Poor customer service and horrible operations management by United
Airlines. It’s as inevitable as death and taxes.
The latest fiasco involved a return flight from Las Vegas to San
Francisco (April 26) with a late night connection to Redding. The flight was delayed and
then delayed again and again — the final delay being a late arriving crew. The
counter reps continuously assured us we would make our connection — the last
flight of the day to Redding.
Even on board they announced that we would make our connections —
that info having been texted and otherwise communicated to the folks at SFO.
Naturally, we landed at the furthest gate from the main unit area
at SFO. We ran across the airport, arriving at 10:30 p.m., the original
departure time.
Guess what? The flight had not been held. Door closed with the
plane sitting there.
Why was it still there you ask? It was waiting for our luggage.
Our luggage (with my prescription medicine) made it to Redding, but we didn’t.
What happened to the luggage having to be on the same plane you
were on?
The biggest question is why the flight to Redding couldn’t have
waited. They knew we had landed. The flight goes to Redding and the plane sits
overnight. There was no reason it couldn’t have waited 15 minutes.
The same flight was nearly two hours late a couple of weeks ago.
Our reward for trying the unfriendly skies was having to wait 14 hours until Monday afternoon to get home.
With jet service restored to Redding, we tried to fly out locally.
Big mistake. We’ll head to Sacramento in the future.
