
United Passenger “Removal”: A Reporting and Management Failure - heisenbit
http://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2017/04/united-passenger-removal-reporting-management-fail.html
======
zeteo
The subtext here is that customers don't have any actual rights when dealing
with a large corporation. The terms of service have become so lengthy and
obscure that it's virtually certain for a corporate lawyer to find some
justification somewhere for almost anything. The corporate employees and the
police both operate on this assumption. As a customer, your only recourse is
to meekly accept whatever treatment is coming your way.

~~~
Animats
_The subtext here is that customers don 't have any actual rights when dealing
with a large corporation._

The problem is that people now believe that. In fact, lawsuits against big
companies often are settled on very favorable terms for the customer. As the
article points out, United violated their own contract of carriage and FAA
regulations. This is going to cost them.

~~~
cmurf
Only because the passenger peacefully resisted, and did not comply with the
airline's request he depart the plane on his own volition. He didn't give into
threats, and risked and received an assault, in order to arrive at the point
where this is going to cost the airline.

~~~
devoply
He should totally bring a multi-million dollar lawsuit, it's a total cake walk
as it'd be hard to find a jury that wouldn't sympathize and he and his
grandkids would be millions of dollars richer. Not to mention all the dirt you
can drag United through during the lawsuit in the media. Love to see some
testimony from the dick CEO as well who tried even character assignation of
the poor doctor they needlessly assaulted.

~~~
ThrowawayR2
> _He should totally bring a multi-million dollar lawsuit, it 's a total cake
> walk as it'd be hard to find a jury that wouldn't sympathize and he and his
> grandkids would be millions of dollars richer. Not to mention all the dirt
> you can drag United through during the lawsuit in the media. Love to see
> some testimony from the dick CEO as well who tried even character
> assignation of the poor doctor they needlessly assaulted._

It'd be a cake walk alright ... for the airline.

Pilots have similar powers to the captain of a civilian naval vessel, and can
legally refuse to carry passengers or order them off the aircraft:
[https://www.quora.com/What-are-the-extra-ordinary-powers-
tha...](https://www.quora.com/What-are-the-extra-ordinary-powers-that-an-
airline-pilot-has-while-in-flight-and-how-are-they-different-from-those-of-a-
captain-of-a-ship)

Moreover, refusing to leave the premises when requested or to comply with the
police when they arrived, is unquestionably against the law.

Even a jury has to operates within the constraints of the law or be overturned
on appeal. Remember, the airline would be the defendant and has the right to
appeal.

Sure, being bumped is lousy behavior by the airline but the doctor doesn't
have a legal leg to stand on for his tantrum. If anything, the airline could
probably sue him for delaying the flight and win.

~~~
jack9
> requested or to comply with the police when they arrived, is unquestionably
> against the law.

Except that's not who dragged him off. Representatives of a customer safety
federal aviation department physically dragged him. I don't think everyone
fully understands the sequence or "players" involved (I had to look it up
too). - [http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/opinion/zorn/ct-united-
pa...](http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/opinion/zorn/ct-united-passenger-
chicago-police-statement-perspec-0412-20170411-column.html)

Otherwise, you're absolutely correct about voluntary vs compulsory.

A police officer would still be liable for not properly restraining and
ensuring the safety of the "victim".

~~~
ThrowawayR2
The article you linked says the individual was from the City of Chicago's
Department of Aviation. While you do bring up an important clarifying point,
I'd be surprised if the individual in question didn't have most or all of the
same authority/powers as a police officer within his jurisdiction.

Some additional information from the Wikipedia article on airport police that
seems to be relevant: " _The City of Chicago Department of Aviation Police
perform safety, security and law enforcement functions at O 'Hare
International Airport & Midway Airport. The department was formerly called the
Department of Aviation Special Police. The Chicago Police Department Airport
Unit also performs many of the law enforcement duties in and around Chicago
area airports._"
([https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Airport_police](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Airport_police))
However, that information may or may not be current.

