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

[[DHT]Osiris]

Thank you for stating that.

This whole situation is just embarrassing, but I agree that both parties had a part to play in making this entire situation a PR debacle. United Airlines could have upped the voucher and increased compensation to further incentivize someone to voluntarily leave the flight. I, like the rest of you, do not like waking up in the morning to see a man bloodied up by airline security and forceably removed from a flight. At the same time, the man did not need to act the way he did. Regardless of how unjustifiable the position he was placed in, he still chose to act with character we would expect from a someone who was being treated like a three year-old. He, too, had a part to play in how this situation spiraled out of control.

So we're back to victim-blaming again? I suppose that universally, we should be compliant with unjust actions?

EDIT:
In fact, this is even more succinct, shamelessly stolen from the piktchur thread.

 

[Genx87]

Thank you for stating that.

This whole situation is just embarrassing, but I agree that both parties had a part to play in making this entire situation a PR debacle. United Airlines could have upped the voucher and increased compensation to further incentivize someone to voluntarily leave the flight. I, like the rest of you, do not like waking up in the morning to see a man bloodied up by airline security and forceably removed from a flight. At the same time, the man did not need to act the way he did. Regardless of how unjustifiable the position he was placed in, he still chose to act with character we would expect from a 3 year oldHe, too, had a part to play in how this situation spiraled out of control.

I am seeing this line of thinking being thrown around to label this guy. Who is really acting like a 3 year old? A customer who wanted to remain in the seat he purchased? Or the airline who when they didnt get their way resorted to violence to get it?

 

[mikeymikec]

I am seeing this line of thinking being thrown around to label this guy. Who is really acting like a 3 year old? A customer who wanted to remain in the seat he purchased? Or the airline who when they didnt get their way resorted to violence to get it?

If I was in that guy's place I'd be pissed off that the airline is trying to get out of its obligation to deny me service at the last possible moment, thereby screwing up my plans and possibly losing me money and causing me lots of headaches in the process. For all we know, the stakes for him may have been greater than that; he may have been visiting a dying close relative for the last time, not that it matters. I haven't seen any evidence that he acted in any other way than a very pissed off yet still civilised person should be expected to act like.

What kind of weird world do we live in whereby some people think that corporations are OK to jerk their customers around and if those customers don't act like compliant little drones and accept getting screwed over, then the customers are at fault?

If I, in the course of running my company, do things like make promises to honour deadlines then wait until the last possible moment to tell a customer otherwise, then I'm acting like a jerk, and frankly I expect them to be irritated with me and likely act like a jerk in return. From what I've seen, this guy hasn't even acted like a jerk; perhaps a little obstinate and displaying more wishful thinking than I'd expect when confronted with a company that just deployed hoodlums to get its way.

IMO in a sane world, that company should go under before the end of the year for this absolute cluster-fuck of a PR disaster; any reasonable person should not stand for that kind of behaviour and vote with their wallets to take their business elsewhere. What kind of idiotic management staff thinks it's a good idea to beat up an elderly gentleman? Frankly I am glad that he stood his ground (I hate that saying for what Americans have made of it, but anyway), because otherwise this airline's arrogance would not have made front page news.

 

[[DHT]Osiris]

If I was in that guy's place I'd be pissed off that the airline is trying to get out of its obligation to deny me service at the last possible moment, thereby screwing up my plans and possibly losing me money and causing me lots of headaches in the process. For all we know, the stakes for him may have been greater than that; he may have been visiting a dying close relative for the last time, not that it matters. I haven't seen any evidence that he acted in any other way than a very pissed off yet still civilised person should be expected to act like.

Not to continue the creation of straw men, but what if he had a serious medical condition such as Hemophilia? What if he had osteoporosis? What if he was prone to heart attacks, had a history of abuse? I understand that such things need to be accepted (and mostly disregarded) when you're dealing with criminals, as the safety of that person or those around them is of higher priority and you shouldn't 'bet' on a low-chance risk, but can you imagine the fallout if this person had died, or been crippled by this?

