Why Airlines Sell More Seats Than They Have
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- čas přidán 10. 04. 2017
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If you're wondering why this video is a bit less polished than normal ones, it's because I quite literally started work on it five hours ago. Just wanted to get it out when this news story is still relevant!
Nonetheless, I hope you enjoy this extra video!
Five hours for this? A video still better edited then most youtube channels?
Fuck, you're a beast lol.
Wendover Productions Still a great Video!
Wish your audio was at 3-4DB higher. I have my audio at 100% and still can barely hear you.
FYI, the audio levels are very low for this video. Otherwise, another excellent video and incredibly fast turnaround.
Wendover Productions Still a very well produced and explains the topic well. Love all these videos, but miss TWL. Keep up the good work though!
I once got on a flight that was overbooked by 11 PEOPLE. We were traveling in a group of 12 so we volunteered to get onto the next flight. The airline paid for our stay in a 5-star hotel in Dubai for the night, luxury food, and we got a free plane ticket to Dubai as compensation. So that was a pretty good deal
Isabel Kleijberg lucky shit... but congrats, when I got bumped I just got put on the next flight and a 100 airport voucher
Isabel Kleijberg what airline? First class on Etihad?
Isabel Kleijberg if you got bumped from a flight you can demand up to 5000 dollars 💵 ( depending on the airline)
Isabel Kleijberg daaaaaaamnn!!!! Sounds good to me!
@@thomasrusaw2205 honestly if you get bumped you should get an upgrade to business class on the next flight if possible.
next video "Why airlines beat their customers"
When you can't beat your competitors, just beat your customers.
OMFG LMFAO GOLDEN
Michael Echeverria yeah, except the security guards were """minorities""" themselves.
You have to go back.
in addition for the next video, why railroad execs are woefully inadaquate to become an airline exec. Boycott United.
this comment made me laugh so much
United airlines: Our prices are unbeatable. Not our customers.
Southwest: we beat the competition, not you
Jetblue: We dont overbook we are the best at making customers happy
Leron Benari RyanAir: we give our passengers whiplash on landing
Hooters: we had an airline once
NICE
Yeah, my heart just breaks at the thought of airlines potentially missing out on all the extra money they could make by overbooking.
Like he explained, the extra money they make leads to lower ticket prices for the consumer.
@@MrMineHeads. Unless they lie. This is obvious manipulation.
@@semibiotic why would the overbook if they didn't make more money?
@@MrMineHeads. Just to make money, cheaper tickets are very unlikely. There is no direct reason & cause relations between, unless you trust their words.
But how one could trust company, that is commiting scam, selling seats twice ?
They could fill empty seats without deceiving customers, but they aren't willing to.
@@semibiotic you could be right that they may pocket the money, but they also might make more money if they reduce the ticket prices. Instead of pocketing the money immediately, they might do some calculations (depending on numbers and demand and what-not) and they might make more money if they reduce ticket prices (using the money made due to overbooking to offset the costs) due to more passengers buying tickets. You might be right, but keep in mind that the #1 driver of passengers on a route is ticket price.
The issue wasn't that he was "prevented from boarding." He was already in his seat, he has already boarded, and was involuntarily selected to give up his seat, then was brutally removed from it by security, before being literally dragged off the plane. That has nothing to do with profit and business.
The funny thing is it's considered a crime in the US to sell an object to two separate parties without them knowing about it. This is actually a type of scam that is fairly common with con artists. The fact airlines are doing this regardless of their end goal should also be illegal and removing a passenger to make room for another passenger that paid for the same type of seat is unreal. The last person to board the plane if all the seats are taken needs to be compensated heavily and nobody once seated should be asked to leave. Just my two cents on this.
It's all technically in the terms of service on the ticket, so it is legal. Scummy sure, but not illegal.
A ticket doesn't guarantee you a seat. If it did, then you would be right about it being illegal to sell that seat to two people.
@@jamesdinius7769curse the find print!
LOL
@@walter9426 fine print and yes it applies to you. read it genius
"find print" LMAO
United Airlines tried to beat competitors' revenue earnings.
When that failed, it beat its customers.
It wasn't overbooked, though. They had United employees they wanted to take instead of paying customers.
tormaid This right here. I raged when I heard NBC and CNN smear this shit amd made it no big deal that this old man paying customer was assaulted so one of their employees can have his seat.
This is crazy, I work for an airline and when I travel standby I am literally the last dude to be let on board. If there's no space, I get grounded, that's it.
tormaid exactly, it was actually only overbooked by 1 passenger and this was sorted before boarding.
The issue was caused by trying to get 4 staff on to have them available for a stand by flight. Nothing to do with over booking.
tormaid The black lives matter community Shut the fuck up about racism when they found out it was a black cop. You don't see Asian people looting
It is important to note the difference between employees travelling off duty and employees positioning. Off duty staff travel is always on stand by, while positioning crew has a higher priority than paying passengers as they are needed for operational reasons. They didn't kick this passenger off the aircraft because staff wanted to go on holiday, the staff had to get on that flight, probably to crew another flight leaving from the other airport.
Mostly what I got from this video: Fuck, I'm never getting an empty space next to me.
Ronan C - it still happens.
I often have empty seats next to me. Have even had 3 seats all to myself. Got a good night sleep that flight
Kevin Haigh hah... I remember one time there were like 3 seats behind me that had nobody seated on them. so did the 3 seats behind that. and another 3 seats.... xD
i was once on a 30 person passenger jet from ft lauderdale to orlando and only me my mom and sister and one other guy were on the flight so we had a empty 26 seats
Just fly into Detroit, always empty seats when I go there.
First, this wasn't an overbooking issue. They wanted the seats for a couple of pilots. Second, this wasn't someone getting bumped, he got kicked (dragged) off the plane. Once you've been seated, the seat is yours. That's why airlines offer money and other perks, when they need a seat that's already been filled.
