More dick moves and it's not even political- United Airlines

[Londo_Jowo]

so he's not paid by united? he was't chosen by united, but allocated to united by the city of Chicago?

The officer works for the Chicago Department of Aviation Security.

 

[JSt0rm]

security guards and police officers are authoritarian morons. The only difference is security guards got all d's in school and cops got all c's

You cant expect a guy like that to walk into any situation and not use violence. This is why we all must be vigilant around these types.

 

[theeedude]

United and Chicago will be named as co-defendants. Jury will decide degree of responsibility for each. Both have incentive to settle quickly for PR and political reasons.

 

[Sheik Yerbouti]

The officer works for the Chicago Department of Aviation Security.

Fair enough, well he's gonna get sued as is that dept as is united, good.

 

[stormkroe]

With airline seating being sold on the mid-90's dial-up internet model, I'm surprised this isn't much more common.

 

[vi edit]

Take this for what you will...but New York Post is saying this guy actually was convicted about 10 years ago for trafficking drugs in trade for sex and was on probation with the medical board. He is also on the world poker tour.

Not discrediting what was actually done here...but there may be more motive than is being disclosed. The optics definitely look terrible for United, no doubt about that.

 

[JSt0rm]

Take this for what you will...but New York Post is saying this guy actually was convicted about 10 years ago for trafficking drugs in trade for sex and was on probation with the medical board. He is also on the world poker tour.

Not discrediting what was actually done here...but there may be more motive than is being disclosed. The optics definitely look terrible for United, no doubt about that.

what are you trying to say? That some flight attendants knew this guy was a drug sex pedo? lol.

 

[brycejones]

Take this for what you will...but New York Post is saying this guy actually was convicted about 10 years ago for trafficking drugs in trade for sex and was on probation with the medical board. He is also on the world poker tour.

Not discrediting what was actually done here...but there may be more motive than is being disclosed. The optics definitely look terrible for United, no doubt about that.

Serious question so what? United put themselves in this position not the guy. A better process would have prevented the situation from escalating to this point in the first place.

 

[vi edit]

what are you trying to say? That some flight attendants knew this guy was a drug sex pedo? lol.

Some people just make a living out of hustling and maybe he was trying to make a haul on this? That's all I'm saying. It in no way vindicates the actions by the airline or security.

 

[KMFJD]

lol

 

[Paratus]

While United has every legal right to remove a passenger from its property for basically any reason there is generally a cost for exercising that right. It can be individual lost fares, bad publicity, and legal costs.

United managers need to balance those costs against other losses. They don't want empty seats on flights so overbooking becomes a necessity to maximize profit.

Delays cost money so in this case the potential delay of the next day flight the deadheading crew was trying to meet could have cost quite a bit. Paying people to give up their seats so United could get their employees on costs hundreds of dollars.

United managers have to balance all those costs. So going for the cheap legal action of calling security and removing a passenger was probably seen as expedient and cost effective. More so than spending $2000 to buy a passenger out.

It makes sense until you incorrectly predict the cost of your legal action. In this case 800 million in lost market value.

http://gizmodo.com/united-loses-800-million-in-value-after-passenger-drag-1794208511

United’s market capitalization, essentially the current value of the company, has fallen by more than $750 million from $22.5 billion after a video showing a bloodied United passenger who was dragged off a flight made headlines on Monday.

Makes you think that even if the action was legally right, maybe treating paying passengers better and eating slightly more bumped passenger payoff costs might be the cheaper action and be the morally right action.

 

[[DHT]Osiris]

Serious question so what? United put themselves in this position not the guy. A better process would have prevented the situation from escalating to this point in the first place.

It's a weak attempt to make the target of an outrageous act acceptable, which erodes the outrageous-ness of it over time. You see the same thing with overt regulations and 'new laws' of varying levels of constitutionality placed on ne'er-do-wells like sex offenders, illegal immigrants, felons, etc.

 

[Exterous]

It makes sense until you incorrectly predict the cost of your legal action. In this case 800 million in lost market value.

