Monthly Archive for May, 2009

After Some Thought – Bombard United With "Hold Itinerary" Complaints

After doing some thinking during the day (I confess: I devote a lot of time to thinking about airlines and airplanes – whoops! lost another date opportunity, I’m sure), I encourage readers and United Airlines frequent flyers to write United, no, bombard United with complaints of the recent removal of the “Hold Itinerary” feature of their website (see the immediately preceeding post for more information).

Demographically, frequent flyers and aviation enthusiasts are the customers most likely to take advantage and actually use the hold itinerary feature, and therefore, I believe, should be the most vocal in protest of its removal. Frequent United flyers are the ones who pour the most money into the airline, and use its services the most, and therefore, should not have to fall prey to the absolute incovenience and hassle of United’s whims. Make sure you let United know of your thoughts and feelings. It may just work to effect some change – hey, angry United flyers complained in record numbers last year after UA famously and idiotically removed meal service in Economy class on Washington – Europe flights, and United, for once, realized their stupidity, and reversed the change.

It may just be Berkeley, where I spent my formative years, but let’s make some change. Let your voice be heard. Contact United if you have some sort of say as to how incovenient and irritating you find the most recent change.

How to Contact United:

-Call or e-mail or your respective Elite level phone numbers and e-mail addresses (premiervoice, premierexecutivevoice, 1Kvoice);

-Write a good ol’ fashioned letter:

Customer Relations
WHQPW
United Airlines
PO Box 66100
Chicago, Illinois 60666;

-Twitter the hell out of United’s twitter rep: @UnitedAirlines;

-Write a private message (PM) to United’s FlyerTalk rep, UnitedPR;

-Find additional UA confirmation (executive addresses and fax numbers here and here).

Any particular thoughts or considerations? Hit the comments or waapblog@gmail.com.


Published
by
G.Ro
on May 31, 2009
in United
. 2 Comments

United Removes "Held Itinerary" Feature From Website

Several FlyerTalkers reported that the “Hold Itinerary” button had recently disapeared from United Airlines’ website, United.com. United allowed customers to hold itineraries until midnight, eastern time, the next day, while preserving the itinerary’s fare and seat selections. At the begining of the thread, many FlyerTalkers hoped it was simply a glitch.

It wasn’t.

United has officially eliminated the ability to hold itineraries purchased through their website. While it’s not a decision that’s excessively dastardly (say on par with if United removed mileage bonuses for elites), but it’s a decision that results in an inordinate amount of hassle, annoyance, and collapses many of the features of purchasing fares through the website that only result in even more irritating recourses.

First, it was simply nice to be able to hold an itinerary for a bit, especially when booking mileage runs where one has to examine many itinerary options, and know that your fare remained protected while the fluxuations of airfare and the chaos of life swirled around it. For students, like me, I liked having the option of holding a few itineraries when the dates of when I would return home after exams were ambiguous. Now, I’d better know my travel plans in advance.

In terms of inconvenience, annoyance, and hassle, United now abolishes the ability to hold itineraries and ticket them with vouchers. For voluntary denied boarding, United issues a type of voucher that one cannot redeem online, and can online redeem at the airport. Now, one must head to the airport without a held itinerary online, and must experience the hassle of working with an agent to try to create an itinerary to specifications. Yes, I suppose one could attempt to hold an itinerary over the phone, but at times, phone agents are unable/do not have the wherewithal to reproduce the desired itinerary.

I’m simply puzzled – United has been trying to eliminate interactions between customer and human in many respects of the ticket purchase transaction by offering many ticket purchase features online – including refunds, bag check, and those stupid Travel Options by United. They’ve scaled personnel numbers in call centers, have tried to promote communication almost completely via e-mail. Now, United , in an another management-headscratcher, increases the need for the human interaction they have tried to curtail, and makes it more inconvenient for us all.

Of course, I understand I am writing about a relatively small demographic of United flyers, here. I’m sure many of United’s customers, simply traveling from Point A to Point B on the cheapest fare Orbitz offered, don’t really care, or didn’t even know about the hold itinary feature. Regardless, though, it’s a patently poor decision for some of the people who fly United the most, and pour money into the works with frequent travel. I cannot wait for the fun of calling United to hold a mileage run itinerary, with seven stops, crazy connection times, and specific fare classes. Poor form, United.

