Posted on 04/17/2017 7:11:15 AM PDT by Morgana
FULL TITLE: 'It will never happen again': United bars employees from taking passengers' seats in rule change meant to prevent repeat of Chicago flight fiasco
We issued an updated policy to make sure crews traveling on our aircraft are booked at least 60 minutes prior to departure,' a United spokeswoman wrote in an email to the Times on Sunday.
'This is one of our initial steps in a review of our policies.'
(Excerpt) Read more at dailymail.co.uk ...
Re: So this means they will bump a passenger before he gets to get on the plane, no more offers, just - your off the flight
I think that is exactly what will happen. You get to the airport for your scheduled flight but find out you got bumped without an explanation. This happened to a friend of mine recently. I don’t recall what airline. It was on a connecting flight before an international flight. Talk about the domino effect. My friend missed all the connecting flights and had to make new flight arrangements and hotel reservations. Ended up having to spend several hundred dollars more in the process and arrived at the destination a day later. My friend assumed the airline sold the ticket for more money, but now with the United debacle in the news, the explanation of being bumped for an employee is plausible as well.
Makes me wonder if he was on some drugs also. I know if I were one of his patient I would not want him as my doctor knowing his past medical practice.
And as far as anyone knows the Pilot was not involved in the fuster cluck anyway. It was the ground crew and the mall cops at the airport.
Trouble yourself to read the Contract of Carriage to see what the entire airline can and cannot do.
https://www.united.com/web/en-US/content/contract-of-carriage.aspx
Untied won’t have to worry about it much anymore since I’m sure there will now be a lot of seats available for the dead heading crew.
Has the CEO resigned yet? Any wagers? I say by end of month.
Reforms have came too late for me.In 1996 I got kicked off an airliner (don’t remember which) that landed from Frankfurt in Warsaw. I spent the entire 26 hours sitting in an unyielding, hard-plastic, unupholstered banana seat (or circling around it while watching my luggage) until the next flight to my destination. I was given no explanation (although I assumed it was overbooked), was told “you have to get off,” and was offered no hotel or other compensation. Also, I could not venture into the city because I had no visa.
Correction Reforms have come...
United still doesn’t get it. Just up the compensation offer until passengers accept. Takes nothing more than that. If no one takes the offer up to a certain amount, the crew flies on small charter.
The captain SHOULD have been involved. If someone’s getting thrown off, that’s his decision. The fact that he [apparently] wasn’t, and that the contract says XYZ, is what leads to CFs.
The Sixty Minute Rule is going to last about a day.
On day two, some United employees are going to show up at 50 minutes, with seats available, and they will be let on.
Next it will be 45 minutes, with a bump at the gate.
Then 30 minutes. But nobody is getting a beat-down, so what’s the harm...
Before you know it, they will be right back to clubbing people and dragging them down the aisle.
The point is, if a rule makes no sense, it will not be enforced. Unless United announces that controls have been put in place that make it impossible for a passenger to be bumped in the last 60 minutes before departure, they are just relying on the discretion of the gate agents, which is how they got into this mess in the first place.
It will just shift the time. So the gate agent simply boards first and frequent flyers, THEN checks to see how many seats that they need to assign to employees flying standby, and then involuntarily bump who then need.
different shuffle, same deck, same deal
About damned time!
Sorry, but FAA regs are clear that the pilot is in command.
For you belligerent types: 14 CFR 91.3. Responsibility and authority of the pilot in command.
Pilot does not get to open cabin door and throw passengers out.
... and aircraft was on the ground and pilot not involved and perhaps not even present. Passenger was not a threat to the aircraft.
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