn't overbook, I doubt the outcome would have been as favorable.
As an aside: I *always* build slop into my travel plans (after all, there are uncertainties in air travel, like weather) and I always volunteer to be bumped. Ticket refund AND $800? Sheeeet, that's this flight free and 2.5 round trips to Vegas for me! I'm in!
Come to think of it, I remember reading about a system a while ago- far in advance, book tickets to/from big college towns around Thanksgiving, head to the airport, and wait for the offers to fly. Worst case, you might have to spend Thanksgiving in Miami. Wouldn't that suck.
I see no trolling here.
https://vine.co/v/OiZnwVpMbUg
You are having difficulty with this concept of tradeoff, aren't you?
No, I'm not, I just think your assertion is stupid. Sorry if that's hard to understand. You keep saying that people want airlines to overbook. No, they don't. People want low fares, sure, and you think that the single and only way to achieve that is by overbooking, and therefore that overbooking is something that people love. That's stupid. You're not doing yourself any favors either by pretending like I don't understand your point. I understand your point, I just think it's stupid.
For years and years airlines have reduced the room for each passenger, squeezed as many chairs as possible onto a plane, increased fees on anything from checked or carry-on bags to snacks that used to be free, and they are currently enjoying a boom as low fuel costs and high demand mean extremely high profits. It's not like airlines are operating a low-margin business here, their margins are high, on everything. That's why this United video can cause United Continental Group to lose $800 million in market cap. It's because they are making insane profits. They are trying to squeeze everything they can out of every plane, and you're sitting there acting like people should be happy for it to avoid a higher ticket price. I think that's a stupid assertion.
You want an example? Look at movie theaters. When was the last time you went and saw a movie in a theater where they had as many chairs and people in there as humanly possible? I can't even remember the last time I was in an "old-fashioned" theater, every movie I've seen for years has been in a theater with large recliners, waiters bringing food and drink, and a max of about 50 people in a theater that used to seat 250. I'm willing to pay more for that. I don't want to feel like cattle shoved into a car, that's what airlines do. And you're trying to suggest that people are happy because they oversell their flights (and I don't even know why you're talking about this, because the United debacle has nothing to do with an oversold flight).
There is no free lunch.
Yeah, it's almost like everyone paid for their tickets. Weird. Also, if you want lunch on the plane that's an extra charge, because fuck you. And if you want a drink with that lunch, that's an extra charge too, because fuck you. And if you want to listen to the movie then you have to pay for the headphones and still give them back after the flight, because fuck you.
Here's another thought - if it's profitable for the plane to travel with, say, 80% occupancy (and it is), why does the airline care if someone paid for a ticket but didn't make the flight? Why do they feel like they need to put another ass in that person's seat? They already paid for it, the airline still gets their money, and shit the plane is now lighter than expected so extra fuel savings. It's not like the airline loses money if someone doesn't show up for a non-refundable flight. But you're sitting there saying that people want airlines to try and plan for that and sell too many tickets. No, they don't. You're wrong. I understand your point just fine, and you're wrong. It's that simple. People want to be treated fairly, that's what they want. It's not hard to figure out.
"Our two-party system is like a bowl of shit looking at itself in a mirror." - Lewis Black
Also, since you travel so much, the next time you do I would encourage you to book travel on Korean Air, or maybe FinnAir if possible. When you board a Korean plane and get to your seat you'll notice that you have slippers, a blanket, a pillow, and a bottle of water waiting for you on your seat. You can take off your shoes and put on slippers for the flight. The cabin staff is far more polite than any American would think is necessary. It's almost like they want you to have a pleasant experience flying. Compare that to getting your face bloodied because United decided they needed your seat for their own employee to get to a city that is only a 5 hour drive away anyway.
"Our two-party system is like a bowl of shit looking at itself in a mirror." - Lewis Black
I may be living in an alternative universe, but every ticket I've ever bought on JetBlue has been non-refundable. Does United not do that?
