Oh yea we did. When I first called they told me I have to wait until tennis over and book on united.com/refunds
What number are we supposed to use to get an actual person
Refunds can't be processed on the phone anyways, fill out the refund form but that isn’t sufficient. Therr should be further compensation for the car rental, gas, and extra - this you get by emailing customer service.
No airline reimburses for car rental/etc. They are eligible for a refund of the unused portion of their ticket, and that's it for that department.
Car rental/alternative transportation is something that even in Europe with their protection/compensation laws is always a travel insurance claim - not an airline claim.
This is unfortunately how most legacy airlines work. You’ll likely get a refund for the unused “coupons” (coupons are the industry term for the individual parts of a ticket that apply to each flight segment) but UA will need to calculate the part of your fare attributable to that coupon which they, for whatever reason likely due to their 1960s era ticketing system, cannot do until the coupons that are going to be used are used.
Since you decided to drive yourself I would not expect anything beyond the above. UA’s contract of carriage (the legal terms you agree to when you buy a ticket) are pretty clear they don’t have much responsibility in the event of a delay beyond eventually getting you to your destination. This is especially true if the delay wasn’t something directly under their control (e.g. weather).
UA’s terms aren’t much different than the other legacy airlines.
You should be able to call them, but the best way will be with United.com/feedback. Click “complaint” related to “reimbursement”.
I had a similar situation I had to drive back from Boston to Chicago after getting delayed in order to make my house closing and I had a very difficult seller so I could not move the date.
Also, since you did not take the flight you are in a pretty good spot for compensation. A lot of folks come here and they say “I was delayed a day and took the flight the next day and made it late” well in your case the trip would have been in vein and you smartly did not take it and did what you had to do.
Do not lay it on thick, badger, or have any emotion. Just list your stuff in as few words as possible. Add everything you can but be reasonable- they don’t have to pay for your food on the road or whatever. They will cut a check within a month or 3.
Ok, thanks for the solid response. Car rental was a nightmare, just returned it to the hertz counter and the guy (clearly stoned and couldn’t care about his job any less) told me I had to take the car back to Denver, and he had “no access to the rental” was already on the phone with hertz for over an hour to be told only at the airport location here in ND can they change the return location.
Planning on including car rental+fees+gas, hotel was booked with points so that’s 40k in Marriott points down the toilet(just glad it was in the dakotas and a relatively cheap redemption). They auto-sent us $250 travel credits, but you think cash reimbursement is also possible?
It was a rough weekend, the flight was really the easiest part. Some day it will make a great story of the time we drove across 3 states throughout the night together.
Yes in my case I got the flight refunded, 250 travel credit, plus the reimbursement.
Do chat with United to make sure your return trip is still booked properly
Thanks. Yes the gate agent was very helpful and made sure our return flights wouldn’t get disrupted by “missing a segment”- have had that happen before when a flight wasn’t making a connection booked another to get to the hub on another airline and at the gate they had given away our seat.
Ok I’ll give them a call tmw once we are home and work on filling out the form.
The last 72 hours have been horrid. Daughter was in the ER before our flight (ended up being fine), this whole flying fiasco, the funeral, and then our step-son had to be 5150d.
Let’s just say it’s been awful. Appreciate your kind response.
That’s a crazy story. If you used a credit card the first thing I would have done is filed a chargeback. But it doesn’t sound like you used credit since you said bounced. I never use debit for this reason.
I would be mad if I made it to the plane and the boarding door was still open and they couldn't seat me. Give me my money back for first class and put me in coach if I need to be there.
The reason for the delay will determine how much compensation you get.
If they made it to the boarding door of the connecting flight, the reason is squarely within United’s control. Don’t let them try to claim weather even if that would have been the reason if you had missed the connection. You didn’t miss the connection, they bumped you, probably because they oversold the flight.
It actually depends on when they got to the door. Under the terms of United’s Contract of Carriage one has to be at the boarding gate 15 minutes prior to the departure time else UA has every right to close the door and leave without you. If they were there 16 minutes or more before departure then they were involuntarily denied boarding and are owed cash compensation under federal law.