Published
by
G.Ro
on May 30, 2009
in United
. 6 Comments

Bizarre Post From Gary Leff of "View From the Wing"

Gary Leff of View From the Wing posted on May 25th how his upgrade on a recent Delta transcontinental flight failed to clear and he sat in economy class. From the title of his post, he calls for readers to, “Feel Sorry for [Him],” because flying in economy was, apparently, an emotionally and physically painful experience. Unless Leff is trying to be ironic or satirical, which I don’t think he is, his post rings somewhat oddly, especially for someone who normally analyzes issues in an entirely rational and principled fashion.

Mostly, the post seems somewhat hyperbolic for the normally grounded Leff. His blog usually presents sophisticated analysis and reviews, and this particular post seems a bit juvenile, self-pitying. I’d hazard a guess that Leff, of all people, would approach flying in economy with a much more logical rationale, that, well, flights end. They are finite periods of time. Leff’s histrionics make it seems as if he’s dragged to the town stocks and flogged for hours, and then tortured.

In my opinion, it’s not really that big of a deal. Yeah – cross country flights are long already, and with long taxi and wait times at some east coast airports can become excruciatingly longer, but I say, deal with it. It’s really not that long of a time period, and an event certainly not worth making an overly dramatic decree of, “I don’t think I can do this again for awhile.” Really? Something tells me you could, if you needed to, Gary. Yes, economy is uncomfortable and cramped, but, ultimately, a flight is a flight. While I, personally, do enjoy upgrading, I don’t complain if I have to sit in economy, and in fact, sometimes actively choose to sit in the back. I’ve spent plenty of time in middle seats in economy, transcons on US Airways, and in seat 53G on Lufthansa 747s. Up0n landing, really, it’s not that big of a deal. Yes, sometimes your neck kinks because of awkward positioning, but, in all honesty, Gary, I’ve had my neck kink much more painfully when flying in a domestic first class seat. I think of the people emigrating from Africa or Asia, with little command of English, readying to begin life in an unfamiliar place, who endure up to 24 hours in economy in a middle seat. I certainly don’t hear them complaining. And, for someone who descries TV as “boring,” a seemingly subtle intonation that Leff is intellectually above most television, bring a damn book to read. I guarantee you – War and Peace will take up all of your time on that flight.

So, sorry, Gary. I don’t feel sorry for you. Unless you have a blood clot in your femoral arteries that is threatening to head to your heart, your coach experience doesn’t sound that bad.

It all goes back to the old FlyerTalk maxim – you want to fly in first class, purchase first class outright.

Published
by
G.Ro
on May 28, 2009
in Other Blogs and Philosophy
. 4 Comments

Patrick Smith at His Finest

While I love when Salon.com’s Patrick Smith, who pens the weekly Ask the Pilot column, waxes poetically about the condition of the aviation industry and the media, I also love when he writes a good old-fashioned Ask the Pilot column that takes readers’ questions. Last Friday’s piece was especially good – answering questions such as why Europe-bound flights from the US arrive at awful morning hours, how crew choose routes to fly, and some illumination on crew rest quarters. I always learn quite a bit – I finally found out what “O&D traffic” is – something, I confess, I had been too embarassed to ask my fellow aviation bloggers, for feaer of their reproach and scorn.

Published
by
G.Ro
on May 27, 2009
in Articles/Features and Writers
. 2 Comments

United in the Days of Yore

Good ol’ Flyertalk has a great thread running on the United Mileage Plus Forum about the olden days of United. Sigh – the airline has really changed in the past ten years, based on some of the responses. I’ve only flown United competitively for two and a half years now, and feel as if I have witnessed a multitude of changes, amendments, and cuts in service, amenities, and routings. I cannot imagine how old-school UA flyers must have felt when some of the discussed perks disappeared. Ten years ago, in 1999, I was entering my freshman year of high school. At that point, I hadn’t flown United since, as my dad recalls, I flew to Portland as a two-year-old in a 727. I have never witnessed some of the perks mentioned, but – I did love visiting the Airline Business Centers on Sutter Street in San Francisco to pick up actual, printed flight schedules, and I did sit in a model Connoisseur Class seat once at the United ticket office in Corte Madera, about 20 minutes from San Francisco, where I went to elementary school.

I’m kind of glad I never saw United in its heyday. Think about how badly I’d be complaining now.

Published
by
G.Ro
on May 26, 2009
in United
. 1 Comment

Not a Bad of Flying – And, New York Looks Odd

Descending through the clouds into JFK this evening, something felt off and different in New York’s appearance. Something felt a bit odd about my return. More on that in a moment.

First, my flight from San Francisco (SFO) to JFK on United Airlines, in their “Premium” Service (p.s.) outfit they run between SFO, Los Angeles, and JFK.