A friend of mine is regularly late for her flights and the last time she arrived "as the plane was taking off", I was permitted to purchase her a ticket for the next flight at the current full price (around $350, which was more than the original ticket that was purchased a couple of weeks prior) after they deducted around $150 from the refund on the missed flight.
Does JetBlue not overbook or are they just "smart"?
We all know that airlines overbook planes.
But still, selling a plane seat to two people is like selling a house to two families, It's criminal fraud and somebody should be locked up!
Whitewashing this based on statistics is bullshit!
ANY percentage still hurts somebody. ESPECIALLY when there is a far more reasonable solution:
1) Don't overbook, and; 2) Don't refund missed seats, and; 3) Last minute empty seats can be resold to standby passengers for the same rate originally sold.
Airlines OBVIOUSLY overbook with the HOPES of executing the more expensive tickets.
If seat 7A sells for $400, then re-sells at $500, the airline will opt to bump the $400 seat.
It is a crime against humanity to make people suffer over a corporate entity bottom line. PERIOD!
This is stranger than fiction. We must not be getting the whole story.
Self-importance and self-indulgence is the root of ALL evil.
Because fuck you, that's why.
I've yet to see those coupons offered at >$300, or without conditions that rendered them unredeemable.
I just looked up my experience with a domestic round trip on JetBlue a little more than a year ago.
1. Purchased round trip for $498
2. Arrived late, as flight was boarding; it was the last flight of the day
3. Eventually I was offered a ticket for the first flight in the morning
4. Charged $236 for the change
5. The evening before the return flight I asked to reschedule to a later flight, same day
6. Charged $69 for the change
Charging what the market will bear? Please google an econ101 price v quantity profit optimization chart.
Appreciate the back and forth but it's clear we aren't going to make any progress. Best wishes.
I came to the same realization yesterday. From bottom to top it seems like this country is filled with people who are either trying to screw everyone they can to get money, or pay as little as possible. Instead of doing their jobs and being courteous to people, and treating them the same way they would want to be treated, people treat each other like assholes just because they can. Like the flight attendant who informed my short wife when she asked for help putting her bag in the overhead bin that, if she couldn't do it herself, she should have checked her bag, or maybe she should find a boyfriend who thinks she's attractive to help her. People treat each other that way instead of taking 5 seconds to help them, it's awful. It's part of the culture and society in this country, at every level, and it's going to be the reason why we eventually find ourselves living in another country. Your sentiment about people wanting to go through things like overbooking just so that they can pay a lower price is a symptom of that problem, and it's difficult to argue against because we have no counter-examples in this country, every airline is trying to squeeze water from stone and get everything they can. No airline charges higher prices and guarantees that you'll have a comfortable seat and be treated humanely and courteously, so we have no comparison. The chase of the almighty buck causes people to accept shit service and treatment just so that they don't have to spend a little more, and on the other end it causes owners to spend as little as possible to make as much money back. It's a toxic system and it pervades the culture and society of this country at every level. It's not like that in a lot of other places and I don't know why we accept it here, but it's been going on for generations.
"Our two-party system is like a bowl of shit looking at itself in a mirror." - Lewis Black
I have no idea what you're talking about. Almost every airline allows you to pay an extra $500 to ride in first class, and it's a much better experience. But most people are not willing to pay that, so first class seats are mostly filled by people getting upgraded in exchange for loyalty, which generally means paying an extra $50-100 per ticket to stick to one airline rather than picking the cheapest for your route. We have tons of options if you want to pay more for comfort, flexibility, and certainty. Airlines have like 20 fare classes where you can choose the rules you want to abide by. So whining about the rules and pretending you don't have full control over those rules by paying something more than the lowest available fare class is either your ignorance on how airlines work or just willful denial because you want to blame "that corporations!!!!" for only being able to fly anywhere you want for next to nothing using under whatever rules you desire. Ok...