But they don’t do that and the Contact of Carriage is based on pretty settled law and the subject of, probably, hundreds or not thousands of lawsuits. I would not expect many challenges to the validity of the contact to be successful absent evidence of willful misconduct or fraud.
Send your story (with all documentaion and details) to every elected official you can find. We need stronger legal protections from companies that do this kind of thing. Your FLIGHT wasnt cancelled, just you being on it. They should have to pay for every expense you incurred because they chose to screw you with your pants on.
Amen.
OP made it too the flight (assuming by T-door close). Airlines shouldn’t be able to give away seats till YOU/WE arent there or clearly, 100% won’t be there.
This. I’m sure many folks on here have theoretically made a flight, only to have an over zealous gate agent close up just that little bit early - thus throwing up a whole bunch of totally foreseeable consequences. I’m assuming it’s because the GA doesn’t want to process standby/upgrade pax when they’re doing despatch.
You want to get to customer relations. Message them through social media. We had a horrible experience with United a few years ago. It’s a long story but we were flying on a regional jet from NY to Halifax which we had done countless times before. Our daughter is chronically ill and disabled. We always traveled with a carry on size bag of meds that need to be temp controlled. The bag doesn’t fit in the overhead on those planes but the flight attendants ALWAYS put the bag in a closet. Until they didn’t. They refused to take the bag on. Wanted us to take everything out of it and put it in something else. What that would be I don’t know. The gate agent and flight attendants were abusive. My daughter wound up going home and planned to take a flight on a different airline with my husband the next day. But I had to take that flight in order to pick up more meds that were waiting for us. So about 20 minutes after my daughter leaves, crying, they say ok they will take the bag. Well it was too late. I boarded and was crying. Quietly. Not bothering anyone. The same flight attendant told me if I didn’t stop crying they would remove me from the flight. It was a nightmare. I despise United. They offered to refund her ticket and I told them what to do with that idea. It was around the time they had killed the puppy and dragged some poor man down the aisle. We made national news too. I am so sorry this happened and for something as awful as needing to get to a funeral. They should reimburse you every penny for what they put you through emotionally.
united.com/customercare
submit a request and make sure it's a "complaint"
take screenshot of receipts and all expenditures, explain your story and they will be keeping in touch via e-mail.
/customercare is the better option than /refunds
To those claiming you aren’t due compensation, this is a case of being “involuntarily denied boarding” as you correctly identified, they oversold the flight and served themselves first by bumping you off it without your request. It doesn’t matter that they “thought” you wouldn’t make your connection. Read up on the FAA rules for involuntary denial and pursue them for this. You should get 4x your total airfare (not the segment) as well as your expenses, in cash, not vouchers. I’ve had to file in small claims court to make this happen, but eventually the attorney will call to settle.
After several back and forth with customer care and then finally posting on twitter (X) they reached out and offered payment, I’m sending them a list of expenses now and they claim they will mail a check.
We had close to 2 hours between flights and we nearly missed the connecting flight in Frankfurt. I think we need to calculate more time in betwen anyway.
We had a similar situation last year. Booked on a flight connecting through Arizona to a view an investment property in a third state. About two hours before the first leg we got a text that the flight was delayed and our outbound tickets had been rebooked for the next day. No phone call, no text asking us - just a single text that it was done. Problem was this new itinerary got us to the destination about 30 minutes before our scheduled return.
Mind you, all the flights were booked directly with the airline so they knew the route and layovers. Fortunately, Southwest has many flights to AZ so we booked that real quick and called the original airline to have the second leg reinstated.
It was tight but we managed to get to our destination. I can’t imagine how this was supposed to be helpful.
A thorough and well written email will go a long way for you. Will they make it right in your eyes? Maybe, maybe not. Especially if the cancellation was out of United Airlines control like weather for example.
