It probly didn't leave earlier. I work for the airline that usually doesn't happen like that. What probly happened was. They canceled his flight due to weather. So they rebooked everybody to the earlier airplane. He should have called and checked with united. I know everybody will say united should have called him and that is true. But for you people who do not understand how an airline is run he is not the only passenger united has to deal with. So if you're flying it's a good idea to check with the airline about your flight.

Now for all of you people complaining about how bad the American carriers are you need to stop it. You people want the lowest fares and the best service. You cannot have it both ways. If the airlines offer cheap fares they have to cut service out. What you are paying for is transportation from point a to point b. that's what your paying for. Ok the airlines are like no other business out there. Weather, maintance, crew legality all can cause delays. All the airlines in the us and other countries all deal with these issues. And what happens in another city can affect your flight. Until the contental commuter crash there had not been a fatal accident in by the us carriers in three years. So regardless what you complainers say the airlines are doing their job of getting you from point a to point b safely. If you want the service pay for first class are quit complaining about the fares. If the airlines gave away free tickets you people would still complain. So there is no pleasing you people. As a airline employ I'm sick and tired of people complaining about the airlines. Everybody seems to think the airlines owe them something. Well the airlines are in business like every company to make money. There not a charity organization. I do not here people complaining about other businesses bad service like I do with the airlines. If you do not like the airlines take a bus and take 3 are 4 days to get where you're going. Are driving there yourself. But the airlines are doing their job.

And they *did* have some planes available to roll out - a plane we were trying (unsuccessfully) to get on had some mechanical issues and they replaced it fairly quickly to get the flight out the door. If they could do that, why couldn't they get approval for a whole flight to get the 100+ folks on standby to their destination?

That's not what happened. It was a schedule change. The flight now leaves *every day* at this new time.

United should have notified all affected passengers, yes. But at the same time, doesn't everybody check flight status the day prior when they have made reservations so far in advance?

United should have immediately contacted him of the change in flight status, especially considering that they were leaving 2 hours EARLY, or rebooked him on the next flight with an upgraded seat. There is absolutely no excuse for what he and his wife had to endure.

Not all the airlines assign seats at check-in. Part of my job is to arrange travel for my bosses. Seat assignment happens as soon as the tickets are booked. The only airline that doesn't is Southwest.

Lets take this to the next level. Not only did this exact same thing happen to my wife, I, and about 50 other passengers(on the 27th, flight 663)but the Service Director for United Airlines in Washington D.C. (Corwyn Jeffers)was screaming at the whole group of us and telling us that they had done nothing wrong and since we didnt check on our flight within 24hrs it was our own faults. However there were two people behind us that bought two tickets that morning. Anyway here is his picture and we tried to call and they said same thing as he did and they could do nothing to help us, not even a $25 off next flight (even though that is an insult anyway). There were several other things that were just unaccetable that I will mention later. I would like to know ... Is this just the way its going to be?

Is it his fault? Maybe.

Is it the airline's fault? Certainly.

Good to hear! Thanks!

Either you work for United, or you are smoking crack. This kind of behavior on the part of UA is totally unacceptable.
Thank goodness they and the other 'domestic' airlines get bailed out with MY tax money.

i've never heard of this happening before. they must've changed it way back, like a month after he booked it, and then forgot to notify him or for some odd reason expected him to check and make sure that the product he bought was still valid.
It really doesn't matter at this point; United should be comping the ticket and figuring out some plan to make him happy for defaulting on their contract with him.

Flight plans can be filed and modified up to flight time. Its no deterrent to leaving early. Given the literacy of the OP's complaint, I would be willing to bet he was able to read the scheduled departure time on his ticket;

As GreshamAgricola says "no airlines leave early." QED

@VidalOyster: Alaska/Horizon gives free beer and/or wine every flight, and snacks!

I've had horrible experiences with United and will no longer fly with them.

I really dont see the problem here? I ALWAYS check my reservations way before my flight is scheduled to leave. In case SOMETHING LIKE THIS HAPPENS.
Does fault lie on United?. Somewhat, they should inform their passengers of changes in flight no matter what.
Is the passenger at fault? Yes, he should of been checking up on his reservations.

Theres a thing called being proactive.

Thanks, Delta, for detouring my "direct" flight and canceling it on me twice! Not to mention leaving me stranded some 1500 miles from home.

I just hate all airlines. Except Southwest.

United Airlines - the only airline to have a complete complaint website dedicated to it

www.untied.com

read it and weep more///

He should have checked his flight beforehand especially since he booked it 3 months prior. I have a habit of checking my flights with United weekly. I purchased my x-mas tickets months in advance and both my outgoing and return flights both changed several times.