And maybe first class isn't good enough for you. Maybe you want an even nicer experience where your short girlfriend is massaged in her seat. Well, there are only about a gazillion charter and private airlines in the US. For most people this isn't an option, because it turns out planes are expensive and operating them is expensive and maintaining them is expensive and landing fees at airports are expensive and security is expensive and paying commercial pilots is expensive and keeping them current on their type ratings, medicals, sim time, etc is expensive and complying with FAA regs is expensive and they end up in a totally different league cost wise compared to the highly efficient large commercial airlines.
So it's clear to me you have no idea what you're talking about and have onidea how good you have it and how amazing it is that $300 gets you anywhere in the US on a safe plane.
But I will give it one more shot. Suppose you get your own pilots license (to fly a small single engine plane). And you rent a Cessna and want to go somewhere, say, 500 mi away. Because it's you, you don't have to pay a pilot. You can leave from a regional GA airport, so no fees. You can even land at a regional GA airport, so likely no fees. All you're paying for is gas and plane rental. It will take you about 2-3x longer to get to your destination, plus 90 mins or so for preflight planning and inspection, but ignoring all that... you will still pay at least twice the cost for the round trip than if you bought a commercial airline ticket.
Perhaps that gives you some remote idea of how efficient commercial airlines are and how much you would need to pay to have the experience you are imagining... ...which, as I have said above, YOU CAN ALREADY DO TODAY.
Almost every airline allows you to pay an extra $500 to ride in first class, and it's a much better experience.
That doesn't really matter when you still have the same shitty employees who for some reason think that they can work in a service industry and be cunts to everyone. Again, compare with airlines from different countries. Here in the US we accept shitty customer service for some reason, as long as we don't have to pay much. I'm talking about an entire plane filled with comfortable people, staffed with employees who, for some strange reason, think that their job as a service worker means that it's their job to make sure their customers are happy. I'm not talking about 12 seats in the front of a plane staffed by cunts who are looking for any reason they can to get you off the plane.
We have tons of options if you want to pay more for comfort, flexibility, and certainty.
Right. Options like Korean Air, FinnAir, Virgin Atlantic, etc. Plenty of options that aren't US airlines.
Airlines have like 20 fare classes where you can choose the rules you want to abide by.
What a weird statement. How about "treat me like you would want to be treated", is that an option written into some contract somewhere? Is that something that I have the option of paying extra for? After all, this is the US, and if someone is willing to pay $100 for something, don't give it to them for free, right? If someone is willing to pay extra to be treated like a decent person, then don't do that for free. Make the default shitty service and then get everyone to pay extra if they want to be treated fairly.
So whining about the rules and pretending you don't have full control over those rules by paying something more than the lowest available fare class is either your ignorance on how airlines work or just willful denial because you want to blame "that corporations!!!!" for only being able to fly anywhere you want for next to nothing using under whatever rules you desire. Ok...
That's what you think, huh? I just want to be treated fairly, by a person who understands it is their job to make customers happy and not the other way around. That's all. It's not just about airlines either, this country is full of entitled cunts in service jobs who think that helping a customer is some sort of burden instead of their damn job.
Maybe you want an even nicer experience where your short girlfriend is massaged in her seat.
My wife doesn't want special treatment. She wants to be treated fairly, like she has been when she's lived in Brazil, Finland, and Ireland, but not here in the US. It's just about being treated fairly, that's all. And you're suggesting that we charter a flight in order to be treated fairly in the US. You know what the real stupid thing is? You're right, chartering your own plane is probably the only way to guarantee you're going to be treated fairly in the US.
And, if you've only ever lived in the US, then you're as blind to the problem as anyone else here. You accept it because that's the way it is, even though that's only the way it is here. There's a reason why the stereotypical American tourist in other countries is loud and rude. It's because we are, especially to each other. Certain industries like airlines and telephone/cable providers are particularly known for this, according to customer satisfaction rankings.
it turns out planes are expensive and operating them is expensive and maintaining them is expensive and landing fees at airports are expensive and security is expensive and paying commercial pilots is expensive....