Those numbers make nice headlines but a good chunk of that has already been made back up and its not really any more volatile than it has been when it wasn't making headlines.

 

[Paratus]

Those numbers make nice headlines but a good chunk of that has already been made back up and its not really any more volatile than it has been when it wasn't making headlines.

Of course. But I'm looking at this from a management failure perspective.

If you told Mr United CEO 2 days ago he could put a process in place to offer extra incentives to overbooked passengers in extenuating circumstances

Or

Lose 3% of the value of the company overnight and spend company time and resources on a public relations nightmare.

Which would you pick?


If you said number one, the question then is why wasn't that the policy before this debacle?

 

[Exterous]

Of course. But I'm looking at this from a management failure perspective.

If you told Mr United CEO 2 days ago he could put a process in place to offer extra incentives to overbooked passengers in extenuating circumstances

Or

Lose 3% of the value of the company overnight and spend company time and resources on a public relations nightmare.

Which would you pick?


If you said number one, the question then is why wasn't that the policy before this debacle?

If you told me today's lottery numbers 2 days ago I would pick those too. Regardless of getting volunteers people have been getting IDB'd for decades so there is a clear and established trend that having limits on your compensation does not equate to having police bloody up your customers. If you're a CEO you're not going to have a job long if you are spending all your time thinking up all the ways to avoid issues that occur 0.00001% of the time

Their communications plan afterwards was absolutely terrible though

 

[KMFJD]

Chinese market for United isn't taking this very well

 

[Sunburn74]

Honestly I have no problem with what happened. The guy was told to give up the seat and that the airline was refusing him service. He refused to do so and was removed by force. And this was after much diplomacy and bargaining by united. Every company has a right to refuse service. I recently was trying to buy a bottle of wine in a store and was told inexplicably that unfortunately I had to wait a few hours before they could sell me the specific bottle I had in my hand. If I raised a stink and was thrown out, that'd be entirely on me. They have the right to refuse service.

The worst thing to me is that he is a 69 year old MD. He should know better than to act as a petulant child. Yes you have patients to be seen tomorrow. You call in work emergency coverage or you cancel the shift/clinic etc. I assure you he didn't go to work the next day and his patient's did just fine. The fact that he was an MD makes his behavior even less justifiable.

 

[DrunkenSano]

Honestly I have no problem with what happened. The guy was told to give him the seat and that the airline was refusing him service. He refused to do so and was removed by force. And this was after much diplomacy and bargaining by united. Every company has a right to refuse service. I recently was trying to buy a bottle of wine in a store and was told inexplicably that unfortunately I had to wait a few hours before they could sell me the specific bottle I had in my hand. If I raised a stink and was thrown out, that'd be entirely on me. They have the right to refuse service.

The worst thing to me is that he is a 69 year old MD. He should know better than to act as a petulant child. Yes you have patients to be seen tomorrow. You call in work emergency coverage or you cancel the shift/clinic etc. I assure you he didn't go to work the next day and his patient's did just fine. The fact that he was an MD makes his behavior even less justifiable.

I would disagree with your analogy. Since the man already paid for his ticket and boarded the plane and took his seat, United does not have the right to IDB him. If you want to use your wine bottle analogy, it would have been as if you took the wine bottle, brought it to the cashier, paid for it, left the store. Then the clerk chased you down outside and said, we need the bottle back to sell it to someone more important than you. You have the right to say yes or no.

 

[[DHT]Osiris]

Honestly I have no problem with what happened. The guy was told to give him the seat and that the airline was refusing him service. He refused to do so and was removed by force. And this was after much diplomacy and bargaining by united. Every company has a right to refuse service. I recently was trying to buy a bottle of wine in a store and was told inexplicably that unfortunately I had to wait a few hours before they could sell me the specific bottle I had in my hand. If I raised a stink and was thrown out, that'd be entirely on me. They have the right to refuse service.

