A United Airlines passenger’s complaint is getting a lot of attention after she and her fiancé booked business class seats from London Heathrow to Chicago, only to find that the airline bumped the fiancé to coach in favor of an employee.
At first she says he was bumped for a flight attendant, but corrects herself. She’s obviously distraught and she has reason to be. United sells a premium product to people who do not want to fly coach, and then failed to deliver that product – he’s stuck doing exactly what he was paying more to avoid.
Another disgraceful action by United Airlines!
Once again, I will never fly them! They bought first class tickets why couldn’t the United Airlines employee sit in coach? pic.twitter.com/EhuPA8GqHm
— Kathleen Winchell ❤️ (@KathleenWinche3) June 13, 2025
As soon as I saw what this video was about I knew what was going on. This isn’t a case of a pilot being upgraded. It’s an international long haul flight. And I checked the schedule to confirm, but I knew the route had to be operated by a Boeing 767-300.
On widebody aircraft like Boeing 777s and 787s, there will be dedicated crew rest bunks above the passenger cabin. Here’s what they look like on a 787:
However the United Boeing 767 doesn’t have dedicated crew rest. Instead, seat 1A (the business class bulkhead window on the port side is blocked for pilot rest, and is required on flights blocked at 8 hours or more. There is a curtain fitted around the seat.
- The customer has a contractual requirement for a business class seat
- But pilots have a regulatory requirement for rest
- And the flight cannot operate without this
It’s almost certainly the case here that seat 1A – the pilot rest seat on this aircraft – was broken. It may not have reclined, and didn’t meet requirements for crew rest. So United had to downgrade someone in the cabin. Maybe they were upgraded with miles or a buy up, but almost certainly did not have MileagePlus status, and so he was first on the list for a downgrade when the airline had fewer seats available for passengers than they had paying passengers confirmed in the cabin.
FAA Part 117 lays out the requirements for pilot rest. And United’s pilot contract goes beyond those requirements. For instance, FAA rules don’t speak to whether the pilot rest seat in the cabin must be lie flat versus angled; the size of the seat; what linens must be provided if any; or shielding from passenger noise beyond the required curtain.
Under the United Airlines pilot union contract, every augmenting pilot flight on a Boeing 767 gets a business class seat with its own floor-length sound-deadening curtain. The FAA allows a recliner, the contract requires a lie flat seat. The contract mandates a full-size duvet, two large pillows and sheets, which also exceed FAA minimums. And only one flight may operate with a deferred (MEL’d) crew-rest seat. Afterward the airplane must be fixed or the plane cannot operate an augmented schedule.
Flight attendants, by the way, receive crew rest seats on the bulk of the 767s in seats 43 A and B and 44 A and B, the last two rows of Economy Plus. These seats have 43″ pitch, leg rests and extra recline and there is a curtain for these seats.
In the case of meeting crew rest requirements, employees do trump paying passengers. The airline cannot fly without meeting contractual and regulatory standards. So it’s less a matter of employees over passengers, and more sacrificing one passenger for the rest of the passengers on the aircraft.
Still, it’s the result of a maintenance issue and that’s on the airline – and the airline should bend over backwards with generosity to make good with the passenger being sacrificed. Their inconvenience saves the airline from cancelling the flight and they should get far more than just a refund of the difference in price between what they purchased (business class) and what they received (coach).
Just because they can simply bump someone doesn’t mean they **should**.
Ideally, they would have explained the situation to the FC cabin and started to auction off a downgrade. If they offered enough, someone would have taken it AND been happy about it.
Instead, they get angry passengers and bad press.
United simply doesn’t care about passengers.
Note to self: avoid booking seat 1A on United longhaul 767 flights.
I wonder why the couple didn’t request a re-booking on an alternate flight? Surely the plane would not have left the gate at that time.
@Thing 1
You are absolutely correct. Everyone has a price. Pay it and they will come.
As always… Look for…. the Union Label….
Many of these seats have a manual function, often under the cushion, in order to raise or lower without power. While not United, on AA’s a321T, First, I’ve had multiple experiences where the seat was broken, and the FAs ripped off the cushion to manually move it to lie-flat and back. Just saying, there are more creative solutions than just forced downgrading passengers. Who knows what really happened here. If you wanted yet another reason to turn United into a punching-bag, here it is.