Therefore, hire the cheapest cunts you can find and don't bother training them how to deal with other people. Because that $21 billion market cap for United Continental doesn't mean anything if the CEO can't get all the money they can out of it while spending
"Our two-party system is like a bowl of shit looking at itself in a mirror." - Lewis Black
Use a different airline. Every experience I have had in first class has been wonderful.
Literally every experience I've had as a coach passenger on a foreign airline has also been wonderful. Even coach on Hawaiian, it was just fine. It's stupid that Americans are willing to accept shit service from the 8 major US airlines if they fly coach. Again, it is not that way in the rest of the world, for some reason people accept it here, and each of the 8 major airlines has profit margins of around 20 - 30%. It is a profitable business and they could very well spend additional money to hire good people and train them (and fire them if needed), but they don't feel like they need to do that because people like you don't blame them when they treat you like shit, and will actually *defend* them. "Their customers WANT THEM TO OVERBOOK." No, we don't. A fair price and fair service shouldn't be mutually exclusive.
"Our two-party system is like a bowl of shit looking at itself in a mirror." - Lewis Black
Look, you keep complaining about what Americans want and keep citing how much better service is in the rest of the world. It is clear you just aren't representative of the bulk of the US market. That's ok. As I explained before there are tons of options, including paying a bit more for domestic first class. Meanwhile, you should realize your view on this differs from the majority of US customers, so if I were you I would hesitate before asserting that I am wrong about US customers wanting airlines to overbook, especially since every airline does it and innovation in the US airline industry is almost exclusively focused on price. So you can keep replying and saying the sky isn't blue. But it stopped being interesting quite a while ago.
It is clear you just aren't representative of the bulk of the US market.
I think I admit that when I say that for some reason Americans are willing to accept shitty service.
Meanwhile, you should realize your view on this differs from the majority of US customers
I realize that the majority of US customers suffer from a form of Stockholm Syndrome that they confuse with brand loyalty. I think you're one of them.
I would hesitate before asserting that I am wrong about US customers wanting airlines to overbook
I'm just trying to suggest that if people knew what they were missing, they would demand better service. The only reason you might be right about your assertion is if people think that's the way it has to be. It doesn't have to be that way, but it stays that way because people don't demand a change in their relationships with service companies. Again, airlines aren't the only ones who get away with treating their customers unfairly. And, again, major industries like these simply don't have an actor which treats their customers substantially better, so people don't even have an opportunity to choose that company and vote with their wallet.
especially since every airline does it
That's simply not true, not even among major domestic carriers. JetBlue, for example, doesn't overbook. People still get bumped if flights get canceled or things change, but they don't overbook. Even so, if you told me that everyone beats their wife that doesn't mean I'm going to go home and beat my wife, or that I should beat my wife, or that my wife wants me to beat her.
innovation in the US airline industry is almost exclusively focused on price
You have correctly identified the root cause of the problem. I'm glad that you're understanding what I'm saying.
"Our two-party system is like a bowl of shit looking at itself in a mirror." - Lewis Black
Your argument still makes no sense. Americans only put up with overbooking because they don't know there is a better way, yet you yourself point out JetBlue doesn't overbook.
Americans want airlines to overbook. They won't ever say it like that, but the evidence is clear. The benefits of overbooking to the consumer are large and the negatives are almost non-existent, because the airlines have become really really good at overbooking. Just look at the FAA stats for IDBs.
But, yes, I have zero illusion that you are ever going to understand this because of your personal preferences, which you have expressed repeatedly now. So I think we can move on.
This isn't just about overbooking. That is a symptom of the problem, it's not the problem.
"Our two-party system is like a bowl of shit looking at itself in a mirror." - Lewis Black
He has to hope united doesn't take it to court.
So they can enjoy the fun of THROWING people off a plane even though they paid for that seat: http://www.newser.com/story/24... http://www.newser.com/story/24...