Dude...who doesn't check their flight status when traveling around the holidays..this happens ALL the time..

Sadly I agree with the previous commenter that our airline companies have gone the way of our car companies-- cared about money over quality for so long that foreigners & smaller businesses outstripped them many times over. Whatever happened to "do whatever it takes to make the customer happy?"

I'm saying that the OP could have, and probably should have, taken steps (or in this case, one step) that is commonly done and would have saved a ton of trouble.

I specifically said also that it doesn't excuse the airline for not contacting them.

So yeah...it's not that it's the OP's fault, but they could have avoided it by following common modern flight protocol.

Southern hospitality, my ass.

Sorry for your airline troubles. I have also had issues like this in the past. My flight was delayed two hours in Tampa, so I went back to the main terminal to get some dinner. Apparently, Delta changed its mind and the flight left on time. They paged me in the terminal, but I didn't hear them in restaurant. They had my cell phone number in the reservation, but didn't think to call it. So I had to fly out ridiculously early the next morning and missed an extra day of work.

This is the reason that the hubby, kids, and I drove 24 hours to Florida this year instead of flying. Yes, it is painful, but I refuse to be held hostage by airlines who know that travelers will keep coming back no matter how poorly they are treated.

Flight schedules change from time to time, it's a fact of life. Should the airline update you? Absolutely! Sometimes it doesn't happen though. I thought United did a decent job of handling this guy's problem given the sheer mass of people traveling and the weather delays all around the country.

I personally feel like it's naive and irresponsible to book more than a month in advance and not double-check the schedule a few days before you leave to make sure nothing has changed. It doesn't seem like anybody else on the flight had the same problem, probably because they were responsible travelers.

This is at the bottom of a cheaptickets itinerary:
" You may receive an e-mail from CheapTickets if a schedule change occurs prior to or during your trip. Such changes also will be noted in "My Trips". We recommend you check there periodically before your trip.

If there are changes to the flight(s), bring a printout with the updated itinerary and ticket number(s) to the airport. We will send you an e-mail 2-3 days before departure."

I fly more than 4-6 times per year and this makes perfect sense to me.

No, what we need to do is direct some of this rage at our politicians so we can drown out the noise of airline lobbyist money. Even Senators fly.

I'm gonna call "SHE-NAN-E-GANS" on this one. Let's look: a flight leaves 4-hours early, and you happen to be the ONLY person who's stranded at the airport getting placed on flights the next day.

Even if the airline was incompetent, does this imply every other passenger was smarter than you?

Also a bit confuses as to how your wife suddenly shows up with you the next day. Not really sure how she wasn't included in your flight plans the day before -- did you happen to leave out that you wanted her to fly with you now? I suspect (with no evidence, what-so-ever) that you tried to take the situation of the airline "messing up" and tack on a few freebies including free vouchers, an extra ticket for your wife and free parking. You paid for a flight, you got a flight. You're flying during the busiest time of the season, maybe the busiest day to be precise, and you have the gumption to complain?

Seriously... fly another airline if you're really that annoyed.

Yesterday, in Charlotte, I watched a US Airways customer service manager call in the Charlotte police no fewer than four times. The customers weren't being abusive or threatening; they were just refusing to accept what the customer service people had offered. The customer service manager, rather than moving people to the side brought in the police JUST TO KEEP THE LINE MOVING. Then, at 11 pm, they shut down the line with people still waiting in it.

Nearly all of the airlines have become this awful. (Southwest is much better than the others, but they would still be out of business if they had to compete in any other industry.)

One of the core problems is that we have so much competition and nobody can make a profit. We all must stand together and make sure that, as long as two or three airlines survive, we do not bail out anyone.

Far more havoc is created when a flight leaves early (missed connections plus mixups at origin of departure) than when it leaves late (missed connections). Flights should never leave earlier than their scheduled departure time unless all paying customers are onboard.

Every transport system around the world experiences dramas during peak holiday times. Some learn to leave early, some stubbornly bash their heads against to wall.

You could book 2 years in advance and that would change none of the fundamental facts.

Moral of the story above? Some people don't learn.

@ShylaEuterpe:US airlines are in roughly the shape that US car manufacturers were in the 80's, except that instead of choosing to evolve with foreign competition they locked them out of the market. I fly reasonably frequently, and I'm stunned how often flights are simply grossly mishandled in everything from flights delayed for 6 hours due to mysterious mechanical failures to having the gall to charge for terrible food and *running out of it almost immediately*.