I think this video, and many people are confused about what actually happened. Remember, this wasn't a case of someone being bumped or denied entry to the plane. He had already boarded. Once you board, the seat is yours. This is not just policy, it's actually FAA regulations. Again, that's why they offer you money and tickets and dinner and other things to get off the plane. If they were allowed to remove you, they would. Why would a company that isn't required to pay people to leave, ever do it? They wouldn't.
United screwed up on so many levels. Don't be surprised if the FAA fines them for this behavior.
John Miller Forced deboarding happens all the time although usually under different circumstances and it is legal as long as the door is open. When the door closes, no adjustments can be made to the flight. Many times weight and balance calculations aren't finished until passengers are already boarded (especially on regional airlines like American Eagle where one employee has the job of two mainline employees) and for the plane to be able to take off safely and fly safely, people have to be taken off (weather events).
Yes, under those circumstances. And there are several others. Including security reasons. But not because they overbooked or because they need the seat for a pilot going home.
To your questions on why airlines would pay people to leave if their was no regulations, they wouldn't do it because it's bad business. if they don't ask for people to get off for a gift or a free ticket they would have to force people to get off which would put a bad mark on the company (like what happened to united's stock). also, can i have a link to the faa regulation saying that?
Here's an idea, hire more pilots so you don't have to kick people off planes. Or, manage your flights better so you don't run into the problem of having to fly them back. Or, manage your flights better so you know that you'll need the extra seats and don't sell them. There are a dozen things they could have done before dragging someone from the plane.
+quinnjim UA was only concerned about "inconveniencing" its bottom-line and made what it thought was the "correct decision" accordingly. If treating every customer as a human being and not as a commodity is in the stated mission and advert of the company, and thus the expectation of every customer, then treating individual customers as though cattle and expendable in the grander scheme of business operations is a breach of trust.
The individual customer who's held up his end of the bargain can't be ethically held responsible or made to pay for the fuck-up/shortsightedness of a company. Planes are delayed and cancelled all the time for every conceivable reason, from the mechanical and natural (acts of god) to company fuck-ups like in this case. If it was imperative to make the next-day flight on schedule, the ethical thing to do would've been for UA to make potential volunteers extremely happy (i.e. if necessary in order to get them to willingly give up their seats), even if it cost the company a pretty penny, since it and not the passengers were responsible for the fuck-up. Instead it offered them a paltry $800 non-cash-redeemable voucher, which is not only practically worthless to most airline passengers because of its restrictions, it's way short of what it could've and should've offered in cash, which could've been any amount, since, contrary to what airlines want passengers to believe, there's no maximum limit on how much airlines can offer in the federal regulations.
(Witness account says that someone offered to give up his seat for $1600 and the UA rep in charge turned him down.) UA chose to do the greedy thing, piss off four of its already seated passengers and "re-accommodate" the face of one of them by proxy because it thought it could. The choice between pissing off four passengers and pissing off a greater number of passengers the next day is a false choice, one pushed by UA and its apologists.
Whether UA is in the legal right or wrong is another matter. It depends on whether UA has the right to pull boarded/unboarded passengers off a flight to seat its non-booked employees at the last minute, in a non-emergency, and/or whether the need to transport UA employees to crew a plane the next day constitutes an emergency that allows for the forcible removal of its _highly valued human_ customers from not only their paid-for seats but from getting to where they're going ASAP.
I still can't believe how quickly you got this out dude
The guy was already in the seat, he wins. also he was bumped by employees, unacceptable.
I agree, airlines shouldn't have the right to bump you from your seat that YOU paid for just because they feel like it's acceptable for their employees to get a flight.
Gertius It's not because they feel like it's acceptable, it's just policy and the rules there. They had to do it, but I feel like it's the wrong thing to do too. I feel like people should blame the security for the man's injuries, not the company or plane.
I understand it's the policy and the rules however like you said, it's not right (which it isn't). Yes it might mean less profit however logically, selling two tickets for one seat isn't right.
Personally, I believe the Airline has the same responsibility as the Security as it's their policy. If their policy wasn't corrupt this PR disaster wouldn't have occurred.
T.K. Brown but the customers are the kings, you cant simply watch them getting harassed by the security especially when your customer already seat in the plane, he did check in first, its his seat and the company also their employees are responsible for his safety, its his right to seat there and he paid for it. the company is responsible over the employees for letting them acted like that.
Jessica Tirza Some of what you said is right, but when you buy the tickets, you are agreeing to their policy, if you don't agree, then don't buy. He had the right to his seat in certain circumstances (such as overbooking).
Overbooking is fine. Just don't fucking beat someone till he bleeds.
yeah exactly
Aldo Its not necessarily United's fault. Once they call the police, its out of United's hands. They can't control how police handle the situation
Aldo I just subbed to you please sub back
GoldenAce57 yeah but they dont have to call the police. thats the wrong course action. Traditionally the airline will keep upping compensation until someone volunteers.
+GoldenAce57 yeah but it is partially united's fault as they called security very fast instead of offering a higher amount of money for people to leave. i do think what happened to the dude was due to the police and that's awful but united did very quickly go, nah i guess well throw guys off without offering all that much cash for people to leave.
The thing is, they used to offer great extras when you would volunteer to get bumped and wait a few hours for the next flight or take another airline. Whichever. They no longer give these incentives anymore. So why would anyone want to volunteer? Thats why they bump. Its unfair. .
"You're much more likely to fly on your flight."
I should be 100% likely to fly because I paid for the flight. What other industry can legally sell more of something than they have? If I "sold" something to someone by taking their money and not providing the good or service, wouldn't that be considered a scam?
BTW that bit about being a frequent flier who signed up for the rewards program has NO BEARING whatsoever when it's time for the gate agent to deny someone boarding. They have no knowledge of the passengerss status when making that choice. The rule when I was a gate agent was that you deny the LAST person who checked in who does NOT have a seat assignment. Obviously I mean when you can't get any volunteers.
Have you ever read the fine print? Companies can easily deny service, it's their right, it always has been and it is correct. The question of compensation for the passenger is another issue though.