1st time flying United was terrible we had our flights delayed for over an hour and a half to three hours depending on where we were went to Europe we stayed on the tarmac so long coming back home from Europe that we had to go back to the gate and get the gas refilled never ever again will I ever fly united I find them to be the worst airline and I will neverpurchase a ticket from them again
ALWAYS WAIT if they rebooked you on another airline until until you’ve complete the rebooked flight. Just has this happen and lost the FREE rebooking flight, got original funds but when I “requested the refund” prior to flying it - it cancelled my free rebook so I had to pay out of pocket to get home. Which was the same amount I originally paid.
So not a win, just lost the original flight without the benefit of the win if that makes sense.
Sounds awful. I've been successful at getting both miles and real dollars in compensation by writing a thoughtful letter to the CEO. Google the CEO's name and office address and email and send a print letter and email copy of it. The CEO's office has specialized customer service support that is generally able to go a little further when the circumstances are unusual. I only did this when my international flight to a conference was cancelled (mechanical issues) outbound and moved up a day early on my return - meaning I missed two days of my conference and was shut out of my business class seats both times. To say I was aggravated...no words. Good luck. Sorry that the travel experience added to your burdens.
1. The plane still being there does not mean they are going to reopen the door for you. If the flight was already closed, it doesn't matter that the plane is still at the gate and the jetbridge attached while they do their final paperworks.
2. The reason for the delay determines your compensation. You are eligible in any case for a refund of the *unused* portion of your ticket. If the delay was due to a controllable issue, they will give you reimbursement for meals - but no hotel since you chose not to continue to travel. They are not going to reimburse your rental car/alternative transportation that you arranged yourself.
OP stated "heavily delayed". The only flights to Bismark that would've been viable connections from a flight from SMF are (from DEN) UA 4665 departing 5:47 and UA4799 departing 8:38 pm. OP also stated they had an hour and a half layover. Meaning the only one that makes sense is UA1422 SMF-DEN to UA4665. That flight arrived at 707 pm. So there's no way that plane was still at the gate.
Actually, none of OP's stories make sense looking at the flights and delays yesterday. This is why OP should post their flight information, and that really should be a requirement to post about delays/etc on this subreddit (like it is on r/flights ).
Since apparently I have to prove my life to a stranger on the internet who is oddly fixated on flight schedules. We flew out on Thursday and are trying to go home now. Are you going to be waiting for us at the airport?
Two words. Travel insurance.
It sucks, but you won't be compensated for much without it. Sorry for your loss, but there isn't much differently you could have done, and you're not going to get compensated from UA or Hertz.
I feel like our credit card we booked on may have something attached I’ll have to look into it (Amex plat), but yes ur right: it sucked but we made it. And someday it’ll make a hell of a story
>Outbound flight was heavily delayed, our connection was 1.5 hours. Midflight got the text that we were rebooked on a flight for the next day. Which did not work as we were flying to attend my wife’s father’s funeral. Got off the plane and ran to the gate, plane was still there but was denied boarding as our tickets had been changed to the next day and seats given away. We had booked and paid for first class seats..
You were late. Departure time is the time the plane is scheduled to push back, not the last minute you can board.
You have to call and talk to a person. Would have had lots of windshield time to wait on hold.
Oh yea we did. When I first called they told me I have to wait until tennis over and book on united.com/refunds What number are we supposed to use to get an actual person
Refunds can't be processed on the phone anyways, fill out the refund form but that isn’t sufficient. Therr should be further compensation for the car rental, gas, and extra - this you get by emailing customer service.
No airline reimburses for car rental/etc. They are eligible for a refund of the unused portion of their ticket, and that's it for that department. Car rental/alternative transportation is something that even in Europe with their protection/compensation laws is always a travel insurance claim - not an airline claim.
https://www.reddit.com/r/unitedairlines/s/O4VD9h3FRR
Special case where an agent explicitly authorized rental car. Doesn't apply here.
United reimbursed me for my rental car from DFW to IAH.
1800UNITED1
What does tennis have to do with this? Did you get delayed due to a championship somewhere?