@kimmiea — This is why we come to VFTW, to learn things, and to banter.
just to be clear, United does not have a crew rest cabin off of the passenger deck on their 767s but other carriers, including DL, do.
DL’s is reportedly at the back of the aircraft which the pilots say is too far from the cockpit so they choose to use a business class seat.
At one time, DL had a pilot crew rest cabin at the front of the business class cabin on a few 767s that it used for 12 hour+ flights but DL no longer uses the 767 on flights of that length.
On a transatlantic flight, the rest breaks should be about 2.5 hours max so it might not make sense for there to be elaborate crew rest facilities but it is incorrect to say that 767s do not have crew rest cabins off of the passenger deck.
thing 1 is correct in this case. There should have been a downgrade offer to as many in business class as necessary.
So tired of stupid comments made in ignorance. There are 2 regulatory choices here. Accommodate the pilot who is on a test great or CANCEL THE FLIGHT. So either one passenger is inconvenienced or ALL OF THE PASSENGERS ARE INCONVENIENCED. Anyone starting to get a clue here? Those are the only 2 choices under the FAAs requirement that pilots have adequate rest before landing a jumbo jet and the FAA thinks your safety is more important than you convenience. Cannot believe I have to stare the painfully obvious!
Year stupid spell check….that was “REST BREAK” and not “test great”
Oh and the union has nothing to do with this….its a MANDATE by the FAA for your safety! Not even sure why I try to use logic and rationale with self centered people. It’s my curse, I suppose.
David W,
relax.
clearly the specific seat is not the issue because the designated pilot rest seat was moved.
all people are suggesting is that there are ways this could have been handled differently than targeting a single passenger.
The 767s are old and lack a lot of amenities. Common sense or lack thereof doesn’t change w/ fleet type.
Flying today can be unbearable.
So many excuses for bad service, a little turbulence, skip bringing out beverage carts!
Finish the service go sit on the jump seat for duration of flight, I can go on but won’t get myself worked up.
My life as a Eastern F/A for 23 years starting in 1966 was hard work but we manage to manage to treat passengers as our guests…
There were better ways to handle this than kicking someone out of their seat. That should be the last resort. Thing 1’s idea would have been a great way to handle it and would have resulted in good publicity for UA. I’d like to hear more about this one. There’s got to be more this story.
why didn’t they just offer a compensation for the downgrade? There should be loss for this. You should get the product you paid for and if at the last moment you don’t then you should get multiples of what you paid for.
I do suspect you are a little more prone to be bumped for a pilot or an air marshal if you are in the first row.
It seems to me that this is an American couple returning to Chicago from London. I’d have tried to negotiate a switch to business class on a flight the next day and a hotel for the night, then spend another day in London.
culture starts from the top. And you have a fakeit loving big pointy nosed CEO who prefers clown costumes (drag). what do you expect.
maybe don’t oversell every (premium) seat and leave a little slack.
united is my last choice [nice polaris lounges though – only visited once via star] always.
Is there any reason why United doesn’t solicit volunteers instead of targeting someone?
@whocares
Seems like the rest of the paying passengers will have a better experience if you don’t fly United.
Add another +1 from me to @Thing 1
I don’t know but I think personally the airlines shot themselves in the foot, over contractual presidence of granting pilots in F/C, I know on 767’s the crew rest seats are next to the middle LAV just before coach, and they laid at a 170dg angle ( at least at AA ) and I don’t know if the airlines doing this only blocks 1 seat or not? If I was the agent and I knew that these people were going to be inconvenienced I would have asked if somebody in first class would have been able to happily give up seat for business or simply accommodated somebody from business to that first class seat so that the couple can be together. Now is that so hard? Hopefully that they didn’t kick her fiance to coach because that would really be a slap in the face. Just imagine how you would feel if you bought your tickets way in advance for a trip like this just to get booted from your seat and your fiance at the same time, people/airlines need to have a little bit more compassion these days and think outside the box.
Another premium experience on the best airline in history.
What does the passenger being a “groom” have to do with anything? Passenger got downgraded. Does the “groom” expect special privileges?
BTW, a person is only a groom when a wedding is imminent, not flying internationally unless the wedding was/is on the plane.