@@user-zb8tq5pr4x That does not justify the airlines selling a good or service they have no intention of providing. The guys says airlines oversell by a certain percentage. That means they fully intend to not provide flights for all the people that bought the oversold seats whether they show up or not. That isn’t right.
@@blakegardner2339Just because it isn't right doesn't mean it's not reality or legal.
@@blakegardner2339 But they do provide the service or compensation. Even if its the next flight. It's part of the agreement you make with the airline. If everyone showed up for their light then the airline wouldn't need to overbook. So arguably overbooking stems from passengers not fulfilling their end of the agreement. And for many people, the next flight and a couple hundred dollars is a good deal. It's not a scam because they provide compensation and a free flight in return.
united flight incident wasn't caused by overbooking, but by shit hhrr management
Finally someone who gets it.
and then the CEO doubles-down on how it was all handled!
A whole plethora of things went wrong not just HR policies and regulations, Public Relations should have appeased the public but their department let the CEO make things look even worse. The thing is, as WendoverProductions mentions, this is a common practice, especially on large routes from huge airport hubs like Chicago, being mad at United for a week won't change things.
It was white people's fault! White supremacy dragged the asian man off the plane
yea my thought was the same as you. i wonder how it is overbooked when they wanted to fly its staffs. its different than selling the tickets to other passenger. i mean like they asked people to volunteer to fly the next day, which no one volunteered. i guess united airline is just a dick
Can you do a video on why Airlines punch customers next?
Daniel Ehlmann And beat and drag them.
+Daniel ] Or a video on clickbait videos wanting to be first instead of accurate.
They should keep punching customers until morale improves
Daniel Ehlmann "For every punch we're saving you money!"
Pretty sure that was the police
Summer 2019 I was on a United flight from Newark to Bangor, Maine. It was overbooked by 2 seats, and rather than dragging someone off the plane, they offered two travel vouchers, increasing in price until they were finally taken at $5,000 a piece.
It’s rare that I actually fly direct to/from Bangor. What he said about missing a flight from Bangor isn’t true if you get a concord coach to Boston South Station, and then fly out of Logan haha. But I have been in an overbooked fight to Bangor from DC, kkkkk
Less importance of being on it??? That dude was a Doctor with Patients waiting for him!!
Question: doesn't the "Involuntarily Deny Boarding" policy only apply to people who have not already boarded the plane?
TheJudoJoker YES!! All these news outlets have it wrong. Flight was not overbooked!! United had 4 of their employees show up last minute and they didn't want to offer people money to "voulenteer" so they started to kick off people they wanted. This old man was a doctor and had patients in the morning so he said no. then he got knocked the fuck out and his bloodied corpse was dragged out. Then they kicked everyone off the plane to clean up the blood. True story.
+Semir Mehmedovic he still didn't have to make it as dramatic....
They did offer some money.
Actually they did offer money to volunteer, the price went to 800 I believe.
He or the security guy whom had been relieved for the wrong apprcoach. you're logic is backwards bruh
Wow, this one came out lightning fast! Hopefully you didn't sacrifice quality too much during this rush!
Eh I definitley did sacrifice quality a bit but I wanted to get it out in time to be relevant. Since I wasn't supposed to upload today anyways since I release my newest "real" video last Friday I just decided to do a super-quick one on this topic.
Wendover Productions thank you anyway. :)
Wendover Productions Just got done watching and I don't really notice any inferiorities
@theelyzium what's wrong with you? HAHHAHA
TheElyzium You need anger management.
I always go for a quality airline over a budget airline by principle. I've always had that attitude, and it paid off when me and my girlfriend flew to Tokyo back in 2014. We were on an Emirates flight bound for Dubai where our transit was at the same time the Malaysian Airlines plane was shot down. We weren't far off at all, difference was that Emirates don't fly over active warzones, meaning we took a longer route that didn't go above crimea, while Malaysian Airlines did.
Yea Malaysians can't be trusted to run their own country, why would you trust them with your life?
I binge watched all your other airline videos a week before this happened. I was amazed at how much I recalled about how flight schedules work. Helped me put things into perspective.
Who the Fuck Would Want a Frequent Flyer Account at United?
People who fly very often and live near a United hub. I don't like what happened but I am not sure if this really damages United Airlines in the long run. Airlines reward loyalty.
In other words, people who *fly frequently*
garra1766 I would. I like United over American and I live in Chicago so
Well I don't think anyone wants it now
garra1766 As Now 24 Hours Later...Not Anymore! LoL poor asian Guy!
The flight was not overbooked. It was to make room for UA employees.
They could have flight their employees with other airlines or used other means of transport.
Henry Nguyên Phạm that's still really overbooking if you think about it. They didn't leave space for their own employees
If the employees had tickets in advance they should have been on the plane BEFORE this man does. Or at least they would have the seat number before this man.
you are right! And no, they weren't "ticketed" days in advance like Kodfod said... This was a crew that was going out to fill a plane that likely wasn't scheduled until that DAY - They are STANDBY crew that UAL has all over the place in case they are needed for flight changes or additions (sick crews, plane replaced with different type/size that original crew has never worked on, etc.)
I worked for UAL a LONG time ago and believe me, what happened is NOT the policy! In fact its VERY rare for flights out of a major hub to EVER have to involuntarily remove a passenger to replace ONE crew member! What they SHOULD have done is keep raising their offer until one more person takes it, OR they should have tried to book that person (or someone else) on another carrier going to the same destination. This was a screwup by the manager in charge of boarding (at the gate) of the plane plain and simple. They even told the police they were "in duress with an unruly passenger" - which we all know now was NOT true. Although he did become unruly AFTER they brought the police on board. Also, the officer who dragged him off is now on leave and under review.
So, the plane leaves 2 hours late and UAL will lose who knows how much because of the bad press (stock prices were down 3%, bookings are being canceled left and right) all because the gate manager who SHOULD NOT HAVE allowed everyone to board if it was 'overbooked' didn't want to pony up another $400 in vouchers. The manager will be sorely missed (not!).