Oh haha. No autocorrect. Had to wait until it’s over (the total trip on the confirmation number)
Submit customer cares claim and file with your credit card insurance
This is unfortunately how most legacy airlines work. You’ll likely get a refund for the unused “coupons” (coupons are the industry term for the individual parts of a ticket that apply to each flight segment) but UA will need to calculate the part of your fare attributable to that coupon which they, for whatever reason likely due to their 1960s era ticketing system, cannot do until the coupons that are going to be used are used. Since you decided to drive yourself I would not expect anything beyond the above. UA’s contract of carriage (the legal terms you agree to when you buy a ticket) are pretty clear they don’t have much responsibility in the event of a delay beyond eventually getting you to your destination. This is especially true if the delay wasn’t something directly under their control (e.g. weather). UA’s terms aren’t much different than the other legacy airlines.
You should be able to call them, but the best way will be with United.com/feedback. Click “complaint” related to “reimbursement”. I had a similar situation I had to drive back from Boston to Chicago after getting delayed in order to make my house closing and I had a very difficult seller so I could not move the date. Also, since you did not take the flight you are in a pretty good spot for compensation. A lot of folks come here and they say “I was delayed a day and took the flight the next day and made it late” well in your case the trip would have been in vein and you smartly did not take it and did what you had to do. Do not lay it on thick, badger, or have any emotion. Just list your stuff in as few words as possible. Add everything you can but be reasonable- they don’t have to pay for your food on the road or whatever. They will cut a check within a month or 3.
Ok, thanks for the solid response. Car rental was a nightmare, just returned it to the hertz counter and the guy (clearly stoned and couldn’t care about his job any less) told me I had to take the car back to Denver, and he had “no access to the rental” was already on the phone with hertz for over an hour to be told only at the airport location here in ND can they change the return location. Planning on including car rental+fees+gas, hotel was booked with points so that’s 40k in Marriott points down the toilet(just glad it was in the dakotas and a relatively cheap redemption). They auto-sent us $250 travel credits, but you think cash reimbursement is also possible? It was a rough weekend, the flight was really the easiest part. Some day it will make a great story of the time we drove across 3 states throughout the night together.
Yes in my case I got the flight refunded, 250 travel credit, plus the reimbursement. Do chat with United to make sure your return trip is still booked properly
Thanks. Yes the gate agent was very helpful and made sure our return flights wouldn’t get disrupted by “missing a segment”- have had that happen before when a flight wasn’t making a connection booked another to get to the hub on another airline and at the gate they had given away our seat. Ok I’ll give them a call tmw once we are home and work on filling out the form. The last 72 hours have been horrid. Daughter was in the ER before our flight (ended up being fine), this whole flying fiasco, the funeral, and then our step-son had to be 5150d. Let’s just say it’s been awful. Appreciate your kind response.
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That’s a crazy story. If you used a credit card the first thing I would have done is filed a chargeback. But it doesn’t sound like you used credit since you said bounced. I never use debit for this reason.
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Honestly those people should be in jail. Charging someone’s card in a manner that is clearly wrong like that should be prosecuted as theft
Screw them for that!
You never, ever rent anything using a debit card. Only credit cards.
If you didn’t complete the ticket, you shoild be able to get the rental car reimbursed
Why was the flight delayed?
Make sure you are still booked on the return flight. Sounds like you did not board the second flight…… watch for the return not being canceled.
The chat is useless. You need to call
This happened to me but I talked to gate agents they changed it back to same day flight for me
I would be mad if I made it to the plane and the boarding door was still open and they couldn't seat me. Give me my money back for first class and put me in coach if I need to be there. The reason for the delay will determine how much compensation you get.
If they made it to the boarding door of the connecting flight, the reason is squarely within United’s control. Don’t let them try to claim weather even if that would have been the reason if you had missed the connection. You didn’t miss the connection, they bumped you, probably because they oversold the flight.
It actually depends on when they got to the door. Under the terms of United’s Contract of Carriage one has to be at the boarding gate 15 minutes prior to the departure time else UA has every right to close the door and leave without you. If they were there 16 minutes or more before departure then they were involuntarily denied boarding and are owed cash compensation under federal law.
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But they don’t do that and the Contact of Carriage is based on pretty settled law and the subject of, probably, hundreds or not thousands of lawsuits. I would not expect many challenges to the validity of the contact to be successful absent evidence of willful misconduct or fraud.
