United Airlines Provides Traveler with Horrible Customer Service Experience, No Eye Contact

Customer service is not about being a presence. It’s not about the customer always being right. It’s about being listening to customer and potential customer concerns and being respectful. I did not experience this on my most recent excursion with United Airlines.

Yes, United Airlines. Red, white, and blue. A company logo that symbolizes American pride. Flying the friendly skies…

… with a company that has no clue how to treat its customers.

I’ve flown United quite a bit in the last three years and accumulated a decent chunk of reward mileage—more than enough for an upgrade to Economy Plus to have six more inches of leg room. On September 16, 2009, I checked in for my flight to Tokyo and approached the United Airlines customer service desk next to the gate where I was set to board the flight. My plan was to redeem the points that I’d accumulated to receive an upgrade—something I’d been looking forward to for weeks after finding out that my mileage exceed the amount needed to move up.

A woman, probably in her 50s, greeted me, and I asked about using my points for an upgrade. Without looking up my United Mileage account to find out how many points I had, she looked at my boarding pass and said, “You can’t. You don’t have the right letter on your ticket.” Now, I never visibly get upset immediately, so I played it cool and said in a very calm, unaggressive tone, “But I have enough points for the upgrade.”

So she asked for my account number, took a quick glance and said, “No, you don’t have the right letter on your ticket. In order to get an upgrade, you have to have a ticket with a certain number on it.” Totally confused, I asked, “How do I know what letter I get when I order my ticket?” to which she responded, “If you bought this through an agent or Expedia, you need to ask them for tickets with [insert whichever letters she said here], which are more expensive.” I asked, “So I can’t get an upgrade just because I didn’t buy a more expensive ticket with a specific letter?” And then she says in a harsh voice, looking down at her computer:

“I know you’re not going to argue with me.”

Whoa. I was totally startled. This lady was being completely unreasonable and giving every reason as to why she couldn’t upgrade me, and then she throws this disrespect in my face. Without possibly getting kicked off the plane without even stepping onto it, all I could think of saying was, “So, in order for me to upgrade, I need to buy a more expensive ticket? That doesn’t make any sense.” “Her response? “To upgrade, you need to buy a more expensive ticket. If you want to upgrade, you’ll have to pay $115 for an Economy Plus seat or $650 for an upgrade to Business Class.” And then, she straight-up walked away…

Walked away!

All this happened with her making absolutely no eye contact with me. The closest she got to looking at me was looking at the person behind me in line; all other times, she was looking down at her computer or turning her face to the side. Written words alone could not explain how rude this woman was to me and how, from the beginning, she didn’t seem to care about anything I said. It was just a complete failure of showing any forms of life in United’s customer service.

So, I walked away. All I could do was tweet about my experience and call my mom. I was heated. Never in my life had I been treated with such disrespect. I only worked in retail/customer service for three years, and not once did I treat anybody like that. Not once. Not even the times when I knew a customer was wrong. Not even when customers yelled or swore at me. In this situation, there was no compassion in the so-called “customer service” that the United Airlines representative gave me.

After venting on Twitter and to my mom, I sat down, vowed to never fly United again, and listened to music to calm me down. Then, my name comes over the loud speaker to come to the customer service desk. A different lady has me come to the front of the line and says “We moved your seat. We have a family that wants to fly together. You still have a window seat, but it’s on the opposite side of the aisle.”

Yeah, I mean, it’s not like I chose that side for a reason. Don’t worry United. I enjoy opening my window and having the sun shine directly in my face. Eyesight is overrated anyway, right? I once again vowed to never fly United Airlines.

Re-enter headphones for a sleepless 10 hours sprinkled with various complementary drinks. I was determined to dispel my bad experience and arrive happily in the land of delicious raw horse meat and colorful Ferris wheels.

So, what’s this post about? Sure, maybe I was wrong and didn’t read the fine-print of the rewards mileage program—however misleading and contradictory it is to say “Free upgrade… if you buy a more expensive plane ticket”—but this is more about treating people with respect. I didn’t feel like a valued customer in the eyes of United at all.

Looking at what’s being spread around on the Internet, primarily fueled by social media, it looks like others are getting fed up with the lame, disrespectful customer service that United Airlines consistently provides. Good examples of these are Dave Carroll of “United Breaks Guitars” fame and the more recent track suit-wearing executive from Best Buy.