That seem like the only way to overbook unless it is possible to buy a ticket without having a seat assigned on it. That never happened to me
*flown
"They could have flown their employees with other means..." ;-)
none of those reasons for why some people should be taken off is valid, seeing these people *have* shown up and *are* on time - as is indicated by their presence on the plane.
the only ethical solutions are to not overbook OR *keep increasing the incentive to disembark until someone accepts*. Airlines have to accept that outliers of statistical data are statistical certainties given enough data, so if they're going to sell tickets based on that data they have to pay the consequences.
keep in mind he video is named "Why Airlines Sell More Seats Than They Have" so the reasons is for why airlines overbook which to sum it up is for money.
well that wouldn't be a very interesting question or answer.
Exactly. They knew the risks when they decided to overbook. They can either pay customers now to disembark, or play the legal fees of a lawsuit later.
FlashMeterRed But he took advantage of the controversy to better inform you of why they overbook in the first
place
Edit: Also as he said " Just wanted to get it out when this news story is still relevant! "
@Flashmetered the only reason you need is that passengers do not own the airplane. If you come to my restaurant and I want you to leave you need to get out.If you don't I will get the cops to exit you.
I hate that they practice this policy at the airlines and I wish they would find a new way
love your videos but this audio was very low
Then turn it up
How did this person get likes?
@@davidreyesjamison1814 the ✅
@ThyPeasantSlayer taboritsky clock without the l
@@davidreyesjamison1814 because they're right?
The airline screwed up.
#1: you do not board passengers THEN bump them. You determine the bumps and they never get on the plane.
#2: You don't announce "We want to give 3 employees free seats on this flight so we have to bump paying customers"
#3: You don't beat the crap out of a passenger saying he cant have a seat, then put him back on the same plane.
Here is a fact the video left out: The flight in Chicago that everyone talks about, Flight 3411, the flight was NOT overbooked. United wanted to transport employees from 1 airport to another and they kicked out paying customers for their own employees.
Exactly: they could have handled the situation better especially since the man they took off was a doctor.
While this is a great video about overbooking flights, it's important to note that United Airlines flight 3411 was not overbooked because the airline put too many passengers in, but because they added 4 employees last minute. Another thing that's important to remember is the United *Express* Flight 3411 was actually operated by Republic, a regional carrier operating under the name United. But then we have the issue of was it Republic or United employees who needed to get on, as well as the argument that since it's being operated under United, they should have responsibility, plus it was United who booked tickets for that flight.
adding 4 more employees the last minute sounds like a lousy excuse. Do you know how well prepared the staff has to be for the trip? Have you ever been called to work when you have to wear a uniform, be physically fit, well rested and well-nourished the last minute? No, such story is bogus. They simply miscalculated the number of same seats sold to two different customers and even if it is a rare event, i am glad greedy fucks got exposed.
@@julijakeit The 4 empoyees were not going to be working on that flight.
@@JonathanRamkissoon-el3cj yep most airlines have long call reserve (you have 12 hours to get to your base) short call reserve (you have two hours to get to your base), and RRP (your at the airport with your bag packed and you can be sent anywhere they need you)
The thing was that he was a doctor. they literally made that doctor go to a doctor after he got dragged off the flight. he had patients he had to help where he was going
Yo you need to turn up your audio levels. Your voice is wayyyy to quiet.
I can hear him quite well. The low volume of his voice also makes him sound much nicer than most of the loud youtubers.
I have a studio monitor setup so I hear audio levels are much more clear. I had to turn my system up almost 75% more just to hear his voice at a normal level.
ASimpleSample : "I can hear him just fine" I thought as I read your comment.
Then I noticed my sound was full volume.
i always keep my volume at full
agreed, I usually have my master volume at 50% and youtube at 20% for nearly all videos. I had to max both out to hear this video properly
When I lived in the US I used to fly around cheaply on United by booking the flight before the one I wanted and volunteering to be bumped in exchange for a voucher. It added a bit of waiting time, but almost always worked. (Edit: I lived in Chicago, the United hub, in 1999.)
Zothaqqua That's sad. Wow. Also, that idea is genius.
Smart!!!
That is illegal and your reservations for all flights will be cancelled by the airlines computer systems. Repeated infractions will get you banned from making reservations on that airline.
Does anyone remember when Wendover only had 100,000 subscribers? Now he has over half a million and his video is "Trending". Keep up the good work Wendover ☺️
I thought the 4 people (already seated inside the airplane) removed was to make room for 4 United Airlines flight attendants?
If so, then the plane is not overbooked rather UA forced the passengers to be bumped off when the seat had already been assigned.
If UA had a schedule whereby usually they expect 4 people not turning up on that particular flight but this time they all turned up then UA is still at fault here since the passengers were already inside the airplane even though the seats are under airlines company property and subject to the airline's procedure at any time which they have already paid for it in advance (meaning passengers and the company had been in a binding contract of sort)
The officer is also at fault for unprovoked removal to a rather simple matter. But this situation wouldnt happen in the first place if UA had dealt with it professionally.
Arya Jonathan Why are they on that fucking plane if it's full? If they wanted seats on that plane it should have been planned in advance
Thats why if thats true thats just the case of poor management on UA's part and I hope that passenger sues UA.
Now I'm scared that someone will use my airplane seat in future flights, thanks.
Just get there quite early. And take your seat.
Or maybe change law so airflight companies won't be allowed to sell product they don't have (seats on a planes they don't have)? It would be much easier and more fair system.
Or have a passenger bill of rights that clearly states that if you're already checked in and seated then you cannot be kicked off the plane in favor of employees. Its not the passengers responsibility to make sure employees of the airline get to work on time.
