United Airlines takes a beating in the stock market
By Roman Sabella
So there’s a doctor, the Chicago police and a scorpion on a plane. Sounds like the start to a bad joke, right? Well, it’s more of a play-by-play of United Airlines this past week.
As if in a contest to become the next Perrier as far as PR debacles go, United Airlines has had one mess on their hands after another.
On Sunday April 9, two separate incidents occurred which, more so concerning one than the other, have single-handedly sparked the beginning of the end for United Airlines.
The lesser of these two events, occurred to a Canadian man named Richard Bell who was flying from Houston, Texas to Calgary, Canada.
While sitting in his seat a scorpion fell from the overhead baggage and landed on him to which he placed it on a plate and was stung by it. Although he received no major injuries and went on to both deny medical treatment and pursue no legal action, this comes in the wake of a far worse incident that, oddly enough, occurred the same day.
On a flight leaving from O’Hare International Airport to Louisville, Kentucky, Dr. David Dao, a 69-year-old Vietnamese-American, was forcefully dragged off the plane by Chicago police after refusing to surrender his seat.
Dao was one of four randomly selected by staff to give up his seat so that the airline could transport four of its staff to Louisville. The passengers were offered $1,000 to take a flight the next day, but Dao refused because he needed to work at his Elizabethtown, Kentucky clinic where he serves as a pediatrician.
Upon refusing, the airline reached out to Chicago Aviation Security who sent several officers aboard who proceeded to drag and throw him from his seat.
Sustaining a concussion, broken nose and two lost teeth in the incident is outrageous and beyond excessive for a man that was breaking no laws.
Now, here is the part when United immediately suspends the staff involved and offers compensation right? Wrong says the great re-accommodator indignantly. Now is the time we blame the doctor for not giving up his seat.
In a letter to employees following the incident, Oscar Munoz, CEO of United Airlines, proceeded to state that, “While I deeply regret this situation arose, I also emphatically stand behind all of you and I want to commend you for continuing to go above and beyond to ensure we fly right,” and, “Treating our customers and each other with respect and dignity is at the core of who we are and we must always remember this no matter how challenging the situation.”
Upon the release of this internal memo though, his tune changed heavily as he likely realized that what he said boiled down to “we favor the staff over the customer and he honestly deserved what happened.”
It’s only made worse by the fact that this half-hearted apology and rescinding upon earlier comments comes in the wake of United losing nearly 3 percent in their stocks and almost $225 million dollars overall. This made this sound less like empathy and more like a company trying to cut their losses.
While ticket sales have not declined significantly — which is a plus for United — this could change as the general sentiment being passed around by both United pilots and the average Joe boils down to United Airlines being completely in the wrong on this farcical display of incompetence.
To add to the irony, this incident comes out less than a month after Oscar Munoz was named “Communicator of the Year” by PR Week.
While the future for the company looks dismal, and with good reason, they likely will bounce back based on one simple fact: people need airlines on a day-to-day basis.
It’s quite hard for people to boycott something that quite literally allows them to get to and from places for work and vacation, especially if it is the only option.
As of now, the airline has changed policies so that crew members must arrive 60 minutes prior to departure in order to not displace paying customers.
United announced that it would be examining its current policies concerning “governing customer service, employee training and handling oversold flights,” but these results will not be revealed until April 30.
The only hope we can have is that Dao is heavily compensated and that the airline never resorts to such actions again, because as of now, the name United Airlines puts more than a bitter taste in your mouth, it also slams your head off an arm rest in the name of re-accommodation.