------
jpollock
Even if it wasn't a passenger overbooking, it was overbooking in that they
failed to properly account for the likelihood of having to ship crews around
their network.

If their occupancy ratio was lower, then there wouldn't have been a problem,
they could have fit the crew in. If they reserved 4 seats for crew on every
flight, again there wouldn't have been a problem.

If they had even reserved 2 seats and run sufficient flights such that the
crew got to the target airport in time there wouldn't have been a problem.

If they had brought crew in from two different starting points - it would have
been fine.

It's still overbooking, just not oversold tickets.

The airline played the game, ran too lean and paid the price.

Much like an ISP having all their IP traffic going down one pipe, and not
having enough room to send out the customer invoices because everyone is
watching Netflix.

~~~
LeoNatan25
Even if that is the case, there are much better methods of dealing with a
situation like this than calling a police officer. It seems, like usual for
American police, officers are insensitive to anything but violence; no logic,
just apply force. The man is lucky they didn't taze him. The crew should have
known that. It's good that this policy is about to change, but it is too
little too late.

~~~
dionidium
_It seems, like usual for American police, officers are insensitive to
anything but violence; no logic, just apply force_

My understanding is that there was a lengthy conversation that took place
before the outrage-inducing video starts. They _did_ attempt to resolve the
situation peacefully. At some point there is an impasse. Police are making a
request and he's ignoring it. There are two ways that can go: 1) Police shrug
their shoulders, leave, and let the man have his way; 2) He's going to be
forcefully removed.

That is, as far as I can tell, the actual reality of the situation. And
anybody advocating for outcome #1 probably has some thinking to do about what
it actually means to have a police force at all.

~~~
andmarios
The article suggests that the airline was the one breaking the law and not the
passenger. So in this case the police helped the airline commit a crime. Is
this nowadays what means to have a police force?

~~~
dionidium
The central thesis of my argument is that the ins and outs of each side's
claims can be litigated later on. At that moment, the cops probably don't (and
likely in principle _can 't_) know exactly who is right and who is wrong and
in fact _this isn 't at all the role we expect the police to fill_.

~~~
ambulancechaser
I believe this is correct. If there is a civil argument, it can be heard in an
appropriate venue. But once the owner/operator of an FAA regulated aircraft
has asked you to leave you no longer have any recourse and the word of the
airplane crew carries quite a bit of weight.

I'm seeing the suggestion that United broke the law which doesn't quite seem
to be what this article is saying. The article is saying they breached their
own contract of carriage. This would allow for damages afterwards in civil
procedures but i can't imagine how it gives the man the right to ignore the
order of crew and airport police to get off the plane.

~~~
dionidium
I wouldn't even get too hung up on the "FAA regulated aircraft" portion of
this, just in a general sense. You and I may have a contract that says you can
use my property for a day, but then I might prevent you from doing so. This
could be _wildly_ inconvenient for you for various reasons. If I told you to
leave, I wouldn't expect the _cops_ to figure out who was right. I would
expect the cops to err on the side of the property owner and make the obvious
and expedient decision to evict you from my property.

The contract wouldn't even enter into it. If there's a grievance, then it
should be handled later. The police aren't there to litigate that issue.
They're there to resolve the immediate conflict.

Crucially, it doesn't matter that the contract is 100% in your favor. That's
not what the police are there to discern.