 

[KMFJD]

I've read this part from a supposed lawyer, not a lawyer so i'm not sure how truthfully he's speaking -

"Lawyer here. This myth that passengers don't have rights needs to go away, ASAP. You are dead wrong when saying that United legally kicked him off the plane.

1. First of all, it's airline spin to call this an overbooking. The statutory provision granting them the ability to deny boarding is about "OVERSELLING", which is specifically defined as booking more reserved confirmed seats than there are available. This is not what happened. They did not overbook the flight; they had a fully booked flight, and not only did everyone already have a reserved confirmed seat, they were all sitting in them. The law allowing them to deny boarding in the event of an oversale does not apply.

2. Even if it did apply, the law is unambiguously clear that airlines have to give preference to everyone with reserved confirmed seats when choosing to involuntarily deny boarding. They have to always choose the solution that will affect the least amount of reserved confirmed seats. This rule is straightforward, and United makes very clear in their own contract of carriage that employees of their own or of other carriers may be denied boarding without compensation because they do not have reserved confirmed seats. On its face, it's clear that what they did was illegal-- they gave preference to their employees over people who had reserved confirmed seats, in violation of 14 CFR 250.2a.

3. Furthermore, even if you try and twist this into a legal application of 250.2a and say that United had the right to deny him boarding in the event of an overbooking; they did NOT have the right to kick him off the plane. Their contract of carriage highlights there is a complete difference in rights after you've boarded and sat on the plane, and Rule 21 goes over the specific scenarios where you could get kicked off. NONE of them apply here. He did absolutely nothing wrong and shouldn't have been targeted. He's going to leave with a hefty settlement after this fiasco."

 

[theeedude]

United will settle. They just want this to put this behind them, and settling for a couple million is the necessary first step. It will take tens of millions in advertising to repair the PR damage anyways, but they need the damage to stop first. Otherwise, they will have to sell seats at 5-10% discount on competitive routes to fill planes, which will destroy their profit margin.

 

[DrunkenSano]

Everything points to United settling, especially with the verbiage and tone change that the CEO did, it was a complete 180 from his initial statement which was to protect against any lawsuits.

 

[Sunburn74]

I've read this part from a supposed lawyer, not a lawyer so i'm not sure how truthfully he's speaking -

"Lawyer here. This myth that passengers don't have rights needs to go away, ASAP. You are dead wrong when saying that United legally kicked him off the plane.

2. Even if it did apply, the law is unambiguously clear that airlines have to give preference to everyone with reserved confirmed seats when choosing to involuntarily deny boarding. They have to always choose the solution that will affect the least amount of reserved confirmed seats. This rule is straightforward, and United makes very clear in their own contract of carriage that employees of their own or of other carriers may be denied boarding without compensation because they do not have reserved confirmed seats. On its face, it's clear that what they did was illegal-- they gave preference to their employees over people who had reserved confirmed seats, in violation of 14 CFR 250.2a..

"

CNN legal staff and MSNBC legal staff have completely disagreed with this guy in separate articles.

As I have stated before, they can cancel an entire flight for whatever reason however flimsy at the last minute. They can ask everyone to get off the plane to allow the 4 employees to fly alone if they wanted. They can certainly ask a single person to involuntarily leave.

Will the guy get paid for something? Maybe... maybe depending on how badly united wants the PR to go away. Even if their position was defensible, its still bad PR to take it to trial.

 

[kage69]

Sadly, there are times when this kind of force is actually required on planes. This was not one of those times however. I forget who said it, but they nailed it with 'sounds like the company had a problem and decided to make it a customers problem.' Bad move. This guy actually got tuned up pretty good, busted nose, concussion, missing teeth. He lawyered up and I predict his family to be set for sometime. I bet public sentiment like this can do wonders on settlement numbers.