British Airways has always been on time, had lots of legroom, and frequently given us free socks (to take off our shoes on the plane). All Nippon Airways offers warm hand towels before every meal. United and other domestic airlines tends to kick their users in the sensitive bits and wonder why they're all leaving. We really should throw the domestic market open to foreign competition and let the awful industry evolve into something sustaining or admit that mass plane travel is something that we as Americans are just not good at running.

My point is that, frequently, we DO have a choice. The choice may be a very long drive, and there may be bad weather. And obviously flying is safer than driving, per mile.

But we should think long and hard about that choice when we decide to travel, and even maybe think about whether or not we really need to go at all. Submitting ourselves to barking TSA goons, psychopathic flight attendants, and gate agents that make us homicidal, is not good for our psyches, our stomach linings, or for our democracy.

I'll rephrase my original premise: DON'T FLY (unless you have no choice, and even then maybe you should think about it pretty hard.)

The damn airline moved the OP's flight BACK FOUR HOURS. There is nothing to indicate when they did so. They did not notify the OP so he could have shown up in time. This is the result of bad weather and holiday traffic - you know, things airlines deal with every damn year.

Welcome to the wonderful world of flying. I use to fly once per week but have since given up work that requires so much travel. Now we only fly 4 to 6 times per year. I don't think I've had a flight yet that didn't have some sort of change in schedule. Some minor but some major enough to cause us to miss a flight or spend hours sitting in the airport. It's become habit for me to check our flights several times before we leave. I often find flight times changed or equipement changes. With some airlines, if they change the flight number they also change your seat assignments.

United has made a mess of our planned trip to Hawaii next month. Origianlly, we were to connect through Denver both ways and, our flight home was suppose to be a daytime flight rather than an overnight flight. The day after booking the flight is when the fun began.

First, they cancelled our morning return flight and arbitarily booked us on a flight leaving around 11:00 PM. I've managed to get that changed to a flight around 6:00 PM (as far as I know for now at least). Then the routed us through Chicago coming home and changed our seat assignments. Then they changed our connnection going out to Chicago rather than Denver AND changed out seat assignments on all our flights again (not just the affected flight but all the flights).

There's more but, that's another story and, sad to say, I've come to expect this from the airlines. All I can say for certian is that we have paid for tickets and expect to be flying at some point on the dates we've booked. Past that it's anyone's guess.

There's an old saying that hold trues as far as I'm concenred. If you've got time to spare, go by air.

So, here's the thing. There WAS NO 6pm departure on United from New Orleans to Denver on the 24th of December. It wasn't canceled. It didn't leave early. It simply didn't exist.

There was a 6pm-ish departure on the 26th, but not the 24th or 25th. (There was, however, a scheduled 2pm-ish departure on the 24th which was the last direct flight between those two cities.)

Now that's not to say there was NEVER a 6pm flight scheduled for the 24th, but if it was canceled

Since I presume that Thomas booked his flight properly, I would guess that sometime in the three months between the time he says he made the reservation and the time he was scheduled to fly that United eliminated the flight.

This would correspond to the time frame in which airlines were aggressively paring back their schedules to save costs. It sounds like they also did the right thing by rebooking him on the closest departure (there were only two other direct flights on the 24th: 6am and 2pm).

Based on my own experience on United, I would imagine they probably tried to contact Thomas via whatever contact they had for him -- e-mail, phone, etc. -- but it sounds like he never got the message.

Booking a flight three months in advance and then just showing up at the airport without ever checking on your flight -- especially when flying to somewhere like Denver in the middle of winter -- is foolhardy.

Thomas seems to take no responsibility for any of this and expects compensation. Since the flight was obviously rebooked quite some time before the 24th and didn't just "leave four hours early" I would say that United owes him an accounting of the ways they tried to contact him and then nothing more.

Fellow travelers, use this as a cautionary tale. Don't just show up at the airport three months after booking a flight without checking on it. Online check-in, flight status sites -- there's no reason why this should have happened.

Notice that I said SOME baggage handlers...not all of them are thieves, so don't start bitching to me, ok?

[digg.com]

I have a boyfriend, and we travel. There have been times that circumstances have not allowed us to sit together; we survived.

I have had itineraries changed many times, but they have always notified me via automated phone call if it was short notice, and e-mail if it was longer notice.

Also, a change of this type means that you can then cancel your reservation if you'd like. I had a $180 ticket to DC that they moved up an hour. When I was notified about the change, I priced the same flight at $120, so I was able to cancel and rebook to save $60.

