boarding

Originally uploaded by Joi.

We turned up at Heathrow airport on New Year’s Day for a flight to New York with United Airlines. Because we had just flown in from Copenhagen we were four hours early. I walked up to the empty United Airlines desk and asked whether we were too early to check in.

“Actually, you’re one of the last,” came the reply.

“Ha ha” I said.

“So you’re going to Washington?” asks the woman.

“No,” I smile, thinking we’re having a jolly little New Year’s Day jest. “We’re going to New York.”

The woman took our passports, scanned her computer and then said that she had no record of us on the flight. When I took out the e-booking printout (it’s amazing what marriage can do to a person’s organizational skills) and handed it to the woman her face fell.

“When did you book this flight?” she said. “We don’t do these flights anymore. They were canceled a couple of months ago. The next flight to New York is tomorrow. But if you hurry over to the ticketing desk maybe they can get you on this flight to Washington and then you can transfer to New York.”

Our flight had been canceled completely. Forever. No more 6.55pm flights from London to New York with United Airlines on any day. And they hadn’t even bothered to tell us. At the ticketing desk I found out that United had our home address, our email address and our phone number. But no one thought to warn us (or any of the other customers, I guess) that they had discontinued their service.

Luckily there was enough time for United to book us on the next direct flight to New York with Virgin but what if we had turned up a little later or if we’d had other connecting flights to catch?

Five days on I’m a little less angry than I was at the time but I can’t help thinking that an airline that cancels flights without telling passengers is basically saying that it doesn’t care about them. I’ve made about three transatlantic flights a year with United for the past three years. But not any more.

When I asked why they had canceled the 6.55pm flight I was told that it wasn’t making enough money. Apparently the flight was always full, but it was full of economy customers like me rather than the first class/business passengers that bring in the real money.

A few days after our experience United passengers around the world were delayed for hours after a computer system went down. Within a day or so there were news reports that United was close to bouncing back from the financial limbo it has been in for the past few years. It’s hard to believe on evidence like this.