Questions and Answers

After 30 years flying with United, being a United 1K member, I’m tempted to UA.

I have a bad back and look for United single seat rows in Polaris. I have a flight ORD-FRA where I was assigned seat Row 1 – seat K, but the return there was no single seat rows. A few days later I found a flight from BRU-ORD with a single row seat. I called United to switch *just* the return flight. The UA agent said they needed to rebook the entire flight. I warned her that seat 1K was assigned by an agent specfically because I had a bad back, but she insisted that it wouldn’t be a problem.

Once she rebooked me, she was unable to get me seat 1K. Then the horror story began. She knew she screwed up and tried to fix it, but couldn’t. She transferred to me to a supervisor, who couldn’t fix it, then another, and then another. At one point I got switched from the 1K line to a regular UA agent, who scolded me for not calling the 1K line. Huh?

Got transferred back to the 1K line to a UA agent in ORD who insisted that being transferred between supervisors was not “policy” and that it couldn’t have happened. She also insisted that I did not have seat 1K, but that the “1K” designated that I was a 1K member. Huh? I told her that I had a screenshot that clearly stated ROW 1 SEAT K but she insisted that I never had that seat.

She also REFUSED to transfer me to anyone else because it was against policy. I told her I had been on the phone for 4 hours (no joke) and she said she would now disconnect the call because there was nothing for her to do because I never had that seat. If I had problems to contact Customer Care.

I contacted Customer Care and got an automated reply saying to contact the 1K line or post on Facebook/Twitter. I messaged UA via Facebook and got a reply to contact the Customer Care site or the 1K phone line because they couldn’t help me. Around and around…

The Facebook UA agent was not even reading the situation and kept sending back canned messages that had nothing to do with my problem. Eventually the Facebook UA agent offered me $200.00 travel voucher. Mind you I spend about 2-5K / MONTH on United.

Sheesh.

I would contact the corporate contacts listed at elliott.org and see if you can get any more satisfaction. Sounds tough.