Everybody is trying to play amateur aviation attorney, but this is really
about understanding the role of police in resolving disputes like this one.

~~~
notacoward
> Everybody is trying to play amateur ... attorney

Including you.

You're right that it's not the responsibility of police to determine all
details of who's right and who's wrong, especially considering contracts that
can take days for a trained contract lawyer to understand. They do have a
responsibility to ensure that the person requesting removal is the owner of
the property, and the person being removed is not a co-owner, but that's about
as far as it goes.

However, that's not the only issue being discussed here. Just as we should get
too hung up on the "FAA regulated aircraft" portion, we shouldn't get hung up
on the "police role" portion either. The more important question is
United/Republic's role. Were they in a position to require this passenger's
removal, or was that breach of contract? What about the issues of crew
logistics and voluntary-deboarding incentives? If you want to broaden the
focus, let's broaden it all the way.

------
jazzyk
No, the real failure (and the source of this and many other issues in the
airline industry) is the lack of competition in the US domestic market.

Pure and simple.

The huge, 350-million US domestic market is served by 4-5 major airlines,
while the EU with 500 million people is served by tens of airlines. I recently
flew from Barcelona to Nice for 30 euros, round-trip (with seat assignment).

Where are the (potentially Mexican or Canadian-based) low cost airlines?
That's right, none to be seen.

Let's hope this bust-up brings some legislative measures to introduce more
competitive practices in the airline industry.

Otherwise we will soon be paying for the right to pee in-flight really soon.

~~~
strictnein
> "Where are the (potentially Mexican or Canadian-based) low cost airlines?
> That's right, none to be seen."

I'm in the upper midwest and we have two or three low cost airlines. Sun
Country is the biggest (and based in MN). Spirit Airlines also has a decent
presence. Sun Country flies to lots of places. First class ticket to Anchorage
cost me ~$700 last time I flew with them, less than an economy seat on Delta.

~~~
mark-r
I'm taking a flight this weekend with Sun Country, MN to DC round trip for
$180. Booked two weeks ago.

------
jph
This is a new kind of UI/UX dark pattern. The United app lets customers pay
for seats, and any reasonable person thinks that's the whole of it. But the
fine print says that's not true, and says you can be forcibly removed if the
flight is oversold.

[https://darkpatterns.org/](https://darkpatterns.org/)

"When you use the web, you don’t read every word on every page - you skim read
and make assumptions. If a company wants to trick you into doing something,
they can take advantage of this by making a page look like it is saying one
thing when it is in fact saying another."

~~~
Vivtek
No. The fine print does _not_ say that. The fine print says they can deny you
boarding, not remove you once already boarded. Your point about the dark
pattern is all too true, but United still behaved entirely illegally here.

~~~
scrumper
It's still denied boarding, and would be so until the doors were closed, so he
wasn't technically boarded at the time he was removed. (And they can remove
you for all sorts of reasons even after you've boarded.)

United behaved despicably, but not illegally.

~~~
CyberDildonics
So someone with their luggage checked, their carry on stowed, and already in
their seat is not boarded? Do you have a source that says this?

------
drfuchs
Why didn't they just keep doubling the offer for volunteers? Surely by $1600
or $3200 someone would bite. Then everyone is happy, it all gets finished
quickly, and there's no chance of this sort of PR disaster (even docile
removees can end up in the news if they then, say, miss the death of a
hospitalized family member due to the delay).

~~~
LeoNatan25
Because handbook says a certain amount is the maximum they can offer, and
likely the crew offering more would risk their job. Following this fiasco,
Munoz said they will expand the handbook. We'll see.

~~~
strictnein
Also, I think there's actually a government regulation which caps it at $1300
or so.

~~~
differentView
The cap is the maximum of what passengers are legally entitled to. The
airlines can offer more if they want.

~~~
menssen
I've been wondering: does this mean that a valid response to this situation
would be "I will leave the plane if given my legally entitled $1350"?