Now, if these executives were forced to fly commercial and had to deal with all of this it would take care of a number of problems - we know how vocal and demanding these executives can be, so airline customer service would have to shape up unless they're willing to suffer the consequences of heavy upper management involvement. Hopefully that improvement will trickle down to us normal folk. Also, these companies can cut down on wasteful expenditures and not waste our valuable tax dollars.

We might even be so lucky as to have one "lose it" every once in a while, and get their sorry ass thrown in jail for obstructing airline operations or something like that. With the frustrations of modern air travel, it's almost inevitable. The idea is akin to going after organized crime for tax evasion - we want to punish these executives for their excesses that caused the financial meltdown, but since that's going to be harder to prove, we try to get 'em on something easier, say, assault and battery, with a little help from the pressure cooker that is commercial aviation.

Virgin America and Southwest will blow away the competition in the future.

If he checked the flight day before and day of, that's no guarantee that he just so happened to catch United after (rather than before) they changed/canceled his flight.

But I suppose the usual Consumerist crowd would then be yelling at the OP for not checking his flight status every fifteen minutes, like they do.

@StevenB337:

So it's the customer's fault he missed his plane?

Ultimately, it would be the booking office's job to notify Thomas. Clearly most of the people flying would have been notified or there would have been an empty plane. This would have been done _at_latest_ 2 weeks before the flight.

It's fine to take out your frustrations on UA, but the primary blame should be assigned to the booking office. (Which might also be UA, but it's not mentioned.)

No one posts reviews saying "I drove 23 miles in my Ford today, and it didn't randomly blow up!!!" That is a given. The fact that they get it right some of the time is no help. A great business gets it right ALL the time. Things like OP's story are what we, the consumer, need to sort out the average companies from the great companies. If something like this happens once or twice, it cancels out pretty much any good experience that you had with United because if someone, somewhere, is going to get this kind of treatment, even only once in a while, I don't to do business with them. They don't get a pat on the back for doing what we pay them to do. That's just fulfilling a contract between them and a consumer.

The cool part of it was that I sent a "positive EECB" to about 7 execs and got responses within two hours, including from CEO Glenn Tilton. Calling myself a Consumerist reader probably helped. Whatever you may think of the airlines, they have their bright spots, their caring employees, and their good moments. It's probably worth it to recognize and reinforce that behavior, so that we readers can see more of it.

You know what, there really wasn't a heck of a lot they could do when the flight left early, and there are lots of reasons they do, and you wanted them to do something they're just not set up to do. No big surprise there and asking them to pay your parking is just silly and unreasonable.

Then you didn't recognize an overbooked flight when you should have and instead of demanding you be seated together allowed them to out you where ever and get out of there and deal with it in flight where people are often more than happy to move. You lost all sympathy with me there defeating your "I just want to go see my parents" line when if you can't sit together you'd rather wait 7 hours!

You got a free dinner and two free tickets for next Christmas so get over it and learn that that moving millions of people a day from point A to point B stuff happens, so deal with it!

The only domestic airline that is halfway decent anymore is Southwest Airlines.

Something about this doesn't sound right. I fly regularly (4-6 times per year), and I have never--NEVER--heard of an airline scheduling a flight for one time, and allowing it to leave early.

Think about it, a bit. It doesn't make sense. If the author missed his flight, there would be almost an entire plane full of people standing at the United check-in counter, screaming their heads off.

My guess is that the author simply missed his flight, but wants everyone to believe that it was the fault of the airline If that is the case, then perhaps he is simply getting what he deserves.

My sister had Delta cancel her flight and then rebook her on another flight, without her ability to decide times or airports (she lives in NY). I guess airlines are now offering us a privilege, not a service.

However, I must agree with others' comments on this story...

How the hell do you not check your flight the day before and day of?

Gas prices need to go up a LOT. We should have gas taxes that set a floor of $5/gallon. Nothing else is going to generate the conservation we need. After all, SUV sales went right back up when gas prices came down.

1400 miles in 20 hours? Yeah, well, I suppose so, if you have no bathroom breaks. Also, in case you hadn't noticed, there have been some brutal winter storms the last few days, so the OP would have had a very high chance of sitting in a motel in Nebraska. Thanks, I'll fly. Safer, faster, and much more comfortable.

Weather's been awful across much of the country, particularly in the Northeast and Chicago, which has really screwed things up.

United's website has a free email service, which will let you know if there's a change in flight status - definitely sign up for it.

By the time we got to the airport, they had pushed the flight back again but ultimately ended up canceling the flight, gave everyone a slip of paper with the 800 # and pretty much said "Good Luck!"