The worst thing to me is that he is a 69 year old MD. He should know better than to act as a petulant child. Yes you have patients to be seen tomorrow. You call in work emergency coverage or you cancel the shift/clinic etc. I assure you he didn't go to work the next day and his patient's did just fine. The fact that he was an MD makes his behavior even less justifiable.

I agree with the first part on principle, but I personally object to the last part. I see no issue with getting irate with being treated like a product, to be shifted around based on the whims of someone who has no ball in the game of my life.

What if his patient's lives depended on him showing up? I'm not saying this is the case, but his field could be genuinely specialized enough that there isn't another person to do his job. As far as United seemed concerned, there wasn't anyone else that could do the job of those four employees that had to be on that plane so badly that they needed to kick off paying customers, so why is his case any different?

People aren't cattle, and I would object to anyone treating me or those around me as such. There was no reasonable circumstance for requiring this paying customer to disembark a plane so that a company employee could take his place, and we should never get to the point of accepting that as normal.

 

[Sunburn74]

I would disagree with your analogy. Since the man already paid for his ticket and boarded the plane and took his seat, United does not have the right to IDB him. If you want to use your wine bottle analogy, it would have been as if you took the wine bottle, brought it to the cashier, paid for it, left the store. Then the clerk chased you down outside and said, we need the bottle back to sell it to someone more important than you. You have the right to say yes or no.

They have the right to do that I would say especially if I am still on their property at the time when I was stopped. This is my opinion and I'm not sure what the specific law is. However, your analogy really isn't quite apt and is more challenging the question of when is a transaction complete, rather than whether a company can forcibly undo a transaction after it is complete. That actually is my argument too; the transaction was never complete and therefore they can refuse service.

To make the wine analogy more apt to the united case, it would be more equivalent if: I pay the teller, she hands me the bottle, never lets go of it, and then pulls it back and says no, I can't sell you this bottle and she returns my money. They are completely within their rights to do so.

He paid for his ticket and was seated in the plane. The plane had not taken off. The transaction was not complete and they have the right to terminate the transaction at any time. It'd would be different if he flew to his destination and then as he was walking into the airport terminal was told for whatever reason that he had to be flown back and refunded the money. That is trying to undo a completed transaction with reason he can refuse.

I agree with the first part on principle, but I personally object to the last part. I see no issue with getting irate with being treated like a product, to be shifted around based on the whims of someone who has no ball in the game of my life.

What if his patient's lives depended on him showing up? I'm not saying this is the case, but his field could be genuinely specialized enough that there isn't another person to do his job. As far as United seemed concerned, there wasn't anyone else that could do the job of those four employees that had to be on that plane so badly that they needed to kick off paying customers, so why is his case any different?

People aren't cattle, and I would object to anyone treating me or those around me as such. There was no reasonable circumstance for requiring this paying customer to disembark a plane so that a company employee could take his place, and we should never get to the point of accepting that as normal.

No physician practice in any field is so insulated that the failure of a physician to show up for one day would cause lives to be lost. That would be illegal and unethical and no supervising medical board would allow such a practice to exist. To make that argument is to say that if this Dr Broke his leg in a car accident or caught pneumonia or was stabbed or arrested or something to that effect, people would die the next day. That is not the case.

I'm not here arguing that the united employee's are more valuable to society than he is (actually I would sort of argue that in a tongue in cheek kind of way when you consider the impact of a cancelled flight on society and its downstream effects) but more that I don't buy for a second the argument that having to see patient's the next day is a valid reason why he could absolutely not leave the flight. Its a good reason for not wanting to leave the flight, but not one for why it is absolutely critical to do so.

 

[alien42]

To make the wine analogy more apt to the united case, it would be more equivalent if: I pay the teller, she hands me the bottle, never lets go of it, and then pulls it back and says no, I can't sell you this bottle. They are completely within their rights to do so.

how about this to make your analogy comparable...

you buy a bottle of wine, which is bagged and handed to you along with a receipt of purchase. as you are walking towards the exit, an employee tells you to stop and that you have to return the bottle of wine for a refund and you can't buy another bottle from that store until tomorrow. when you question them, the cops come and drag you out of the store.

quite simply, your initial perspective is typical victim shaming.