As in, among other reasons, is United in the wrong here because the maximum
they offered for volunteers was $800, not the regulated $1350?

~~~
differentView
The way I understand it is that they can offer any amount they want to get
volunteers. But if they want to involuntarily bump someone, they have to pay
at least four times the one-way fare that passenger paid, up to $1,350.

So bumping the person that paid the least for their ticket would mean they
have to pay them the least.

------
colmvp
> This seems to reflect the deep internalization in America of deference to
> authority in the post 9/11 world, as well as reporters who appear to be
> insufficiently inquisitive. And there also seems to be a widespread
> perception that because it’s United’s plane, it can do what it sees fit. In
> fact, airlines are regulated and United is also bound to honor its own
> agreements.

I'm extremely pro-journalism (donate to various organizations, listen to
podcasts hosted by journalists) but I'm completely baffled by how very few if
any journalists dived into the details on what happened here in the very
video, specifically the legalities and technicalities, compared to Redditors
(who happen to be laywers) and bloggers. Going forward, readers who happen to
be consumers and passengers could easily be adopting misinformation spread by
trusted media sources and have the wrong frame of reference to view what
happened.

------
cmurf
I definitely agree with the criticism that the media has focused on the video,
as "shockertainment" rather than educating their viewers. The awareness of the
law and skepticism in media is lacking, they pretty much disseminated
incorrect relevant details. Many would decry a 46 page contract of carriage,
but then also not aid the viewer in navigating that complex document.

At the very least, a journalist should ask the airline and the police: -has a
crime been committed? -has a civil contract been committed? -what breach of
law or contract has been committed and can you cite this exactly? -do you
often threaten passengers with removal? -how often are you asked to do non-
criminal passenger extractions on behalf of the airline? which airlines?

Either the passenger committed a crime to cause forced removal, and it seems
clear he didn't commit a crime (nor was in breach of the contract of
carriage); or the police committed the crime of assault, an unlawful use of
force. There's a crime here either way, and that outcome I think is
interesting.

But no less interesting is that United appears to have a track record of using
threats of violence to get passengers to do things that are not at all
required by law, regulations, or their own contract of carriage.
[http://www.latimes.com/business/lazarus/la-fi-lazarus-
united...](http://www.latimes.com/business/lazarus/la-fi-lazarus-united-low-
priority-passenger-20170412-story.html)

That passenger decided to acquiesce to the threats, and ended up having no
real meaningful recourse, i.e. even for this reasonably affluent person, it
wasn't worth it to sue.

Basically the contract is next to meaningless. This is might makes right. And
if you won't stand your ground, aren't willing to get wrongfully arrested, and
then sue at your own expense, the airline's threats will work and they'll get
what they want.

------
ryanmarsh
I've been saying for years that the only thing holding back massive disruption
in the airline industry is the FAA.

American and United are two of the most poorly run mega-corps in the US.
Customers hate them, but need to fly. Warren Buffet thinks they're notoriously
bad investments. Why?

~~~
yladiz
There are a lot of regulations for airlines like American, but considering,
for example, that there's nothing you can do at 35,000 feet in a giant metal
machine if there's a mechanical failure, I'm much happier that there are a lot
of regulations than not enough, in this case. There are a lot of things that
suck about air travel in the states, but the FAA isn't one of them.

As far as the companies being bad investments, it's most likely due to their
extremely low margins and ROI.

~~~
ryanmarsh
Safety and Regulation are two partially overlapping sets.

The FAA regulates an immense amount of things that are trivial and those
regulations are very hard to update. The FAA issues the vast majority of
regulations[0].

[0]:
[https://www.federalregister.gov/documents/search?conditions%...](https://www.federalregister.gov/documents/search?conditions%5Bagencies%5D%5B%5D=federal-
aviation-administration)

------
hysan
If the information in this article is true, which seems to be the case after
reading most of the linked sources, then a lot of the news articles that were
cited are reporting false information. Now that immediately made me curious to
see if Google Fact Check would flag these news articles as false or possibly
false. Doing a quick search shows no Fact Check under any of the search
results, so seems like the answer is no.

If Fact Check really becomes a thing, I hope that Google will be able to use
current events like this as a bar for how fast Fact Check needs to respond to
an event to make it useful. If they could find and source well researched
information and immediately flag misreported news articles while a topic is at
the forefront of the news, then it would immensely help educate people. For
example:

My parents have not stopped talking about this since it happened and are still
looking at and reading news about it. There was some misreported information
that I had to clear up for them. If Fact Check worked, then it definitely
would have prevented misinformation spreading to them and probably many
others.

------
throw7
There really isn't clarity here. The article argues that the flight wasn't
overbooked, therefore UA couldn't kick anyone off. I agree if it wasn't
overbooked, but it's not clear that that's evidently true. It's certainly
gonna be contentious and probably up to a judge or jury to decide if it
actually gets that far. I doubt it.

The more pressing matter is what do you do as a passenger when YOU are
involuntarily denied boarding due to overbooking? Are you gonna sit in place,
say, "I don't believe you." and wait for the stasi to take you away for a
beating?

------
gspetr
I believe this is exactly the kind of thing that will be resolved by the tools
the market provides.

If they wanted volunteers to fly the next flight instead of this, they should
have offered more than $400. Kind of like an auction: $500, $600, etc. and
eventually enough people would have been incentivized to take the deal.

The company failed at that and now their competitors will get their business
and increase their market shares at United's expense.

IANAL, but they might even be facing a very expensive lawsuit and will have to
settle.

The market will ultimately work things out, I don't think the FAA should
intervene much.

------
ikeboy
So how many people will get fired over this?