Truthfully, I must say this flight was my first remarkable, in a good way, p.s. flight, having flown what seems like ten trillion of them since last November. Other people with whom I had spoken had largely reported excellent service and crews on p.s. flight, but I had never experienced a crew that I would deem excellent, stellar, or, well, even, good. I had experienced plenty of surly p.s. flight attendants, hoping to serve the meal in a brusque, ornery fashion, and then scamper of the the mole-hill of the galley and hope to not interact with any passengers for the remaining four and a half hours.

Today, wonderfully, was different. First, the crews went postively ga-ga over my “Glenn’s Gotta Go” shirt, bestowing such adulations such as, “you’re our favorite passenger!” “you get your own liquor cart today,” (!) and “I’m giving you a bottle of champagne!” (N.B.: This makes the second time that I had been “promised” a bottle of champagne by a UA flight attendant, and have never recieved it. 2/2. At this point, I kind of want to see if I can continue the streak). The purser even invited me to the flight deck to meet the first officer and the captain, who went by the name Virgil (I kept looking for Dante Alighieri in the jumseap, but couldn’t find him – sorry! English major joke). As another first, Channel 9 was on for the entire flight – something I had only seen once before on a p.s. flight, out of Los Angeles, never out of San Francisco. Durign the flight, the crew was one of those that when your drink neared the bottom (I caved and had one of their extremely manly raspberry mojitos near the end of the flight. My seatmate was much more intrepid – she had a Miller Lite with breakfast), another somehow appeared on your tray table. Major props. I had begun to lose hope for p.s.

I only took issue with one announcement of the first officer – who asked us, this Memorial Day, to remember all those fighting abroad for our freedom. Now, my Berkeley liberalism aside (oops!) I have absolutely no issue making an announcement to support and think about our troops, who while I sit on my ass, heading back to school and drink mojitos, are praying to live another day, but to add the “freedom” portion seems skewed and innacurate. I’m not quite sure, yet, of any country with whom we are currently ensnarled in some sort of armed combat that poses an immediate theat to our freedom as Americans. Yes, I understand that threat of covert terrorist operations that apparently exist in far-flung reaches of the world, but – in our most prominent squirmish abroad, we’re simply hanging out until we figure out what the hell to do after entering the country with an incomplete plans. If you make an announcement, just remind us to think about our brave servicemen and women – and let’s not bring our favorite “freedom” idea into the mix.

Anyway, as I approached NY, I realized why it looked so odd. I t wasn’t covered with snow or fog. I saw green. It was 74 degrees at the airport. I think we’ve finally emerged into summer.

Still, I didn’t miss it while I was away. With four classes, though, hopefully I will simply stay inside like a nerd and away from the heat I’m looking forward to returning to San Francisco in August. Let’s bring on the summer fog and summer scarves.

Published
by
G.Ro
on May 25, 2009
in General Travel and United
. 2 Comments

Off to SFO

Think good aviation-related thoughts that I can somehow volunteer myself off this flight!

Come on . . . show yourself, Memorial Day frenzy ;) .

Published
by
G.Ro
on May 25, 2009
in General Travel
. 0 Comments

Back to New York Tomorrow

My good ol’ dad will be giving me a lift to the airport tomorrow, before catching United flight 8 from San Francisco to JFK. The second semester of my postbac pre-med education begins Tuesday, with Chemistry 2, Physics 2, chem lab, and physics lab. Should be a fantastic summer. Hey, at least it’ll keep me indoors, away from the heat. I’ve never experienced the full brunt of an East Coast summer before. I’m used to San Francisco summers, with a few hot days, but most of the time I wear a jacket, sometimes, even a scarf, and at night, the fog swirls, the wind whips, and it’s 43 degrees on the thermometer. Brrrr.

I’ve never flown on Memorial Day, either. Even with a non-stop flight to NYC, I’m hoping for a little fun tomorrow – perhaps, say, oh, full flights, leading to a bump? Unfortunately, I doubt there will be a genuine bump opportunity – flights have been so damn empty lately. If any readers have Memorial Day flying experience, I’d love to hear ‘em, but perhaps, it will simply be another normal travel day.

Goodbye, San Francisco – my one true love. Hello, again, NYC.

Published
by
G.Ro
on May 24, 2009
in General Travel
. 3 Comments

Sydney Makes it Hard Again – Part 1 – The Mystery

First, the flight is epic, and I mean epic. I have never experienced a flight so long. My longest had been a flight been from San Francisco to Beijing, weighing in at about 12 hours with strong headwinds, but flying from Los Angeles to Sydney at 14 hours, placed me in unprecedented territories. I consider myself, even to a fault, an excellent sleeper on airplanes, and I figured that I could easily handle the flight. No problem, I thought. I’ll eat, watch some of a movie, drift off to sleep, and wake up somewhere around Botany Bay.

