I never win anything. I don't own any oversized not-so-plush bears from the fair or have any trophies on my dresser. I think the last time I won something it was a huge basket of Beanie Babies at a church auction circa 2001, and I am fairly certain the odds were stacked in my favor by my father.
However, my luck changed when I got a call last week from my new best friend Donita. It was regarding a series of Tweets I posted about what I thought was my first and last flight on United Airlines. She said the words that every woman with a string of failed relationships never thought she would hear, "You are right. I am sorry. Please let me fix this."
I fly back and forth between Syracuse, NY where I currently reside and my hometown in South Florida quite frequently. Sometimes for work, but most of the time for pleasure. I usually fly the budget airline Allegiant not because I enjoy sitting on a piece of foam core in a packed plane without a beverage service for three hours, but because this is the only direct flight out of Syracuse's tiny airport and it is usually the cheapest and the fastest option. To keep prices down Allegiant only flys on Thursdays and Sundays and due to an ironic scheduling conflict I needed a Friday afternoon flight. My only option was a United Airlines flight with a two and a half hour layover in Newark leaving, as they said, "promptly at 3:10 pm on Friday, November 10, 2017".
Now mind you I booked this flight months in advance. I was under the pretense I would be working an event in Syracuse the week prior to my flight to Florida for the 2017 edition of Small Press Fair Fort Lauderdale (#shamelessplug). As a broke graduate student, I opted for United's least expensive option harmlessly referred to as "basic economy". This option will still run you around $300 but the bonus is you get to sign away any of your rights to quality customer service. As well as the right to bring anything more than a bathing suit, toothbrush, and a pair of shorts as luggage. Luckily for this trip that was not an issue.
Things really started to go downhill the week prior to my planned departure. Due to an anachronistic outbreak of the mumps on Syracuse University's campus, the event that forced me to rearrange my travel plans and tack on an additional 4 hours to my trip was canceled. Ironically, the event's key speaker was supposed to be Jim Olson, a Newhouse alumni, and United Airlines very own VP of Corporate Communications. Equally as curious was the fact I was currently working on a report detailing United's crisis communication response to the forced removal of passenger Dr. David Dao in April of 2017. In other words, I was already apprehensively walking into this flight with way too much information about the airline.
Unsurprisingly, my experience was a complete shit show starting with my attempts to check in the night before. I never received any communications from United about checking in, when I finally found my confirmation number buried in my email I learned the online check-in was "unavailable to those in basic economy who are not checking a bag". United's website configuration for a mobile interface is hellish so I tried to check-in again on my computer before leaving for the airport the next day and learned my flight was delayed three hours due to unknown reasons. I immediately called the airline to get more information as I had yet to receive a single notification. The customer service representative assured me I was entitled to compensation and that she would adjust my connecting flight that I would miss due to the delay. My new arrival time in Ft. Lauderdale was 11 pm.
Once at the airport less than 30 minutes later I was informed that the woman on the phone had in fact done nothing about my connecting flight, that I was not entitled to any compensation as air traffic control issues were "outside of United's control", and that all connecting flights to Ft. Lauderdale were full. They were also unsure of our actual departure time and that the 3-hour delay was a rough guesstimate. When I asked what I should do the woman shrugged and said: "there was a flight that just left to D.C. if you were here 20 minutes ago I could have put you on that". Thank you very helpful. Ultimately she had to put me on a flight into Miami at 1:00 am out of Newark, an hour away from where I was going with a 30-minute layover for which I would have to bus across 3 terminals to reach. She handed me my ticket and said, "no promises".
I found a seat at the bar, ordered the largest beer they had (a Saranac Legacy IPA, classic local choice, 10/10 would recommend), and took to Twitter. Here is a sampling of my attempts to get United's attention.
It took a few tries and a couple trending hashtags I had come across in my research regarding the Dr. Dao dragging incident such as #unitedsucks, however eventually they did respond with the generic "we are sorry" tweet that companies use to demonstrate they hear you but don't plan to take any action, yet. So I persisted.
Eventually, my flight took off at 6:30 pm after sitting on the runway for an additional 30 minutes and I made it to my connection as the doors closed behind me. SPF'17 was a sweeping success and my flight home was uneventful and even pleasurable. I thought that was the end of it and I vowed to avoid any run-ins with United Airlines in the future. To my surprise, I got a phone as soon as I arrived home from the aforementioned Donita. She was calling to express her concern about my Twitter rampage and wanted to help. In the end, I walked away with a voucher for a free future flight and a much better association with United's customer service team and the airline as a whole. For a public relations graduate student this was a very teachable moment.
Now while this story has a happy public relations ending, I am not particularly proud of what I had to do to get noticed. I felt myself turning into one of "those" people who always pop up on my feeds complaining to companies about things that are far from their control. If I were to look in the mirror I would see my father staring back at me. It makes me think back to all the times he embarrassed me by scolding wait staff or fast food service workers in public. To which he would say, "I was just helping them". Or more relevantly, during our stressful holiday travels, where he would fight with gate attendants who I am sure would rather be home with their families. It makes me cringe.
But.
For me, I am going to brand this an experiment as to the power of Twitter. Prior to the election of Mr. Donald "twitter-fingers on the nuclear button" Trump, I preferred Instagram as my primary platform for social media interaction. This is likely because I am inherently a visual person, shocking I know. However, as an aspiring PR professional and someone who wants news quick and dirty, I thought it time to take the plunge. Although social media platforms and the internet may serve as the new public forum, there is something different about hiding behind a screen in order to voice your displeasure with a company. Maybe it is the removal of a human element, or maybe I am just making excuses to avoid facing the fact I am turning into my father. Either way, it is certainly effective.