Sure the company attempted to make the problem go away with financial incentive, but that kind of response is ridiculous for non-violent customers. Just announce that the flight is cancelled and they have to disembark. Once everyone is off, re-do boarding and let security handle things at the gate. Boom. Done. Or maybe the person in charge could have validated the passengers stated credentials and decided to exempt him on grounds of medical necessity, followed by another random selection off the passenger list. Whatever. You don't start knocking people's teeth out.

United and others might get raked over the coals for this incident, maybe that's a good thing.

 

[Ventanni]

So we're back to victim-blaming again? I suppose that universally, we should be compliant with unjust actions?

Actually, I am (to your first sentence). The man could have walked away with dignity knowing that he was in the right, with a sweet voucher in hand, and caught the next flight a few hours later. Instead he chose to go limp, repeatedly defy requests to leave the plane, and play the victim card. Before you take my words out of context and make me sound like I'm purely blaming the passenger, I stand by my original statement in that both parties had a part to play here. I do not agree whatsoever with the airline practice of doing this. This is a horrible customer experience, and it will hurt United Airlines. At the same time though, the guy chose to make a scene, and that's on him.

I actually denied a promotion to someone for this very same concept. They were recently in a situation where they were in the right. Yes, they were in the right. I can't give specifics, obviously, but instead of making decisions that promote connection with others and having a conversation with the individual they felt were wronging them, they chose to play the victim card and build walls with that individual. Sure, they were capable, but they did not have the character to fit the promotion position.

What I'm saying is this. Just like this man, ALL of us will be in situations throughout our lifetimes where we are wronged. Everyone single one of us, including myself, will enter a situation where we're being the ones unjustly treated. And when that happens, we need to make a choice. Will we act with dignity and honor and be the better person, or will we play the victim card and make the situation even worse? This man chose to make the situation a lot worse than it had to be.

 

[mizzou]

its frustrating enough just making a connecting flight on time
being forced to leave when is abhorant.

United simply didnt sweet the deal enough to get volunteers.

 

[chowderhead]

Actually, I am (to your first sentence). The man could have walked away with dignity knowing that he was in the right, with a sweet voucher in hand, and caught the next flight a few hours later. Instead he chose to go limp, repeatedly defy requests to leave the plane, and play the victim card. Before you take my words out of context and make me sound like I'm purely blaming the passenger, I stand by my original statement in that both parties had a part to play here. I do not agree whatsoever with the airline practice of doing this. This is a horrible customer experience, and it will hurt United Airlines. At the same time though, the guy chose to make a scene, and that's on him.

I actually denied a promotion to someone for this very same concept. They were recently in a situation where they were in the right. Yes, they were in the right. I can't give specifics, obviously, but instead of making decisions that promote connection with others and having a conversation with the individual they felt were wronging them, they chose to play the victim card and build walls with that individual. Sure, they were capable, but they did not have the character to fit the promotion position.

What I'm saying is this. Just like this man, ALL of us will be in situations throughout our lifetimes where we are wronged. Everyone single one of us, including myself, will enter a situation where we're being the ones unjustly treated. And when that happens, we need to make a choice. Will we act with dignity and honor and be the better person, or will we play the victim card and make the situation even worse? This man chose to make the situation a lot worse than it had to be.

The flight United offered was a flight 22 hours later. Tell that to your clients after you miss an important meeting that it's okay because you said nothing and kept your honor. So the man was right but it's his fault for being a victim. What happened to him is hopefully going to bring change at United and maybe other airlines on how they treat their customers going forward.

United was the party that had multiple opportunities to deescalate the situation and find a solution that didn't involve the use of force. This is all on United as the CEO acknowledged it.

 

[Perknose]

While United's CEO most certainly screwed the pooch with his incredibly tone-deaf pronouncements after the fact, as this article clearly shows, a lot of the blame for the violent removal of the Doctor lies, not with United, but with the rent-a-cops of the Chicago Aviation Dept.:

United pilots are infuriated by this event. This occurred on one of our contracted Express carriers, separately owned and operated by Republic Airline, and was ultimately caused by the grossly inappropriate response by the Chicago Department of Aviation.