Nope.

I ate, watched a bit of a movie, and then fell asleep, all according to plan. I awoke at one point, the cabin still immersed in total darkness, and figured that we, oh, have three hours to go. I flipped on the in-flight map to check. Eight and a half hours to go. Holy freakin’ shit. I did manage to grab another five and a half hours, and then resolved myself to simply staying awake for the rest of the flight, forcing myself to watch some of the astonishingly shitty options offered on United’s new on-demand in flight entertainment system. I swear to god – I only began to watch Paul Blart: Mall Cop because I mistakingly thought that it was that recent Seth Rogan movie in which he plays, well, a mall cop, but instead it was some film about a bumbling fat man working as a security guard in a suburban New Jersey mall. The English major in me, as some sort of consolation for the damage inflicted by watching the film, decided that one could actually analyze the film as kind of a brilliant tragicomedy, even, dare I say, Shakespearean in some ways. The movie presents a comedic, but dark, view of the suburban mall community, deeply evoking feelings of sympathy for the insular and interminable life of mall workers, while simultaneously portraying the depressing plight of the clumsy, oafish cop as he attempts to find a girlfriend. Yeah, that sounds like utter bullshit and a load of crap, but remember – I was 11 hours into a 14 hour flight. Unfortunately, the movie became so cruddy that I couldn’t even finish it. What a pity. I thought I could’ve at least had the begining of a PhD thesis on literature and suburban mall life.

As we approached Sydney, the feelings of disbelief began to boil inside me. I simply could not fathom that I had actually flown so far, and was approaching the massive continent. Australia had always been a mystery to me – as in, I had hungered for a long time to experience the cities of such an isolated-seeming continent. I was finally landing in the place where, on a globe, from the North American perspective, people were upside-down.

We descended in sharp turbulence and thick fog. I leaned as far as I could to look through the windows of the upper deck of the 747, hoping to catch a glimpse of the greater Sydney area, so I could finally see the components and parts of the mysterious city. Unfortunately, it was hard to see much of anything except the massive engines on the left wing of the airplane, with occasional blasts of the green navigation light illuminating the fog. I readied myself for touchdown, deciding that Booker T. and MGs’ Green Onions from United’s on-demand music selections would be excellent arrival music, I cranked it up in my headphones, and leaned forward to try to catch a glimpse of the view. Now, as many dates as this will statement have me forfeit, I had flown the approach into the Sydney Kingsford Smith airport many times on Microsoft Flight Simulator, and new that we were currently approaching from the north, onto one of the 16s, which should’ve provided an excellent view of the city on the right side of the airplane. With the obscured view, however, I couldn’t really see anything. With a hard landing at 6.10am, two days later from when we took off, I knew I would see it soon enough.

To be continued.

Published
by
G.Ro
on May 23, 2009
in General Travel
. 1 Comment

Listen to me Broadcast UC Berkeley Baseball!

I will have my full report on Sydney later in the day – but, for now, because I am bleary-eyed after the mileage run, and about to head off to run errands, I’d like to make a quick invitational post. I’ll be announcing my dear alma mater’s baseball game today against USC (boooooooooooo – although, if the admissions director of your medical school is reading this, I hereby retract all statements and might swear allegiance to the Trojans – for a couple of minutes). It’ll be coming live from Evans Diamond in Berkeley, and you can listen on UC Berkeley’s own radio station, KALX 90.7FM, if you’re in the Bay Area. If you’re outside the Bay, there is still no excuse – listen to the live feed online at kalx.berkeley.edu.

So, why not take a listen to this dear blogger announcing a little spring college baseball? I’ll be back on the air with my broadcast partner, dear friend, and former roommate. Take a listen for a minute, or for the whole game.

California vs. USC
2.30pm, Pacific Time
KALX 90.7FM, or online at kalx.berkeley.edu

Published
by
G.Ro
on May 22, 2009
in General Blog Blather
. 1 Comment

In Sydney – It's Pouring Here!

And, of course, the second after I spend eight bucks on an umbrella, the storm that rivaled the downpour in Noah’s Ark, suddenly stops. Oh, well. Hopefully, with a clearing storm, I can now see more than the one wing of the opera house I was able to make out across the harbor.

I’ll have a fuller update of the flight and time in Sydney when I return to the airport. Now, I am off to meet the Frugal Travel Guy, his wife, and his son, for breakfast.

Published
by
G.Ro
on May 20, 2009
in General Travel
. 2 Comments