United Airlines Panicked And Gave A Woman A $10,000 Voucher For Her Seat
NBC Washington - A D.C. woman will be flying for free for the next year after getting a $10,000 voucher from United Airlines. But she said the experience leading up to the voucher was not a pleasant one.
Allison Preiss said she was getting ready to board her flight from Washington Dulles International Airport to Austin, Texas, Thursday morning when ticketing agents said the flight was overbooked and they were looking for volunteers to take the next flight.
When no one volunteered, they told Preiss she had to give up her spot on the flight because she had paid the lowest fare.
Preiss started tweeting her frustration with the airline. She said she didn’t want to give up her spot because she was flying to a friend’s bachelorette party.
The gate agent told her the plane had a broken seat and that’s why she had to get bumped, according to Preiss.
The gate agents offered her a $2,000 voucher, but Preiss told them she would rather have a check.
They were about to write her a check for $650, when an agent offered her a $10,000 voucher and a seat on the next plane.
“I’m not going to lie, I’m pretty pumped,” Preiss said of the voucher.
Preiss made it to Austin in time for her friend’s bachelorette weekend.
Oh man this is GREAT. United is in a world of hurt right now. They killed that dog the other day, and now every little thing they do is under such an intense microscope they are walking on eggshells around anything and everything. Allison sent one tweet about how much United sucks, and they started tucking their tail between their legs. They cannot take another PR disaster.
And the thing is, Allison didn’t even go that viral. 100 or so RTs is NOTHING in the grand scheme of the Twitter world. She was just upset and sent out a few tweets, that probably happens to airlines minimum, I don’t know, 9,000 times a day. But she persisted, and next thing she knew, bam, $10,000 in travel vouchers. And not only that….
It’s absolutely hilarious they kick off “the lowest fare passenger”. Not the last person to buy a seat, but the person who got the best deal. I don’t know how they can single out 1 specific person who paid less than everyone else, but apparently they have a system in place for that.
I’ll tell you what, $10,000 and all I have to do is miss a little bit of pre-gaming for a bachelor party, sign me the fuckkkkk up. And she still got on the next flight and made it to Austin in time! What a steal! What a deal! I’m gonna have Allison negotiate my next raise, I’m gonna end up with guild bullion falling out of my ears. I mean the more I re-read the article, the less it makes sense.
They were about to write her a check for $650, when an agent offered her a $10,000 voucher and a seat on the next plane.
I need to know more about that line. Seems the inflection point of giving cash vs voucher is somewhere before the $650 cash:$10,000 voucher mark, but who knows.
All in all, now you know though- if you get bumped off a plane, demand $10k. They have it. They can do it. And apparently, they are very willing.