~~~
AlexandrB
My guess is it will be like the Wells Fargo fiasco. Some low-level employees -
probably the staff that worked that flight - will lose their jobs while those
that actually created the policies that led to this will be just fine.

~~~
rconti
Just announced yesterday: Wells Fargo clawing back $75M in comp from the 2
execs.

[https://www.nytimes.com/2017/04/11/business/dealbook/wells-f...](https://www.nytimes.com/2017/04/11/business/dealbook/wells-
fargo-whole-foods-fed.html)

------
rargulati
On overbooking, this is a solved problem: hold an auction where the max payoff
is the risk in dollars X, distributed amongst Y passengers (the number of
seats you need to free up). Start at some low anchor point ("$300 to get off
the plane") and increment up until you have takers. If the total value exceeds
X, write it off - you messed up.

I believe other airlines implement this in some capacity.

~~~
strictnein
United does too. They just stopped at $800 and then went the random route.
They could have gone higher.

~~~
FireBeyond
Yeah, there's also video from just prior to this incident where multiple
people say "We'll get off for $1500" and the purser literally laughs and says
"Yeah, that's not going to happen. People are going to need to leave the plane
or it won't take off."

------
jksmith
Seems to me that what is most unfortunate is that surrounding passengers
didn't support the passenger dragged off the plane. 4 or 5 people standing up
and threatening something along the lines of "Why don't you take my seat too
jackass; I don't want it anymore" would have been far more effective at
righting this situation than proper media reporting or crying about passenger
contracts.

~~~
Ductapemaster
While that sounds like a nice thing to do on a personal level, it distracts
from the real issue at hand - poor service and handling of a situation that
was bad from the start. I strongly disagree that the passengers should have
stepped up and taken the fall for poor practices from United. People don't
need to be better humans - companies need to be held accountable for their
actions and act better towards their customers.

~~~
jksmith
>>companies need to be held accountable for their actions and act better
towards their customers.

Exactly.

------
speby
Has everyone watched the video? There is a point in the video where "things
went wrong" and it happens right before the officer makes the decision to
physically touch the passenger and begin to assault him in order to remove
him.

Immediately before that point, there are a multitude of things that could have
been done or done differently. The choice was made by that one individual to
physically take hold of the passenger who was ultimately, peacefully,
declining to deplane.

For example ... the officers could have:

1\. Explained to the passenger and everyone around him about how he is single-
handedly delaying everyone else's arrival home right now.

2\. Gave several warnings, spaced out appropriately over time, that increased
levels of escalation will be involved, up to and including the point of
physical removal. In other words, telling him he will be forcefully removed
against his will for not obeying the law.

... and so on with certainly more creative approaches that I wouldn't
necessarily expect a typical police officer to think of and/or employ.

~~~
Mithaldu
The officers should've told the flight staff they're outside their legal
rights.