Ussurin waah waah waah change the law change the law regulate and ban everything. then bitch about why prices are so high and unaffordable
bigbullbk or just not freak out about a one in a million incident
I used to make a bundle every holiday season taking advantage of flights I KNEW would be over booked. Usually flights from LA to Boston or New York. I took some of my time and a little bit of capital upfront but my ROI was fantastic. The key was waiting and being willing to endure the just prior to 'doors closed' crush. I'd usually clear two or three thousand dollars on the day before Thanksgiving, Christmas and New Years Eve and Day. The other trick is to never jump at the first offer, especially if it was a voucher or upgrade. Stick to your guns and insist on cash. I didn't need hotels, transportation or meals so I was able to get a better offer.
Eventually they recognized me and stopped offering me anything knowing full well that I had no intention of flying. My roommates did well for a while until they got noticed too.
There's better ways to make money but taking advantage of the airlines greed with overbooking gave me the warm and fuzzys.
Very good explanation and you explained both sides of the situation. Even though I do disagree with United's method of removing a passenger, I liked seeing someone who sees the positive in airline overbooking.
Once again, amazing video!
I was a gate agent and omg my heart would drop when I realized that our flight was overbooked
Wendover has a plane fetish
Snowcold aircrafts are interesting
Snowcold who doesn't
I imagine everytime he flys somewhere he has an orgasm XD
Plane dildos
Seems to be more of a "stop questioning cronyism and learn to embrace inequality" type of fetish.
is it legal to sue airlines for that?
Putu Widyasena For punching you in the face and dragging you out of the plane unconscious, certainly.
Christopher Teutsch that was done by the police
The issue is that the airline didn't beat him, the police did, and they get away with murder.
There is one other issue that came up also, local police are not taking responsibility and neither is TSA police, so there has been some confusion as to who actually did this to him and I'm sure that will be cleared up soon.
They're gonna get sued, I'm sure they already reached put to him to mitigate the costs out of court
Another high quality video from Wendover Productions. Keep it up!
For as long as a friend of mine is alive, United will never live this incident down.
Dragging me and my dark humor out into the open with this comment huh?
@@anwensu4381 Well you know I’m never gonna give you up
@@liamweaver2944 I HATE YOU😂😂
@@anwensu4381 You know the rules and so do I.
UNITED could've solved the problem very *EASILY* _this_ way -- When the airline could not find anyone on the flight willing to "volunteer" to be bumped-off onto a later flight, they should've then offered the passengers the _added incentive_ of a *FULL REFUND* to anyone "volunteering" to take a later flight as a way of apologizing for the inconvenience.
They offered. They started with 400 dollars then 800 dollars but no one accepted. So they said the computer will randomly select 4 people to leave. The others accepted that passenger don't
its not a refund or cash, its 800 worth of coupons
To: Jamie Santos... Here's what was reported in _CHICAGO TRIBUNE_ -- "[T]he airline [was] unable to find passengers willing to give up their seats for four airline employees in return for *credits* for _future_ flights...." Also, supposedly, the volunteers would've been put up in a hotel for the night. That's *NOT* the same as a *FULL REFUND* which is what I'd suggested! And don't forget that *EVERYONE* on the plane had already been SEATED *before* UNITED pulled this stunt on behalf of FOUR "EMPLOYEES" they didn't have sense enough to plan better for! If having those employees on that flight was really such a drastic emergency, surely a "Full Refund" (plus the added option of a hotel room and a nice meal) would not have been asking too much to compensate for all of the inconveniences that those *PAYING* passengers would have had to endure (including having to be subjected all over again to the humiliating experience of being practically sexually violated though their invasive "screening" process). So what would've only cost UNITED a few hundred dollars at most is now going to wind up costing them MILLIONS for their heavy-handed arrogance!
They actually did even better than that. People didn't take it.
No, United didn't. Law Enforcement did.
Because the guy was violating federal law.
I hope that guy sues and gets so rich off this! United would ironically have to raise their tickets price and customers will opt for jetblu
In the meantime, Jetblue is using almost the exact same calculations to calculate overbooking as United is doing.
The more you know...
Trioptic3D He can't, it's their policy when you purchase a ticket, this is what happens when you don't read the terms of service 😆 you get your face bashed into an armrest
T.K. Brown United got rekt anyway.
It's United that needed to read the terms this time. The flight wasn't overbooked and he was already boarded. The lawyers didn't account for this type of situation.
JetBlue does it probably but they DO NOT overbook, thats why Jet Blue has done so well and grown so big, they where first with the no charge for baggage as well. Dont know about the baggage charge now as its been a while but I do know they do not over book, one of the very very very very few who do or should I say do not. Also one of thee reasons they went from a nothing nothing airline to major competitor, maybe buy a JetBlue ticket, I'm not a JetBlue hack
It just feels weird that you get evicted from a seat you paid money for :/ that's so messed up considering that in the event of overbooking on an airline like Emirates for example they upgrade you to business class (yes, I'm aware that this specific United flight was 1-class configuration but still)
Nikhil Kumar it all ties back to the consumer. Funny
ProCreeper 2000 depends on circumstances.if there are no other seats in economy they can give you an empty seat in business.i also heard of a case where one guy was on a flight and economy and business were full so he got to ride in an first class seat and enjoy all of its luxuries (this was on an emirates flight)
They don't evict you completely, they'll usually give you some serious compensation for the inconvenience (and will ask for volunteers first). They'll get you a nice hotel if needed, you'll be fed, you'll most likely get higher class seating, and a chunk of money as well
It's true. Emirates upgraded me to business class because the plane was overbooked!
if there are no economy seats left, they WILL bump certain people (usually ones with a flight account) to buesness.
this was a one class only flight.
Great video! Very informative.
Here's my prediction: In six months or less, it will be illegal to shoot video on an airplane.
It's gonna end up being a policy on most airlines within weeks.
No, that's other people's predictions that you co-oped for yourself after reading them.
That would be a bad move TBH, like telling me, we might beat the shit out if you, but we dont want it to go viral like last time
I don't think you know the FAA, dude it's taken me at least a month to get a message from the FAA on how to finish my medical certificate. Laws like that take years, as a matter of fact, there have been talks on adding MORE cameras on flights. Airline companies on the other hand may create rules for it.
