[stevepaa]

Took the UAL red eye from SFO to IAD Thursday night and arrived at IAD just before 6 am Friday morning. Next flight was 8:15 to JFK. Had a quick breakfast, go to the gate at 6:45 and find the plane is delayed to 9:41.

Continous rolling updates until 12:45 when United gives us a gate change and says they are ferrying a plane in. Seems original was still in Charlotte on ground with mechanical. Ferried plance arrived at 12:15 but they can't find the original crew. Crew shows up at 12:45 to a round of applause. 15 minutes later they report a slight mechanical with new plane. At 1:30 they cancel the flight.

We get rebooked for a flight to Laguardia at 2:35. Go to gate and informed that all flights to JFK, LGA and EWR are cancelled due to wind.

At 2 pm go to United Pax desk and request luggage. They say it will take 2 hours. Go to rental car phones to get car to drive. None of the rental agencies will allow a car on a one way to NY airports.

Go back to United and wait in long line to get hotel voucher for the night and rebooked on flight for Saturday morning. All JFK flights booked, so we book to LGA.

Go down to baggage at 4 pm, no luggage. Go to Luggage desk for assistance. Repeat this last two sentences 4 times. Luggage finally shows up at 8:30 pm, more than 6 hours after first request.

Get to hotel at 9:30 and have room service and go to bed.

The measure of service is not in how a company and its employees handle regular events but in how they handle unusual ones. United has no clue on this.

PS. One couple on the same cancelled JFK morning flight had a connection in the afternnon at JFK to China. They had informed every United agent and help desk person of their situation during the morning but United did nothing for them and so they flew back to their home.