It is important to review these baseline facts:

1. This violent incident should never have happened and was a result of gross excessive force by Chicago Department of Aviation personnel.

2. No United employees were involved in the physical altercation.

3. Social media ire should properly be directed at the Chicago Aviation Department.

4. This occurred on an Express flight operated by Republic Airline, as such, the flight crew and cabin crew of Flight 3411 are employees of Republic Airline, not United Airlines.

For reasons unknown to us, instead of trained Chicago Police Department officers being dispatched to the scene, Chicago Department of Aviation personnel responded. At this point, without direction and outside the control of United Airlines or the Republic crew, the Chicago Department of Aviation forcibly removed the passenger.

 

[Don Vito Corleone]

United will settle. They just want this to put this behind them, and settling for a couple million is the necessary first step. It will take tens of millions in advertising to repair the PR damage anyways, but they need the damage to stop first. Otherwise, they will have to sell seats at 5-10% discount on competitive routes to fill planes, which will destroy their profit margin.

Indeed. Dr. Dao seems a little wacky, but in my view he is legitimately a victim here, and he suffered real injuries. United simply cannot afford to allow this to turn into a prolonged litigation, because the news cycle on this awful story will continue for years. It's worth paying him big money to avoid the stock value hit that that would create.

To touch on a topic that has likely already been brought up in this thread (I have not read the whole thing), I really take issue with the media dragging up Dr. Dao's personal history in an effort to taint his credibility. Whatever his past may be, it's in the past, and he is currently permitted to practice medicine. In any event it has nothing to do with the way he was treated by the airline, which was really abominable. United deserves the shitstorm that has ensued from its own stupid policies and decision-making.

 

[theeedude]

He's whacky, it takes someone whacky to stand up to authority unjustly used, but because of him, United and other airlines are surely reviewing their overbooking policies and how they treat their customers.

 

[[DHT]Osiris]

I actually denied a promotion to someone for this very same concept. They were recently in a situation where they were in the right. Yes, they were in the right. I can't give specifics, obviously, but instead of making decisions that promote connection with others and having a conversation with the individual they felt were wronging them, they chose to play the victim card and build walls with that individual. Sure, they were capable, but they did not have the character to fit the promotion position.

But can't you acknowledge that someone being 'in the right' and forming walls between himself and I'm assuming either a client or a co-worker, is much different than someone 'building walls' between himself and an authoritative person/persons attempting to coerce him into doing something he doesn't want to do? This wasn't a co-worker he was refusing, he was in the right with, it was someone interrupting his day to day life in what he (and others) perceive to be an unjust way. He has no 'requirement' to get along with these people, and their job (as customer service representatives) depends on him being happy, not making sure others get his seat.

In fact, I'd argue these situations aren't anywhere close to being the same. This man was a) the victim of being targeted for unjust treatment in favor of the company and b) a victim of having his face smashed in by an armrest when he refused to comply with their request, and they called in authorities to remove him. That's far different than someone you're a supervisor of putting up a barrier between him and another because of a perceived slight in a professional work environment.

 

[shortylickens]

Once again, Cracked delivers

First, let me point out that according to official reports, the man wasn't beaten -- he "fell." The cellphone footage of the incident clearly shows him falling straight sideways, assisted by security, face-first into an armrest. Now, that may look like a "push" or "violent shove" to some of you out there, but strange falls like this happen all the time

http://www.cracked.com/blog/united-airlines-exactly-like-abusive-partner/

 

[werepossum]

United slogans:
We treat you like a king. Rodney King.

We have pre-boarding, assisted boarding, water boarding . . .

The first rule of fight club is United doesn't talk about fight club.

We treat you like we treat your luggage.