DrumWild Think of the airplane porn!!!!
From what I've read, the flight wasn't actually overbooked. They wanted to remove a few passengers to make space for extra crew members.
You put this video together very quickly. Great job!
love your airline videos! keep it up!
They'll seat you, Then they'll beat you.
They should've offered monetary compensation for the passengers - that would've avoided the whole incident
they offered $400, $800 and a hotel stay.
huehue why were there no takers?
They should have offered more.
Hugh Mungus agreed
they offered 800$ worth united airline vouchers that expire in 1 year.
I have been impacted by overbooking twice. And I did not mind. Both times the check-in assistant was "Oh I'm so sorry, we've overbooked the flight. Would you mind sitting in business class?" Sorry? Why would you be sorry? There are advantages to having a single ticket instead of booking with other people.
Wendover, you always make amazing content, keep it up!
O'HARE AIR(port)
clayton8or_2 ...and became a zillionaire!
This is about as big of a PR disaster as O'Hare Air
catinabox you made me wipe my screen :P
Pepsi: "No one can outdo us in P.R. disasters"
United Airlines: "Hold my flight fam, I got this."
In Zurich it happen quite few times with swiss airline when I transit. They know they are overbooked, they will ask a volunteer to give his place, and the volunteer gets a compensation, a free rebooking ticket for next day and a free night in the 5 star hotel next to airport with free meal. Same thing happen when I transit in Doha with Qatar airline, they gave free meal and free hotel night and re booked the passenger to next day. The thing is like those companies knew in advance they had an issue and made adjustments before people get in instead of picking a random one inside the airplane. whats ur opinion?
i really love your videos! keep up the good work!!
normal airline: hey so kinda awkward but we overbooked and now we don't have seats for 3 people sorry. if there's any volunteers to leave we can offer them $400 plus a later flight!
passengers: no? we paid for THIS flight!
airline: well ok how about $800?
3 random people: well ok I'll take the money
united: hey we need 3 people to get off the plane if you're lucky we might let you get on another one later
paying passengers: uh... no. this is important that I need to
united: SIC EM.
fun fact: if you can't fly on a flight you booked you're entitled to 4x the value of the ticket (up to $1400) if they keep you waiting long enough!
They offered $800 too dipshit. read the news not just the headlines
I believe they offered $800 to the one guy. Not to anyone else.
They have to go to 4x cost of ticket, or max of $1300, before trying to involuntarily bump/rebook a person thats boarded.
Timaeus Bouma they have the right to remove you involuntary for a "priority" passager. a class that wouldnt include their employees, or high bidders. people like "lost" kids, air marshals, or other government agents.
I understand it may save money and may lower ticket prices, but when you have X number of seats on the plane, to sell more than X number of tickets still seems wrong. Somehow I think there has to be a better answer than overbooking. Do they overbook hotels? Professional sporting events? Broadway shows? Movie theaters? I bet there are no shows for those as well.
When I flew out to Las Vegas for a conference , it wasn't until minutes before the the flight that I knew I would be boarding the plane. Some people have a life, and they need to know if they will be able to make it to a set event.
Wendover Productions, you are the best. You have probably tought me enough to start my own airline. Now all I need is 5 million dollars!
Ugh this happened to me on a flight out of Philadelphia. Went to board the plane and was told would have to fly another day because they were overbooked. They gave me a hotel room for the night and refunded my plane ticket plus a free flight the following day but I ended up missing work and was pretty peeved I waited at the airport for hours just to be told I couldn't get on the plane...
Over booking makes your ticket price cheaper. It's just wrong that they didn't bid higher for someone to stay.
If you already bought your ticket how would it be cheaper, the airline isn't going to be like "We overbooked seat A4 so we're now going to give $X back". You already bought it, just more profit on their end.
No, the airline is in competition with other airlines, so it is always trying to offer the lower price, by overbooking airlines can be more competitive giving you a cheaper ticket. If you have two equal airlines, except one overbooks and the other doesn't, then you will sure be able to get cheaper tickets in the one that overbooks because it can distribute the costs in more people, the first will always have efficient full planes (and some times will have to pay someone to stay and wait for the next flight) while the other will have to charge more to everyone in order to compensate for those empty seats.
This is exactly right. Maybe due to bad weather around the country, there was a delay and they absolutely had to get the other flight crew on board. If it's that urgent, start upping the ante. $400? $800? $1200? $1600? I guarantee if they had offered $1600 and a free motel stay to get bumped to a later flight, a few people would have taken it. Would have avoided the problem, and the PR disaster. Shoot, for $6400, my family of 4 would have just rented a car and driven from Chicago to Louisville.
Over booking because of weather is a myth for fools and as I see you are one of them. What happens when the weather gets better or even when the weather is horrific like around Thanksgiving, Christmas, New Years or any weekend and 3 out of 5 days of the week, prices go up dramatically if not double. There are many more people flying in the good weather and flyable weather then in the so called bad weather and the prices are jacked way up. You really buy that garbage. Thats like me saying I don't do good sales between 6 AM and 8 AM on a Sunday morning so I have to raise my prices for the rest of the week by 30% to compensate.
Airlines now there are lame brains like you that are so easy deceived and they don't need Obi-Won to do it. So they tell you even though 99.9% of all flights during the year are made and as they tout there "we have reduced are late time to near nothing" they still convince you on the statistically irrelevant number of flights that cause a few seats to go empty that they are losing money, when they make more than ever as fuel has dropped by 50% and ticket prices are the same or more, they charge for everything except allowing you to breathe, have cut your seating room by putting in more seats, when you didn't even have any before and now the down right give a man a public beatdown to send a message to all other who may crumble at being on the plane and in the seat already and getting kicked off so they can transport a few non paying employee's. They do all that and sell you on " oh poor us, we lost a few dollars on a few seats over a week"
Just remember to tell your grand kids this great story....Hey kiddies one day a major corporation for no good reason, literally gave a man, who was sitting quietly and politely in his seat bothering no one, a beatdown and dragged him from a plane so they could put there own non paying people on it, then the CEO 3 times called the man out as a trouble maker and blamed him for sitting there quietly in his own seat, he had already paid for. As horrific as that was kids, you know what your brave grand dad did as the rest of America stood up to defend that man, I defend the airline and justified the reason for his beat down! Yeah you little ones come from a blood line that stands proud for evil corporation that beatdown people.