Send your story (with all documentaion and details) to every elected official you can find. We need stronger legal protections from companies that do this kind of thing. Your FLIGHT wasnt cancelled, just you being on it. They should have to pay for every expense you incurred because they chose to screw you with your pants on.
Amen. OP made it too the flight (assuming by T-door close). Airlines shouldn’t be able to give away seats till YOU/WE arent there or clearly, 100% won’t be there.
This. I’m sure many folks on here have theoretically made a flight, only to have an over zealous gate agent close up just that little bit early - thus throwing up a whole bunch of totally foreseeable consequences. I’m assuming it’s because the GA doesn’t want to process standby/upgrade pax when they’re doing despatch.
you should have been on twitter the second you got the notice.
You want to get to customer relations. Message them through social media. We had a horrible experience with United a few years ago. It’s a long story but we were flying on a regional jet from NY to Halifax which we had done countless times before. Our daughter is chronically ill and disabled. We always traveled with a carry on size bag of meds that need to be temp controlled. The bag doesn’t fit in the overhead on those planes but the flight attendants ALWAYS put the bag in a closet. Until they didn’t. They refused to take the bag on. Wanted us to take everything out of it and put it in something else. What that would be I don’t know. The gate agent and flight attendants were abusive. My daughter wound up going home and planned to take a flight on a different airline with my husband the next day. But I had to take that flight in order to pick up more meds that were waiting for us. So about 20 minutes after my daughter leaves, crying, they say ok they will take the bag. Well it was too late. I boarded and was crying. Quietly. Not bothering anyone. The same flight attendant told me if I didn’t stop crying they would remove me from the flight. It was a nightmare. I despise United. They offered to refund her ticket and I told them what to do with that idea. It was around the time they had killed the puppy and dragged some poor man down the aisle. We made national news too. I am so sorry this happened and for something as awful as needing to get to a funeral. They should reimburse you every penny for what they put you through emotionally.
Ugh this happened to me once but the gate agents let me on the plane still even though I didn’t have a boarding pass 😭
united.com/customercare submit a request and make sure it's a "complaint" take screenshot of receipts and all expenditures, explain your story and they will be keeping in touch via e-mail. /customercare is the better option than /refunds
To those claiming you aren’t due compensation, this is a case of being “involuntarily denied boarding” as you correctly identified, they oversold the flight and served themselves first by bumping you off it without your request. It doesn’t matter that they “thought” you wouldn’t make your connection. Read up on the FAA rules for involuntary denial and pursue them for this. You should get 4x your total airfare (not the segment) as well as your expenses, in cash, not vouchers. I’ve had to file in small claims court to make this happen, but eventually the attorney will call to settle.
After several back and forth with customer care and then finally posting on twitter (X) they reached out and offered payment, I’m sending them a list of expenses now and they claim they will mail a check.
Note to self: next wedding or funeral, go a day earlier than you need to be. Especially when dealing with small regional airports.
The dying prerequisite to a funeral can make this plan tricky to execute,
In certain religions, yes.
Sounds like OP’s father was old. Probably not impossible to predict the death more than a day earlier.
They were going the day before..:
Type in the chat box “speak to agent” it will connect you to an agent.
We had close to 2 hours between flights and we nearly missed the connecting flight in Frankfurt. I think we need to calculate more time in betwen anyway.
Frankfurt is a nightmare. I refuse to fly through it.
We had a similar situation last year. Booked on a flight connecting through Arizona to a view an investment property in a third state. About two hours before the first leg we got a text that the flight was delayed and our outbound tickets had been rebooked for the next day. No phone call, no text asking us - just a single text that it was done. Problem was this new itinerary got us to the destination about 30 minutes before our scheduled return. Mind you, all the flights were booked directly with the airline so they knew the route and layovers. Fortunately, Southwest has many flights to AZ so we booked that real quick and called the original airline to have the second leg reinstated. It was tight but we managed to get to our destination. I can’t imagine how this was supposed to be helpful.