Feel free to unbuckle your seatbelt and be dragged about the cabin.

We have first class, business class, and no class.

United: We will re-accommodate the crap out of you.

United: Now mixing our legendary incompetence with the legendary people skills of the Chicago Police Department.

Come in a doctor, leave a patient!

Fight or flight, we decide.

We put the hospital in hospitality.

Now offering one free carry-off.

Would you like a complementary neck pillow or neck brace?

We have Red Eye flights and Black Eye flights.

All our procedures have been reviewed and approved by Mike Tyson.


Vignettes in CEO PR:
PepsiCo: This is bad, people. We have a video conference in ten, all CXO and PR people. Get our lawyers on board and let's see where we stand. Reach out to the victim, see if he or his family needs anything. Let him know all bills will be coming to us and that I will be coming by in an hour to personally offer my apologies.

United: Shit. Hold my beer.

More seriously, this guy may have been loopy because he's 69 years old and was pulled into a set armrest so hard that it broke his nose and knocked out two teeth. Ouch!

 

[trenchfoot]

Looks like United view their passengers as a herd of ornery cattle that require the use of 'lectric prod, lasso and hulking buckaroos on 'roids to cut out some of the herd that needs a lesson or two on how the business of herding gets done right and proper.

 

[hal2kilo]

United will settle. They just want this to put this behind them, and settling for a couple million is the necessary first step. It will take tens of millions in advertising to repair the PR damage anyways, but they need the damage to stop first. Otherwise, they will have to sell seats at 5-10% discount on competitive routes to fill planes, which will destroy their profit margin.

Sounds like way too low of a figure. We will never know what the settlement amount will be, but it will be yuge.

 

[agent00f]

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.

This is a good illustration of how authoritarian systems work. The authorities can request anything and prols are expected to comply. Concurrent with that expectation is if anything bad happened to those who don't it's their fault.

What's even crazier about the incident is that they left the guy with two broken teeth, a broken nose, plus concussed in the terminal and he got back onto the plane/flight, repeating that he had to get back home. Supposedly they evacuated the plane after to clean up the blood before reboarding.

Finally, not quite true this incident "isn't even political". The only sites to drag the guy's past up as a way to divert and protect united are degenerate tabloids such as conservative media. Not that anyone is surprised at all.

 

[Sea Ray]

Sounds like way too low of a figure. We will never know what the settlement amount will be, but it will be yuge.

If there's a settlement to be paid, it should go not only to this guy but the 3 who cooperated and gave up their seats without having to be forcably removed. That sort of defiance should not be rewarded. If the security folks were overly rough then they're the ones who shoud be sued over his injuries.

 

[JSt0rm]

If there's a settlement to be paid, it should go not only to this guy but the 3 who cooperated and gave up their seats without having to be forcably removed. That sort of defiance should not be rewarded. If the security folks were overly rough then they're the ones who shoud be sued over his injuries.

tell it to the judge and jury.

 

[ch33zw1z]

If there's a settlement to be paid, it should go not only to this guy but the 3 who cooperated and gave up their seats without having to be forcably removed. That sort of defiance should not be rewarded. If the security folks were overly rough then they're the ones who shoud be sued over his injuries.

Bullshit.

There's no defiance in refusing to leave a seat you paid for.

 

[mikeymikec]

This is a good illustration of how authoritarian systems work. The authorities can request anything and prols are expected to comply. Concurrent with that expectation is if anything bad happened to those who don't it's their fault.

The funny thing is, "the customer is always right" is an expression that many companies adhered to (and many still do, but IMO less than before) for quite some time, and while there are some obvious flaws in that philosophy, there are a shitload more flaws in the idea that the customer is never right.

There's no defiance in refusing to leave a seat you paid for.

You pay for a service, you expect it to be delivered. If it hasn't been delivered, you demand it. It really is as simple as that.

Furthermore, if this guy hadn't acted like this, then United would still feel that their method of operation was correct.