United Passenger “Removal”: A Reporting and Management Failure

Post by jksmith » Wed, Apr 12, 2017, 7:36 PM UTC

Ductapemaster wrote: post #119

jksmith wrote: post #109

Seems to me that what is most unfortunate is that surrounding passengers didn't support the passenger dragged off the plane. 4 or 5 people standing up and threatening something along the lines of "Why don't you take my seat too jackass; I don't want it anymore" would have been far more effective at righting this situation than proper media reporting or crying about passenger contracts.

While that sounds like a nice thing to do on a personal level, it distracts from the real issue at hand - poor service and handling of a situation that was bad from the start. I strongly disagree that the passengers should have stepped up and taken the fall for poor practices from United. People don't need to be better humans - companies need to be held accountable for their actions and act better towards their custo…

Post by seanmcdirmid » Wed, Apr 12, 2017, 7:44 PM UTC

ashark wrote: post #74

ubernostrum wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you look in the /r/aviation threads you'll see various people who are airline crew claiming they can fly jumpseat but it's beneath them and they want their regular-seat privileges enforced at basically any cost.

Don't the jumpseats have more legroom? I thought the ones I'd seen did, just by not being part of the ordinary aisles and being smaller (slimmer back especially). I'd take a milking stool over the regular seats if it meant not having my knees jammed most of an inch into the seat in front of me (and I'm not even that tall).

Post by dwyerm » Wed, Apr 12, 2017, 7:53 PM UTC

techsupporter wrote: post #122

dwyerm wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is exactly why I'm fighting against Mandatory Binding Arbitration and Class Action Waivers. The system is slow, creaky, and arguably broken, but that's a _feature_ if it means that companies are afraid of it. I'm not having a whole lot of success in my fight, it seems.

What hurts even more is that the supposedly enlightened companies that come out of Y Combinator also put in these clauses. When I asked one why, the reasoning was "our lawyers made us." Yet there seems to be no consideration that the business owner hates to be on the other side of that kind of clause all the while imposing it on his or her own customers.

Post by ryanmarsh » Wed, Apr 12, 2017, 8:01 PM UTC

yladiz wrote: post #28

ryanmarsh wrote: post #18

I've been saying for years that the only thing holding back massive disruption in the airline industry is the FAA. American and United are two of the most poorly run mega-corps in the US. Customers hate them, but need to fly. Warren Buffet thinks they're notoriously bad investments. Why?

There are a lot of regulations for airlines like American, but considering, for example, that there's nothing you can do at 35,000 feet in a giant metal machine if there's a mechanical failure, I'm much happier that there are a lot of regulations than not enough, in this case. There are a lot of things that suck about air travel in the states, but the FAA isn't one of them. As far as the companies being bad investmen…

Post by ryanmarsh » Wed, Apr 12, 2017, 8:03 PM UTC

jameskilton wrote: post #73

ryanmarsh wrote: post #18

I've been saying for years that the only thing holding back massive disruption in the airline industry is the FAA. American and United are two of the most poorly run mega-corps in the US. Customers hate them, but need to fly. Warren Buffet thinks they're notoriously bad investments. Why?

Flying is the safest form of transport because of the FAA. Yes there are a ton of rules and regulations, but the vast majority exist for a very good reason and the FAA is very good at cracking down on offenders. Why? Because the consequence of failure is so high that we can't afford not to. Get rid of the FAA and it's only a matter of time before what was illegal ends up taking down a full airliner, killing hundreds…