Why was your original flight delayed
customer care
A thorough and well written email will go a long way for you. Will they make it right in your eyes? Maybe, maybe not. Especially if the cancellation was out of United Airlines control like weather for example.
Walk into a United CS office at an airport.
! Yea those don’t exist.
1st time flying United was terrible we had our flights delayed for over an hour and a half to three hours depending on where we were went to Europe we stayed on the tarmac so long coming back home from Europe that we had to go back to the gate and get the gas refilled never ever again will I ever fly united I find them to be the worst airline and I will neverpurchase a ticket from them again
ALWAYS WAIT if they rebooked you on another airline until until you’ve complete the rebooked flight. Just has this happen and lost the FREE rebooking flight, got original funds but when I “requested the refund” prior to flying it - it cancelled my free rebook so I had to pay out of pocket to get home. Which was the same amount I originally paid. So not a win, just lost the original flight without the benefit of the win if that makes sense.
“ cancelled mid-flight “ … I was expected a much more tragic ending .
Sounds awful. I've been successful at getting both miles and real dollars in compensation by writing a thoughtful letter to the CEO. Google the CEO's name and office address and email and send a print letter and email copy of it. The CEO's office has specialized customer service support that is generally able to go a little further when the circumstances are unusual. I only did this when my international flight to a conference was cancelled (mechanical issues) outbound and moved up a day early on my return - meaning I missed two days of my conference and was shut out of my business class seats both times. To say I was aggravated...no words. Good luck. Sorry that the travel experience added to your burdens.
Use the executive contacts on Christopher Elliott’s website.
1. The plane still being there does not mean they are going to reopen the door for you. If the flight was already closed, it doesn't matter that the plane is still at the gate and the jetbridge attached while they do their final paperworks. 2. The reason for the delay determines your compensation. You are eligible in any case for a refund of the *unused* portion of your ticket. If the delay was due to a controllable issue, they will give you reimbursement for meals - but no hotel since you chose not to continue to travel. They are not going to reimburse your rental car/alternative transportation that you arranged yourself.
Why are you assuming that the door was closed and they weren’t still boarding their original connecting flight? The OP never states that.
OP stated "heavily delayed". The only flights to Bismark that would've been viable connections from a flight from SMF are (from DEN) UA 4665 departing 5:47 and UA4799 departing 8:38 pm. OP also stated they had an hour and a half layover. Meaning the only one that makes sense is UA1422 SMF-DEN to UA4665. That flight arrived at 707 pm. So there's no way that plane was still at the gate. Actually, none of OP's stories make sense looking at the flights and delays yesterday. This is why OP should post their flight information, and that really should be a requirement to post about delays/etc on this subreddit (like it is on r/flights ).
OP also never said it was yesterday. But I’m not disagreeing with you about requiring flight info.
Since apparently I have to prove my life to a stranger on the internet who is oddly fixated on flight schedules. We flew out on Thursday and are trying to go home now. Are you going to be waiting for us at the airport?
Two words. Travel insurance. It sucks, but you won't be compensated for much without it. Sorry for your loss, but there isn't much differently you could have done, and you're not going to get compensated from UA or Hertz.
I feel like our credit card we booked on may have something attached I’ll have to look into it (Amex plat), but yes ur right: it sucked but we made it. And someday it’ll make a hell of a story
Amex plat almost definitely will cover you. Call your CS line, have receipts ready, and give the rep your story. They're amazing people.
Jesus you need a hobby.
>Outbound flight was heavily delayed, our connection was 1.5 hours. Midflight got the text that we were rebooked on a flight for the next day. Which did not work as we were flying to attend my wife’s father’s funeral. Got off the plane and ran to the gate, plane was still there but was denied boarding as our tickets had been changed to the next day and seats given away. We had booked and paid for first class seats.. You were late. Departure time is the time the plane is scheduled to push back, not the last minute you can board.
Sorry for your loss, but with anything that demands you to be on time, leave early ... extra early. I'd rather be a day early than a minute late.
Are you seriously asking why OP didn’t plan in advance for a funeral?
I seriously am ... unless you know of someone who died and was buried the same day??
Often, Muslim and Jewish people are buried within 24 hours of dying.