One thing I love about social media is the smart, clever funny people on it who can give a solid burn where necessary. The huge companies trying to get out of sticky situations or outrun scandal cannot escape being pilloried by social media. It is a great leveller.
In this case, United Airlines is trying to outrun a PR disaster caused by an incident having been filmed which shows disgraceful behaviour on the part of the airline and law enforcement.
Airlines usually knowingly overbook flights because they know passengers sometimes don’t turn up. It guarantees a) more money and b) full flights. If all the passengers do turn up, people are offered money or vouchers to take later flights. In this case the passengers were all boarded but UA wanted four paying passengers to give up their places for four non-payingcrew members who needed to travel elsewhere for a flight.
No one volunteered, despite being offered money, so UA forced four people to leave. One man refused to give up his seat so they physically and violently dragged him off the flight. The man in question was a 69-year old doctor who had patients to see. The violence in this film is too awful for words. This was a PAYING passenger who refused to ‘volunteer’ to leave.
According to the airline he was ‘disruptive’ and ‘he fell’, but thanks to social media and passengers who filmed it from several different angles, you can see that it was not quite that way. I hope he sues the pants off the airline!
@United overbook #flight3411 and decided to force random passengers off the plane. Here's how they did it: pic.twitter.com/QfefM8X2cW
— Jayse D. Anspach (@JayseDavid) April 10, 2017
@united @FoxNews @CNN not a good way to treat a Doctor trying to get to work because they overbooked pic.twitter.com/sj9oHk94Ik
— Tyler Bridges (@Tyler_Bridges) April 9, 2017
So, after United Airlines blaming the customer and saying that he was being ‘re-accommodated’, Twitter went wild…
We flew with several airlines including United during our trip to North America I wasn’t that impressed with most of the American airlines, Air Canada was very good though
Of course, as per their contract of carriage once you board the plane you are required to follow the instructions of the flight crew. Once he refused to leave this then required them to involve law enforcement – but they should have handled it very differently in the first place, i.e. not board the plane until they had the seats they needed or similar!
What I can’t understand is why they did not offer the maximum $1,325 for people to give up their seats, if it was that important. They only went up to $800 and then resorted to manhandling. I am sure someone would have taken the $1,325.
Haha, the Hunger Games quote with United’s logo is my favorite!
My favourite is the Rocky one! ‘I made it on the plane!’