Hey I have a bridge in Brooklyn I need to sell....................
over booking make your ticket price cheaper?
slavery also make all your product cheaper too, maybe we should just bring back slavery and start hunting other humans.
It's one thing to deny boarding to someone who hasn't gotten on the plane yet because the plane is already full... it's much, much worse to forcibly remove someone who has already been seated and injure them in the process, which is what happened. Whatever "right" they may have had to take him off the plane for business reasons, that doesn't justify roughing him up and dragging him on the floor.
really good video. I like how you make your videos relate to real life
Just another reason JetBlue is a cut above the rest. I honestly consider them the best airline by far.
I think that JetBlue does mainly do point to point flying (afaik), that makes things a lot easier for an airline.
This flight was not overbooked. They decided to boot seated passengers off the plane to accommodate employees they decided last minute they wanted to fly.
Great timing
I have volunteered a number of times, when flights are overbooked and wound up with some nice trips.
One time, my wife and I gave up seats on a Vegas-O'Hare non-stop and had to change planes at LAX. While we flew First from Vegas to L.A., L.A. to Chicago was showing First Class as overbooked.
Guess what? We pushed back at LAX with 6 empty seats in First.
We need Wikileaks to expose airliners hidden data on overbooking algorithms. (Evil laugh)
Nothing special about the algorythms. They are relatively simple machine learning models. They are created based on the no show data, which is more interesting than the model itself
Literally, do nothing for individuals and unnecessarily hurt the companies. All it would do would be like pouring blood into shark water.
Can you please talk louder? I put my volume up to high but I still cant hear you!!
Btw: Im not deaf
Endless Nightmares. i think he talkes fine
Thank you.
Yeah it's definitely super quiet, I just compared it to CGP Grey and WarOwl and I had to turn up my volume from 40 to 80 to hear what he's saying.
Yea, the volume is really low :/
no problems for my. My vloume is at 22% and I hear him fine.
We have it great in Australia. Our airlines don't over book. You have a 'guaranteed' seat! It's awesome!
Thanks for that background information, especially given the short time frame. HOWEVER, in the context of recent events, over booking does not justify beating your customers and dragging them off a seat that they have paid for and are sitting in. There is no apology for that.
Doesn't the airline keep the money if the customer does not show
yes, yes they do
Lol, obviously they do. Unless the passenger cancels the ticket before a specified deadline.
Cancelling doesn't accomplish anything from the perspective of most passengers. Most if not all of the ticket value would be lost to exorbitant change fees anyway.
If you pay with a credit card/debit card you can probably get your money back.
Yes for most of the time, but airline companies get even more profit from overbooking. That's why they do it.
Uhm.. could you please turn up the volume in the future? I noticed it on previous videos too but this one is severely quite. Please do my phones speakers a favor ^-^
watched it at home on my desktop computer, it was quiet.
Mr.Jeff.R Why are you telling everyone to "invest in some speakers", not everyone has a laptop.
Some people have cars also, theres this new invention the headphones for the videos that do not speak up. Twats that you say i kunt hear you i have an in fuckion in my ear.
DEnied boarding is the important factor. He wasn't denied boarding, he was dragged off so a United employee could have his seat.
i got kicked of a flight and my dad is a gold premier member because of often he flys. They realised and moved someone else off the flight and gave me business class for my second flight and a gift basket. Still sucks that they had to remove someone else of the flight and i felt really bad afterwards. The fact that if my dad wasn't premier, they would have kicked a 17 year old off the flight and have my parents go is still pretty bad though.
"If we can't beat our competitors, We'll beat our customers" -united
I just started watching this video and then I got bumped off my seat :-(
Trevor Best o the Irony in that sorry man.
AviationMan98 Aviation Why?
Did you get an upgraded seat
From what I came to understand about it, they didn't even offer the max amount of money to the people they asked to get off. The employees could offer $1300, but only offered him $1000.
Not all airlines overbook, well never seen overbooking in Europe tho.
TheRandomRon cough *9/11* cough
I'd like solid data on this assertion. I am European, I've lived in EU for 15+ years. I don't see KLM, Lufthansa, British, Iberia, Alitalia, etc., not overbooking. If anything, you tend to have more alternatives, distances are shorter so you're likely to find a plane ticket to your destination or a nearby city (e.g: if you need to go to Eindhoven, NL, you can safely go to Dusseldorf in Germany, and drive back home). The Airline industry works using the same rules, the only new kids on the block are the "Budget Airlines", but that's another business model.
+Nairobi Karis The US _does not_ have good economic policies for people, it has good economic policies for corporations.
Marzik Gaming you don't see overbooking in the EU because it's illegal, at least in Spain
I was flying with British airways and they overbooked our flight. I am from an island and the flight got cancelled which means that we missed our next two connected flights (Aberdeen to Heathrow to Malaga). The airline gave us free boat tickets which was 12 hours sitting on an uncomfortable chair. We then spent hours trying to rebook flights and what they had to do in the end was overbook our flights. It does mean that our original flights did have 5 empty seats.
So even British Airways overbook flights..
I wonder how many people are going to book a flight just to get a chance at a lawsuit.
I think they're gonna get sued before another chance of a lawsuit. They're screwed.
My buddy travel accross Europe and always go as volountary overbook because gets some money and hotel for free
Is it just me or is the video quiet?
When he said Bangor, Maine I jumped a little like "o shit he knows where I am"
Ok this is out to the people who are seeing Wendover for the first time. He's not defending united he's simply trying to explain the situation and economics of the situation.