We don’t use the nautical terms “port” and “starboard” in aviation. It’s hilarious when people like you use these terms in reference to aircraft because it’s clear you have no real training or industry experience but you want to sound like you do. Just report your story and if you need technical advice, consult someone with actual experience and knows what they are talking about.
They are owed compensation from the equivalent if EU 261. How much is that?
I stopped using United years ago and did so because of crap like this. “Fly United?” How about fly divorced…from United that is….
I think a free roundtrip biz class ticket on a future trip is what would have saved the day here.
anybody considered, a staffer mad at UA (and plenty to be mad about), followed the Rule Book exactly as written? After all, you can’t be fired for that, can you?
Here’s a novel idea – FIX THE SEAT!! I can’t tell you how many darn times I’ve flown United and the seat or back was twisted, arm rest was messed up, entertainment center was out of order. What a crappy airline they are, along with just about all other American airlines.
Dedicated crew rest LHR-ORD?!? It’s only a 9-hour flight.
Why not downgrade someone who did an upgrade first … or someone who is on an award ticket. Why a paying passenger? Better to cancel an upgrade of an elite than to downgrade a non-elite paid passenger.
And usually when they calculate the ‘refund’ for being downgraded from a paid biz fare, they give you the highest economy fare. It’s not fair. His $4k round-trip biz ticket, we’ll call it $2k each way – they’ll say he’s only due a refund of $200 because the full-fare economy is $3.6k round-trip ($1.8k each way)
Reading that headline in my news aggregator of choice was like having a stroke. Someone needs to attend some phonics classes. Just because it’s not grammatically incorrect doesn’t mean it isn’t an absolute mess.
Since a cuddly teddy bear is waiting for the pilot in their crew rest first-class seat 1A, what does the pilot do with all their teddy bears?
@morno this is an FAA requirement. Period. Hard stop.
If the issue with the crew test seat was that it didn’t recline the why not offer that seat to the pax who got downgraded with the understanding there is no recline and compensation would be provided. I’d take a non-reclining up front before I’d take a downgrade.
Isn’t UK 261 operative here?
FAA requires crew rest facility for any flight over .8 hrs. It is not a contractual issue. FAA also specifies the type of rest facility required depending on flight time.
@Piotr
The only thing clear here is that you have no clue what YOU are talking about. “Port” and “starboard” have been used in aviation since at least WWI. While not as common as “left” and “right” in modern aviation, they do still pop up even in official NTSB and FAA reports. To claim otherwise so boorishly and incorrectly shows a poor understanding of aviation history.
They could have taken a different flight
FAA regulations ruled this one.
Simple fix for this would have been to let groom fly the plane.
Yes, I am joking.
This is yet another example of a corporate middle finger. Not sure who is worse, United airlines or American. I believe that they both hate their customers. This abuse will never change as long as we keep on normalizing it and consuming their lousy products.
@kimmiea you can’t book the seat 1A on United 767s for international flights, it always shows as unavailable.
@1990 they can and have used the manual pulls, but if is a broken seatbelt, broken trim that poses a hazard, or something that otherwise makes the seat unusable for being occupied – then a different rest seat has to be used.
United should have offered the downgraded passenger the option to take the broken recliner in 1A after explaining the reasoning for the Pilot taking his seat. Often times, if it is explained carefully, the passenger will agree. In this case, I wonder if any other options were given…miles, flight credit etc – especially knowing that in this day and age people will post experiences to social media and it could (and did) become a thing.
Given that the top 3 Majors in the United States have all capitulated to the Pilot Unions regarding 1st Class Seating, the only recourse for travelers is to NEVER fly a US Carrier when traveling internationally. That works every time, and the service, food, hard product, and overall experience is much better.
This story is from 2023:
https://liveandletsfly.com/united-airlines-business-class-downgrade/
Gary,
It isn’t the union contract, it is an FAA requirement.
You found the regulation but you also need to reference the FAA Advisory Circulars which expand on the requirements of the regulations and the acceptable methods for complying. Take a look at the following:
14 CFR 117 (The regulation you already referenced.
Advisory Circular (AC) 117-1 – Flightcrew Member Rest Facilities
Advisory Circular (AC) 121-31– Flight Crew Sleeping Quarters and Rest Facilities