The 800# refused to admit that the flight was canceled because it wasn't in their system as canceled so they couldn't rebook us (Eventually they did but we lost TWO days of our FIVE day vacation because of constant flight cancellations)

On the way back, I called American to check the status of our flight - to which everything was okay. By the time we got to the airport we found out American had decided to change our flight to an earlier one (which they never called me about especially since I called to confirm the original flight a couple of hours before) - leaving within 20 minutes of us arriving at the airport.

What did American expect me to do? Call their customer service in India every 20 minutes just to make sure my flight is on time or not canceled at all?!

I vowed never to fly American again, but it doesn't look like I have that many alternatives.

United, American, and Northwest will all have been an absolute mess as their hubs are located in towns that were majorly storm-screwed.

Since then I've sworn no holiday travel. I'm not doing that shit anymore. The airports suck. The airlines aren't any better. People are moody. Weather is unpredictable.

F*CK THE HOLIDAY TRAVEL.

I'll go in the summer or something.

Why is it not OK? Airlines change schedules all the time, this guy booked 3 months in advance, and probably didnt check until he tried to check in at the air port. His fault, not united's

"Most Airlines Suck". So true...however, they pretty much suck in North America - and mainly the US. I can't believe how backwards airports and airlines are in the US. WTF has happened? Why have we fallen behind so far? I thought we'd be in flying cars by now? We only have a few more years left until the hover skate board (Back to the Future 2015?)...and we still don't have our **** together with airlines.... :(

I travel quite a bit within the US, Canada and Europe. Honestly, the US feels like a third world country in this department - and it's not like we have many other options of travel...it's a frigging HUGE country/continent and flying is the most logical option - too bad the people running it are old and decrepit just like the airports, airplanes and airlines.

Time for a change...

- A flight may leave 20-30 minutes early if all the scheduled passengers and bags have arrived for the flight.
- A flight may leave very early due to weather conditions at the origin, destination, or along the route. An airline may consider the best option of at least getting some of the passengers to their destination, instead of cancelling the flight, and having to rebook an entire planeload of people.
- A flight may leave early if a crew is due to "timeout". Much like truckers, pilots and flight attendants are only allowed to be on the clock for so many hours in a day. This is to prevent fatigue and ensure safety. Mostly these flights leave after their original scheduled time, but before their estimated delayed departure time, unless there was a last minute crew change and they need to move quickly (but not four hours quickly).

We don't just say "I am making this flight leave now." Major changes to flight plans require FAA approval and a flight plan to be created, including 2 alternate landing locations, etc.

The statistics don't "cancel each other out". We are measured by how many flights leave at their scheduled time, how many, if they came in late, left by their minimum turn time (there are standard times for how long it should take to fuel, load passengers and cargo, and push out). So you don't know what you're talking about.

It sounds like the OP's problem was weather related, as half of the country was experiencing adverse weather and travel conditions on that day. I mean, if it was snowing just recently down in New Orleans, you were flying to Denver, half of the West coast was shutdown to to horrible weather conditions, it seems irresponsible to not check up on your flight, and just assume that God and the airlines will make sure that your Christmas eve flight goes as smoothly as you wanted it to.

I'm not kidding. If there was only one person going, the cost could be offset by sharing the ride with others. Consult your local ride-sharing board.

Yes, I know it's not for everybody. But the alternative is to be treated far worse than cattle (cattle get food and water on their way to the abbatoir).

Yes, 20 hours is a long time. But factor in the travel to the airport, the time getting your rectal probes, and the need to generally schedule your life around the convenience of the airline.

Yes, I value my time. But as Merlin Mann once said, I value my JOY. Life is too short to be treated like this.

Think about it.

@EtoilePB: If you can do online check-in 24 hours before your flight leaves, it takes care of checking the flight time AND doing it at the airport.

And don't blame the airlines for not informing anyone that a flight has been cancelled. They're VERY BUSY and they're thinking of a whole lot of things all at once!

Pay a little more money for the Continental ticket (if available; I haven't had any hassles with them so far).

He'd bought the tickets three months in advance - I can't be sure but I'll wager United rethought their flight schedule between purchase and flight date.

Still, shame on United for not trying to get in touch - they likely had one or two phone numbers plus an email. And how they treated him when he needed to reschedule was just unforgivable.

Secondly, UA most certainly does have assigned seating, and it is not acceptable to split a party up that is traveling together or to bump you without compensation. A travel voucher is NOT compensation. Travel vouchers are goodwill gestures from the airline, but should never be substituted for actual CASH compensation, as required by the rules of their contract of carriage.