As someone who does not work in the airline industry, but knows *MANY* people who do: both of my mom's parents, plus her sister, were "lifers" at United Airlines (although they all have stopped flying United even though they have employee/retiree passes, because of changes in the system,) plus quite a few airline pilots (friends from college, where I dropped out before finishing, yet know plenty of people in the aerospace industry as a result.)
United's PR department is apparently the absolute worst on the planet.
A couple notes about their recent issues:
1. The "kid kicked off for wearing tights" incident: The kid was flying on an employee pass. United has had a policy - essentially forever - that you have to "dress up" when flying on an employee pass. I experienced this many times flying on my grandparents' or aunt's employee passes. As a kid, when we took family vacations on employee passes, I had to put on a suit and tie. United simply followed their policy in the "tights" incident. They just handled it badly. Reading in detail about the incident, they *DID* tell the teenager that she could board if she put pants or a skirt on over the tights. The teenager refused. The gate attendant said she couldn't go on. Again, perfectly within standard United policy, as explained to the teenager at the time. But explained *VERY BADLY* to the public in the aftermath.
2. This most recent "doctor dragged off the plane" incident: This one has some gray area. While "disallowing boarding" is firmly within United's rights, it's a little unclear what the situation is for REMOVING someone solely because the plane is overbooked. For those that haven't read the whole story: United loaded a full plane of passengers. Then, *AFTER* all seats were full, they made the decision that four United employees who needed to travel this route for their job needed to get on board. The practice of employees riding airliners as "passengers" to get to where they are actually needed is very common. It's called "deadheading". For example, a pilot may have one flight from San Francisco to Chicago, then their next flight is from Louisville to Denver. The pilot needs to get from Chicago to Louisville somehow. So they just get put in a regularly scheduled flight. Sometimes they take an empty seat in the passenger area, sometimes they ride in the extra seat in the cockpit, sometimes they ride in the fold-down seats used by the cabin crew, if there are fewer cabin crew than crew seats. (These seats are called "jump seats".) My guess (United hasn't confirmed this fact) is that there were more employees "deadheading" than there were available spare-crew seats. Thus, these employees needed to use passenger seats. On an overbooked plane. Herein lies the problem. If United had NOT yet loaded all paying passengers on the plane, they would have been fully within their rights to simply deny boarding to four passengers so the four deadheading employees could board. When doing this, an airline first has to ask for volunteers, generally compensated with a simple "we'll get you home on the next flight." If nobody volunteers, they offer money in addition to a reflight. In general (as they did in this case,) they offer larger amounts of money until people volunteer. The big rub in *THIS* case is that there is a maximum amount of money they are allowed by law to offer. (It's a little over $1300.) United only offered $800 before choosing to randomly decide who to kick off. Note that no law said they would HAVE to offer the full $1300 before denying some people boarding. But in all likelihood, had they bumped it up to the legal maximum, they probably would have had people get off. We don't know. We also don't know if actually removing someone from a plane once they're already onboard is legal. So we had the mis-steps in making seats available to the employees. Then we had the downright "shot themselves in the foot" response by United's PR team. Even if what they did was 100% legal, their PR team just threw a giant load of cow crap in their own faces with their treatment of the situation. Even a simple "we cannot comment at this time while we investigate what happened" would have been better than what they did.
seems to me like simply just selling the right amount of tickets would be easier
Wow talk about striking when the iron is hot! Nice job.
I am new to your videos and have been enjoying them very much. Any chance we can see some specific airplanes and/or the tech they employ? Like maybe stealth tech on a B-2 or F-117 etc. ? Thank you!
Your timing is impecable
"No-show?" Who the hell books a flight and doesn't show up? That shit ain't free you know.
Lots of people miss connections, get caught up with TSA, hit traffic, or just leave way too late.
nolasludge That's a fair point.
David Bergara - Gonzalez It's mostly because of transfer flights.
Did you watch the video?
or you leave, forgot your ticket and then when you get back after like 15 minutes of leaving YOUR ROOMMATE is already having a party and your ticket is in someone's drink and ripped up
Imagine the money this guy is making, he gets a decent amount of views on videos of a decent length and hes always trending AND his channel is suitable for ALL ages! Clever guy meeting those guidelines!
Happened to my mom one time on a flight from Germany to Norway. But instead of kicking someone off, they offered everyone on the plane 300€ and a stay in a hotel for the night. And my mom took the offer. I think that‘s a lot better than abusing and dragging someone off the plane.
underrated comment
United's logic
Kick a PAYING passenger out in order to let their employees, who gets PAYED by United, sit.
There are sometimes good reasons,
to bump paying passengers to put a deadheading crew on a flight to be in position to work some subsequent flight. That can be necessary on short notice if a scheduled crew member gets sick, or the planned crew “times out” due to delays on earlier flights.
Airline crews are subject to a complicated set of FAA regulations limiting how long they can work at a stretch and how long the rest periods they receive must be. If a crew has been scheduled to work a flight that will take them close to their time limit, even small delays before departure can cause them to time out, or reach a point where they would time out before the flight reached its destination…delays may create a situation where the pilots still have time to work the flight, but will be required to take a rest break at the destination and won’t be eligible to work the return flight or their next scheduled leg…. Better to offload four passengers to make room for two pilots and two flight attendants than to cancel the onward or return flight that will inconvenience and delay seventy passengers in the case of a regional jet, or several times if the cancellation has ripple effects through the later schedule.
So the airlines are selling the same seats twice? Wtf
TheRamboBeast yes, they lose money if they don't
that is what the video said, yes
No they don,t "RamButBest" they got paid for the seat and saved on the fuel, so fuck off.
+Alia Clearwater
No, they earn less money if they don't.
***** they oversell because over time with all of the no-shows they spend more money to operate than they're taking in statistically.
Holy shit 500k plus subs. Crazy to say been here since 1k!!
bla bla bla, this is considered illegal in Europe Union for a reason!
That's why i choose airlines from Europe on Intercontinental flights
EU? More like ew
@@buzzlightyear6960 Very constructive criticism.