United Loads out of Melbourne?

[Ben W]

Not sure what they did on 826 out of Melbourne with the extra people, but when took off, business and First were full as well, so some people must have been upgraded for free or something? The check in line was the longest, and slowest moving that I have ever seen it in Melb- which is the reason the flight was late leaving. We got in line at 10:45 and stood in it until 12:15 before reaching the counter! There were at least 150 and maybe 200+ people behind us. It didn't seem as though they had enough staff on to handle the full flight or something?

Our flight from LAX-ORD was also oversold and they announced at the gate that they needed 6 people to surrender their seats in exchange for traveling first class on the following flight and also getting a free round-trip ticket that can be used from anywhere to anywhere and back in the continental US before the end of 09........which I though at the time was a good deal........and so did the other 40+ people that jumped out of their chairs and rushed the ticket counter.

[Andrew M]

Again I suspect the high loads were due to V Australia booking people onto the United flight.

I remember flying UA alot when growing up and constant overselling of seats

[NickN]

Would they be obligated to upgrade the oversold pax to another class for free and get them to their destination even if they refuse to pay to upgrade due to the airlines error? I assume a passenger who purchased one of the oversold seats would have a claim against the airline for damages if they missed a connection overseas or suffered any losses etc from being bumped from the flight?

I am pretty sure it was on Airline, the EasyJet one where one of the staff or maybe even the narrator mentioned they oversold seats on EasyJet flights because they anticipated a certain number would not turn up for each flight. Seems kind of silly, but thats just my opinion of course.

[James K]

Originally Posted by NickN

Would they be obligated to upgrade the oversold pax to another class for free and get them to their destination even if they refuse to pay to upgrade due to the airlines error? I assume a passenger who purchased one of the oversold seats would have a claim against the airline for damages if they missed a connection overseas or suffered any losses etc from being bumped from the flight?

I am pretty sure it was on Airline, the EasyJet one where one of the staff or maybe even the narrator mentioned they oversold seats on EasyJet flights because they anticipated a certain number would not turn up for each flight. Seems kind of silly, but thats just my opinion of course.

Very few flights where I work are only sold to the capacity of the J, W and Y cabin. F is never oversold but J, W and Y are all the time and depending on time of year and route the oversale numbers vary greatly. Obviously seats in forward cabins are used in the event of an oversold Y cabin. However in the event the oversale does not clear with noshows, which by the way occur on just about every flight then volunteers are called for and offered monetary compensation for their inconvenience and in some cases upgrades on their new flight.

The airlines has no responsibility if a pax misses a connection with another separately booked itinerary. If you did have such a connection then you wouldn't really volunteer anyway!

[NickN]

I never knew that overselling was so common.

[Nigel C]

Originally Posted by NickN

I never knew that overselling was so common.

The old board covered this a few times over the years...tis a shame it's all gone otherwise I'd suggest a search!

[Sam Chui]

From my 800,000 miles travelling United experience, UA will offer Complimentary upgrade to Premier, Premier Exec and 1K when Economy is oversold. It is actually a good thing if you are a United Premier or above fly Y class when the flight are overbooked in Economy. No money needed for upgrade. I was lucky to have numerous flight upgraded completely free of charge at check in. On couple occasion, they even refunded the upgrade certificate I used back to my mileage plus account!! (terrific act)

Do a search on Flyertalk UA forum you will find out.

ExpertFlyer is another good tool to show flight availability and seat map but you need to pay monthly fee ($5?)

During low season SYD-LAX or SFO, it is NOT unusual to see UA loads in the low hundreds, this has always been the case since route launch. Australia route perform very well during peak seasons but failed to reach average load factor in low season.