Tag Archives for united airlines.
At the start of Wednesday’s United Airlines earnings call, CEO Scott Kirby outlined four reasons he believes United is positioned to win relative to competitor airlines.
Viral video with nearly 4 million views shows a passenger on being kicked off of a Los Angeles-bound United flight “after screaming, threatening, and pushing flight crew and passengers.” Things began going south when the passenger wouldn’t get off of his phone, and only later did it descend into a mask dispute.
Maybe for the first time ever the passenger demands to be removed from the flight yelling at the crewmember that he “didn’t even want to go to Cali.” He took off his mask and declared plans to dox the flight attendant, and pushed a seated passenger to get into the aisle.
United elites striving for status will find this card valuable, though, and those who would pay for a club membership are better off doing so in most cases via this card’s annual fee in my view anyway. The rest of the add-on benefits are gravy.
When face mask policies were introduced for air travel last year, ‘but I’m drinking’ became a common excuse and passengers could nurse a Starbucks throughout the entire flight. This is no longer acceptable, or at least while some passengers will still do it – and some flight attendants allow it – the rule doesn’t permit it and you may get kicked off the plane.
When you fly an Asian or quality Middle Eastern airline, you expect that lavatories will stay relatively clean throughout the flight. I’ve seen ANA flight attendants cleaning restrooms between passengers, and Emirates has even had staff on its A380s dedicated to this cleaning.
After a long haul flight on a U.S. airline, though, it’s almost de rigueur to expect that by the end of the trip lavatories look like something out of a post-apocalyptic zombie film where we everyone must band together to rebuild humanity out of the ashes.
There’s little question that employers have the legal right to impose vaccine requirements, and this seems to be true even where working conditions are subject to collective bargaining. However what remains to be litigated is what sorts of accommodations are in fact required for religious or medical exemptions. The Biden administration’s proposed OSHA rule is expected to include regular testing as an alternative to vaccination.
United does not allow such an alternative. At 97% vaccination, United faces less operational risk than other airlines – who might see pilots take retirement if they object.
This United Airlines sports charter provides perhaps the most graphic visualization of why weight and balance matters on a mainline jet. after arriving with USC Trojans in advance of their game against the Washington State Cougars.
A flight attendant on board United Airlines flight 6060 from Charleston to Houston Intercontinental, an Embraer ERJ-175 operated by Mesa Airlines, was photographed appearing to take cash from a first class passenger. Another passenger on board reported on twitter that the cabin crew member “took cash bribes” from passengers up front not to enforce mask rules for the flight.
Another photo from inside the cabin shows at least passengers in the cabin not wearing masks, although the two closest to the person taking the photo are speaking to each other while at least holding a drink.
President Biden on Thursday announced sweeping national vaccine mandates, which are still to be written. Timing remains uncertain, but federal workers will have to be vaccinated. So will federal contractors. And most health care workers. And anyone employed by a company with over 100 workers (though weekly testing will be an alternative). Federal workers, of course get a 75 day grace period and only then will begin the ‘standard H.R. process’ such as it is.
This announcement puts a move made by United Airlines just the day before in a new light. United Airlines was specifically called out as an example by President Biden.
While United legal concluded they had to offer these vaccine exemptions, they’ve decided that anyone obtaining one cannot work in some cases “he pandemic meaningfully recedes” and in other cases (such as non-customer facing roles) when new health procedures are in place for weekly Covid testing and masking.
Gary Leff is one of the foremost experts in the field of miles, points, and frequent business travel -- a topic he has covered since 2002.
Co-founder of frequent flyer community InsideFlyer.com, emcee of the Freddie Awards, and named one of the "World's Top Travel Experts" by Conde' Nast Traveler (2010-Present) Gary has been a guest on most major news media, profiled in several top print publications, and published broadly on the topic of consumer loyalty. More About Gary »