Third, unless you're a very frequent flyer with UA, your calls will get sent to contracted call centers in India that are staffed by people who CANNOT help you. The only way to get results is to write letters to UA's HQ in Chicago, and quote their contract back to them and document, document, document your case.

Fourth, definitely call your card issuer and get a FULL refund, even if you flew. When you bought your ticket you agreed to pay for a specific flight on a particular date and time. You did not agree to get screwed around and have your time wasted by incompetent fools. Don't pay for their crap. If enough people chargeback for crap services, UA will notice.

Last, don't even think of reporting them to the BBB or anything like that. You'll waste your time. UA is a company that is driven purely by spreadsheets and numbers, and unless you have 1,000 friends willing to all complain to the BBB at the same time, you'll be more productive doing other things with your life.

This is why we need to let companies that provide bad service or products fail. Someone will step in and do it better.

If they only value us for our dollars then there's no reason we should value them for anything but what they can do for us.

FUCK UNITED.

I think in Egypt when they were using Jewish slave labor to build the pyramids, one of the first things they did was to take away all forms of transport. A populace on foot is easier to control. Every year, it gets more and more difficult to travel in the US. Gas prices are usually skyrocketing, train fares have gone up because the govt pulled their subsidies to bailout the airlines after 9/11 and I could almost match this guy in pain levels on my last passport experience. To travel to see family this year we spent 16 hours to get from NYC to LA. I can only hope, now that we actually have real leadership, we can start to back away from the culture of fear that has been nurtured these last 8 years.

A flight that leaves hours early is still two hours WRONG, same as a flight leaving two hours late. Flight time changes should be locked out at least 48 hours before and advise to check final times should be BIG BOLD instructions on the front of the terms and conditions.

It is clear that the way this works is to try and fleece as many customers as possible while not breaking the technical rules.

Shocking and saddening...

There was also no food or snacks on our multi-hour flight, only 1 drink per customer. When I asked if they had pretzels or *anything* to eat because I was just stranded at the airport for hours after all of the restaurants closed and I was hungry… the stewardess complained pretty loudly that a lot of things have been cut because the airline is getting cheap. :-/

On the way home we got to the airport and the plane sat on the runway and got de-iced multiple times and they almost turned the plane back. We had to fly through LA and got stranded at LAX for hours. We finally got into SFO and got back home around 4AM instead of a 8PM.

Oh, and they charged us $15 per bag both ways and $125 because our bag was 53 pounds, but would have charged us $0 if it were 49 pounds. I'm used to paying an extra $15-20 if the bag is over 50 pounds, but $15 flat per bag + $125 for going 3 pounds over? Seriously?

We had major delays and screwups with all 4 flights on our trip, outrageous extra hidden fees, bad service… My last few flights were with Virgin America and they were cheaper and FAR better than United in pretty much every way. I don't think I'll be flying United again for a long time.

Even my really shady flights through Asia on budget chinese airlines were far better than United was for me this Christmas… and that's saying something…

Anyone that travels even once every few years (since 9/11 especially) knows that the airlines have the cumulative intelligence of a waffle.

Had Thomas done his part and had his own private twin engine turbo-prop on standby, with 2 pilots, this would never have happened.

Lastly, the STEWARDESS, yea that's right, I said it!! went back to check for more seats because on certain commercial aircraft, it's a well-known fact that sometimes the specific number of seats, regardless of what is 'supposed' to be there, or what was 'just counted', can actually change due to such unavoidable factors like an extremely high ambivalent temperature, very low relative humility, and spontaneous mechanical construction.

I once flied on a 737-300, wich of course holds 300 passingers normally, butt...due to an usually drie period when it wasn't raining, the plane spontaneously constructed 18 more seats.

We had 2 stop at Palm Beach, on the way too Cincinnatee (from Shicago), and grab sum more peepull.

Even Stewardesseses be knowing that. Thomas just ain't too brite!!

I missed my first connection immediately. I got in to Vegas 20 minutes AFTER my flight had left. Fortunately I got put on standby after waiting in line for over an hour. The lady at the gate was very nice about the whole thing, once she realized that I was near tears because I didn't want to miss my WEDDING. She bumped me ahead of a bunch of people, and I made my way to North Carolina directly, and caught my original flight out of there. Disaster averted? Sort of.

