United Airlines is by far the worst airline I have ever flown with. I had the pleasure of flying with them to London on business and then to vacation on the Bahamas within the span of 2 weeks, and what I experienced was pretty typical of what I have experienced in the past 10 years having traveled on United for business.
1) The 1st class lounge personnel did everything they could to make sure as little people got into their 1st class lounge as possible. I was told that my 1st class tickets did not suffice because the ‘partner’ airline they contracted with to get me from Florida to Exuma was not a ‘silver star partner’. I had just flown cross country 1st class, and did not have a choice in the airline carrier that would take me from the coast of Florida.
2) On my flight to London I witnessed them messing up my, along with another passenger’s special meal request.
3) Flight attendants were extremely rude. I asked one for a Kleenex since the fasten seatbelt sign was on, and she curtly told me ‘get one in the bathroom yourself’.
4) It took many efforts just to get my mileage credit with them. Unlike most airlines such as Alaska that allow you to enter your frequent flyer number as you book your ticket to minimize confusion, United forces its consumers to take the additional step of having to ‘request’ the miles after the flight and waiting for approval. When my miles finally did ‘approve’ they failed to credit me for half my flights and I had to call their India call center to makes sure I got re-credited the 3000 miles I was missing.
5) I have been a lifetime member with over 150k miles traveled with United. This time around, they did not even notify me when my last round of miles expired as they specify in their Mileage Plus agreements, and I was given the only 2 choices of paying $100 to reinstate the miles, or paying $200 to enter their ‘credit card challenge’ to reinstate the miles.
6) Their airplanes are old, stuffy, dirty, and out of date. Their chairs do not even lean back. There are no footrests for international flights, and my dust mite allergies go crazy.
United fails in every which way when it comes to customer service and value for your dollar.
