Here’s how United Airlines screwed me out of 800$ for nothing

This story is about basic customer service and decency, it’s an unfortunate case of a lot of those big companies and it seems to be even more common with Airlines

I have been a loyal United Airlines customer for years and all my international travel was with the company.

Over the last 3–4 years I probably spent 30,000$ for flights with United on the Tel-Aviv -> SFO line (not the new direct one).

Here’s the story of what happened.

On June 15th I booked flights to go to Vancouver with my family. If you are on a working visa in the US you know you need to renew your I-94 by going out of the country every 2 years.

So, I booked a flight for my family (4+infant) and paid everything. It turned out 297.36 per person.

Yesterday, I found out I will need to book an earlier flight since the I94 expires 3 days earlier than I expected.

This is totally my mistake and it’s a stupid one to make, I am aware of it.

I called United to ask for a flight change and after 17 minutes on the line I got an answer that the change fee for the flight is over 2000$

Mind you the original price was 297*4 so essentially is double what I paid summing up to 3000$ for a fight from SFO to Vancouver.

Shocked, I asked to cancel the flights all together and was told that they DO NOT refund money to the credit card but save it as credit and then, if you want to book another flight there’s a 200$ per person fee to reserve a different flight.

Basically, this means I lost 800$ for nothing.

Few things to note here.

1. I did not expect the change to be free, this was my mistake and I am fully aware of it, I went into the call expecting and willing to pay a fee for a flight change
2. I did not expect a 2000$ change fee and was absolutely not willing to pay it.
3. Even if there’s a 200$ change fee (which I am willing to pay), why would it be per person?

Summing up

This is the first ever “bad customer service” post I have written online. It’s also the first post I ever write while upset.

You be the judge whether this is a customer service level you expect to get and what should have happened here.

I just ask that you RT and share this post with full force so that the executives and managers over at United know what they cause their customers. More often than not this bitterness stops with the customer service reps and don’t reach the top levels.

In a competitive world, customer service is everything.