My bags never made it. I made a claim, but I was burned out from traveling, so I made my way to my mother-in-laws place and got a good night of rest. I tried again the next day and got a bit of a run-around. They told me to give it some time. I got a call a couple of days later saying they'd found my bags and they'd be couriered out to me. I got one of them. I called again, complained, and they said to give it some more time. Ultimately I ended up back in Calgary and still making calls. I visited the United people in the airport, they told me that they had nothing there with my name on it, and it didn't "exist" in the system. That is when I started calling their office numbers. I was giving a claim number and told to keep up with them, call as I could.

First call back, I was told I was basically SOL, and that if they couldn't find it, they weren't going to be liable for it, they didn't cover electronics. I argued that I was told specifically that it was OK for me to take them and any issues arising from it would be handled on their end. I was told that I would basically have to get lucky and hope for an agent in a good mood to basically reimburse me for the total, otherwise the only thing I could claim was the roughly $100 dollars in clothes that was in the bag.

I kept up with them, they explained that after the Christmas season, they'd be gathering all of the lost luggage and storing it in a warehouse in North Carolina for claims purposes. If someone made a claim and it was there, they'd send it up, free of charge. I gave them my claim information and a detailed description of the bag, and they said they'd get back to me in a day or two. A week passed and I got to calling again. I was told to wait more. Eventually, I got annoyed. I waited for about a month, and when I called back, I was told that there was no such claim in their system, that my luggage never existed as far as they were concerned.

I was angry. I didn't quite know what to do, and basically just forgot about it instead. They didn't want to give up the stuff that was taken from me, even though they told me they'd cover it.

Yeah, nearly ruined my Christmas. I'll NEVER fly United again, and I've gone out of my way to recommend people not use the airline in the future either.

@johnarlington: I fly 20+ times a year in Mexico (a third-world country) using purely Mexican companies, and I've never ever had a single problem with any one of them (other than maybe a 1 or 2 hour delay, but even that has been a while since it last happened). I honestly don't know anyone who has experienced something quite as awful as the stuff that I routinely read on this site about American companies.

If you all think it is at all acceptable for a flight to leave early, then airlines should just schedule you to fly on a given day and you can call the day before to find out when your time slot is.

Contest this with your CC, you did not get what you agreed to pay for.

We are being intentionally conditioned to have lowered expectations.

Southwest didn't want to cancel that flight, but there was a massive blizzard over the northeast. (February vacation week, 2003.) They decided to have the plane take off early rather than not at all. We were the last flight out of PVD for over 24 hours and the less said about the first 90 minutes of that flight, the better. *shudder*

So, that doesn't explain United (what can?!) or the rest of the story, but it is a legitimate reason why a flight might take off early. The thing is, if a flight's *that* early the airline really owed the missing passengers at LEAST a phone call.

What with people not spending money, travel should be down, right? Shouldn't that decrease the likelihood of clusterfucks at airports?

Having said that, I know American requires at least a phone number when booking a flight.

But I do agree that United should have been more accommodating.

@ohenry: ForeTHOUGHT, that is. I can't expect either party to be clarvoyant :)

@wagnerism: Hey, how about reading my post before hurling insults at me.

I never said that weather delaying his flight made it leave four hours early. Obviousely, that's stupid.

I'm saying that because of the weather delays happening right now, he probably should have called the day before to check his flight. Even if he had called in with the intent of checking to see if his flight would be LATER, he would have found out at that time that his flight was EARLIER. It's called being a smart traveler.

Again, I'm not blaiming the OP, and it doesn't excuse the airline from not contacting the OP about the change in flight, but I think this whole situation could have been avoided with a little foresight.

Hilarious. Actually I usually insist on flying United when I travel for work. It's not because they are a great airline either - I find them rather mediocre. The big plus is United is consistent in their mediocrity and I NEVER get bad travel surprises from them. I like predictability in an airline and United (in my experience) has been quite predictable.

United:
Lines suck - check
Seats cramped - check
Flight attendants rude or apathetic - check

But the light green snack box isn't all that bad and I bring my own entertainment with me.

I go to school in Golden, CO so I have three airlines who will get me most places non-stop: Frontier, United and Southwest. Of the three, Southwest is most generous with fare pricing, Frontier seems to have the best experience and united...is United.

Despite the slight price differential, I've flown Frontier so far on all but two flights involving DEN. Aside from a gate change that got me going for about five minutes on my evening flight, I've had little to no problem flying with the airline. Though my "it fits the linear inches measurement, honest" carryon did get gate checked on my Thanksgiving (Tue departure, Sun return) trip on both legs, and a half-hour-late flight left me strapped for time when picking up bags for a connecting bus ride. In fact, my last two flights have been a half-hour late, but no complaining here...