United should never have let the man on the plane to begin with, once they did, it became their problem to solve.

 

[theeedude]

I am sure United will find a way to get off the hook legally, or settle to avoid further PR embarrassment. But, the calculus for airlines has changed because this one man stood up and refused to be a pushover. Now they will think long and hard about the risk of another PR disaster, and offer more money to avoid it. The UAL CEO is being trashed, and I am sure he'll make clear to people down the org chart that he is not enjoying it. We all should be thankful for this man for his bravery and civil disobedience in the face of a giant corporation and its government provided henchmen.

 

[[DHT]Osiris]

They have the right to do that I would say especially if I am still on their property at the time when I was stopped. Your analogy really is more challenging the question of when is a transaction complete, rather than can whether a company can forcibly undo a transaction after it is complete. That actually is my argument too.

To make the wine analogy more apt to the united case, it would be more equivalent if: I pay the teller, she hands me the bottle, never lets go of it, and then pulls it back and says no, I can't sell you this bottle. They are completely within their rights to do so.

He paid for his ticket and was seated in the plane. The plane had not taken off. The transaction was not complete and they have the right to terminate the transaction at any time.




No physician practice in any field is so insulated that the failure of a physician to show up for one day would cause lives to be lost. That would be illegal and unethical and no supervising medical board would allow such a practice to exist. To make that argument is to say that if this Dr Broke his leg in a car accident or caught pneumonia or was stabbed or arrested or something to that effect, people would die the next day. That is not the case.

I'm not here arguing that the united employee's are more valuable to society than he is (actually I would sort of argue that in a tongue in cheek kind of way when you consider the impact of a cancelled flight on society and its downstream effects) but more that I don't buy for a second the argument that having to see patient's the next day is a valid reason why he could absolutely not leave the flight. Its a good reason for not wanting to leave the flight, but not one for why it is absolutely critical to do so.

Well if we're going to argue the criticality of someone disembarking the plane, why does the United employee get preferential treatment over someone who's already completed the transaction, and spent the better part of their day 'involved' with this airport and its employees? By your logic of no medical board permitting a single point of failure within one physician, why are these four employees such a single point of failure for an aircraft taking off, that someone else (no matter who) has to be ORDERED to disembark a plane on their behalf?

 

[Vic]

He had already paid for his ticket, and UAL had boarded him on the flight. Barring some kind of legitimate safety issue, UAL was contractually obligated to provide service at that point.
Most arguments that businesses can refuse to provide service at any time they feel like are legally flawed, but in this case it's more flawed than usual.
Plus, let's assume (purely for the sake of argument) that UAL was within its legal rights to refuse service in this case. Was that still the right decision? People choose to fly airplanes because they believe their time is valuable. UAL just told the whole world, in the worst way possible, that they don't believe that their paying customers' time is in any way valuable. They don't care if you have a connecting flight to make, reservations for the vacation of a lifetime, your mother's funeral, or patients to treat.
You -- their paying customers -- do not matter to them. That message is loud and clear.

Sent from my SM-G930V using Tapatalk

 

[DrunkenSano]

To make the wine analogy more apt to the united case, it would be more equivalent if: I pay the teller, she hands me the bottle, never lets go of it, and then pulls it back and says no, I can't sell you this bottle and she returns my money. They are completely within their rights to do so.

Then she is stealing from me. I already handed her cash, she did not give me the bottle. You can say that the cashier will give you the cash back but that isn't what United is doing. They are giving a voucher. So to add on to your analogy, you paid her cash, she doesn't let go of the bottle and says you have to take this coupon instead.

However, flight and travel plans are much more complex than a simple wine bottle. A bottle of wine may hamper dinner plans, killing travel plans due to being IDB'd has a much greater impact on a person.

What I hope is that because of this man standing up for his rights, people from now on will stand up for theirs. So United either has to assault people off of their flights or companies in general have to change their policies.