Frontier recently changed their fare structure to more closely mirror Southwest's (of whom I've heard good things from friends who fly them), so that $20 per flight seems to get you two checked bags. Hopefully this will not only allow Frontier to turn a profit (ha ha Southwest is losing money neener neener fuel hedging), but will free up some cabin space again...when people are charged to check luggage, they'll carry on more stuff. We'll see...

Luckily, reviewing flight info online the night before helped resolve this, though it took a few hours and United kept asking to call them back because their "computer system was down".

Every time I called their customer service I basically started from the beginning. Since then I refuse to fly or deal with the airline industry at all if I can help it.

I know I will have to fly again, but until I have to I'll just take a couple of extra days off of work and hit the road with the family.

Sounds like he thought he booked for one time in his head, but had really booked at the time the flight had taken off. When he missed the flight he tried to cover himself and said he booked for the later time.

I'd like to see the original reservation or e-mail confirmation before I go blaming the airline for what sounds like Thomas' bad memory of when he was supposed to leave.

@67alecto:

I agree with this. I had just finished recording a short track speedskating meet. Luckily, the rink had access to wireless. I was to depart St. Louis at 630pm, then fly to Vegas, and back to Oakland, CA. I checked my flight status and BAM, flight to Vegas delayed for two hours. Connecting flight was delayed too and no way in hell I was going to make it. Checked other flights with Southwest to see if I can get on another flight and found out that the flight to Denver then to Oakland was on schedule. Got to the airport 2.5 hours ahead of time, got to the ticketing counter and talked to the rep. Rep confirmed my statements, then immediately changed my flight from Vegas to Denver, then on to Oakland. Needless to say I'm impressed with Southwest so far that I've flown with them and will continue to fly with them every chance I get.

I don't specifically see if this person did or did not check their flight status before leaving...but wouldn't that have been a good idea, especially with weather/overbooking possibilities this time of year?

United sucks for their representatives' response. No way around that.

However, the postscript on this is that the consumer should have checked on the flight status, if not 48 hours before, at least the day of.

Last summer, United changed all of my family's flights around - we got automated phone calls and emails stating this.

I heard people get interviewed at the Philadelphia airport this holiday talk about how they were so excited that nothing went wrong. I think that is quite the wrong attitude. If the airlines do everything right, no one should notice.

For the record, my experience with United has been good. On my recent trip, they changed my flights for FREE and SAVED me 15 hours of sitting in airports.

Anyone who honestly expects that United will get them where they're supposed to be on CHRISTMAS FREAKIN' EVE probably also believes in Santa.

I sure would.

But deep down, I cannot sympathize with people who insist on flying United...

I suppose we were fortunate because even though the airline couldn't accommodate us on another a flight for two days, we at least had family we could stay with for the extra two days. The only inconvenience is that originally the flight home was on a Friday, intended to give us the weekend to recuperate before working on Monday. Instead, we flew home on Sunday, and had to work on Monday. :p

But it taught me a lesson to always call the day before to double check on the flight times.

if that happened to me I would get nuts and my wife would get her "daggers from the eyes" stare on.

And to get left standing at the gate when you already have a seat? WTF?

"delaying" - I don't think you know what this word means.

He booked a flight and it left earlier. Generally speaking, this is the opposite of "delay".

When weather hits and delays flights, you show up on time and wait until they get it together. He was not given notice that his flight time changed.

He did the responsible thing. He arrived at the airport at the proper time based on the time given when he made the reservation.

Yes, I'm an idiot watching it move 10mins fwd and 30min back for months. I myself found it comforting.

Sucks for Thomas, though. United should try to mitigate the loss. On a sort-of positive note, at least they didn't say "you were a no-show, your money's ours. P*ss off." (That's part of your "contract" with Air Crapada up here. You don't at least call or show up, you forfeit the dough, Joe.)

It sounds like he had a frustrating experience, but United did what they could. Lets not forget he missed his own flight because he didn't bother to confirm the flights. I'm sorry he had a crap day, but he's to blame, not United.

That's like saying "I hear all the complaining about herpes, but until you've had cancer, you haven't experienced illness."

The fact of the matter is flying in the US does in fact suck compared to many other countries. The fact that there are places that are worse doesn't mean we should be happy with it.

That sucks, to be sure, but with all the crap happening with the weather delaying flights right now, why would you NOT check your flights at least the day before you leave? Not to blame the OP or anything, but that would have been the responsible thing to do.

the plane left at 9:27 without me.

United owes you one hell of an apology and some money, Thomas.

The only reason I check my flight times constantly is because I know I'm forgetful and I'm afraid I'm going to forget the flight time.