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    Crisis Management

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    Mars Cervantes
    United Airlines forcibly removed a paying passenger from a flight to make room for airline employees, dragging the passenger down the aisle bleeding and injured. The incident sparked widespread outrage. In response, the United Airlines CEO apologized for "having to re-accommodate these customers" but failed to acknowledge the passenger's injuries. Critics argued United Airlines responded poorly and should have offered incentives for voluntary bumping instead of involuntary removal of passengers. The incident highlighted the lack of transparency in airline overbooking and bumping policies.

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    Crisis Management

    Uploaded by

    Mars Cervantes
    46 views2 pages
    United Airlines forcibly removed a paying passenger from a flight to make room for airline employees, dragging the passenger down the aisle bleeding and injured. The incident sparked widespread outrage. In response, the United Airlines CEO apologized for "having to re-accommodate these customers" but failed to acknowledge the passenger's injuries. Critics argued United Airlines responded poorly and should have offered incentives for voluntary bumping instead of involuntary removal of passengers. The incident highlighted the lack of transparency in airline overbooking and bumping policies.

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    United Airlines forcibly removed a paying passenger from a flight to make room for airline employees, dragging the passenger down the aisle bleeding and injured. The incident sparked widespread outrage. In response, the United Airlines CEO apologized for "having to re-accommodate these customers" but failed to acknowledge the passenger's injuries. Critics argued United Airlines responded poorly and should have offered incentives for voluntary bumping instead of involuntary removal of passengers. The incident highlighted the lack of transparency in airline overbooking and bumping policies.

    Copyright:

    © All Rights Reserved
    Download as DOCX, PDF, TXT or read online from Scribd
    Download as docx, pdf, or txt
    46 views2 pages

    Crisis Management

    Uploaded by

    Mars Cervantes
    United Airlines forcibly removed a paying passenger from a flight to make room for airline employees, dragging the passenger down the aisle bleeding and injured. The incident sparked widespread outrage. In response, the United Airlines CEO apologized for "having to re-accommodate these customers" but failed to acknowledge the passenger's injuries. Critics argued United Airlines responded poorly and should have offered incentives for voluntary bumping instead of involuntary removal of passengers. The incident highlighted the lack of transparency in airline overbooking and bumping policies.

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    of 2

    Joshua Carlos I.

    Jose Emaj 3
    AB-Logistics 3-1

    Reaction paper on
    “Overbooked Flights in United Airlines”

    On Sunday 9th April 2017 Chicago Aviation Police officials dragged paying
    passenger 69 year old Vietnamese American Dr. David Dao off United Express Flight
    3411 from Chicago O’ Hare International Airport to Louisville, Kentucky to make room
    for 4 United Airlines Employees. Cellphone videos of Dr. Dao being dragged off Flight
    3411 elicited outrage. According to passengers, Dr. David Dao refused to giveup his
    seat on the Chicago to Louisville flight because he needed to see patients in the next
    morning. The footage shows him screaming as he was forced out of his seat by aviation
    security officers and dragged down the aisle by his arms. There was visible blood on his
    mouth, and his glasses and shirt were crooked. As a result of his rough treatment, Dr.
    Dao was hospitalized and suffered a concussion, a broken nose, injury to the sinuses,
    and the loss of two front tooth. CEO Oscar Munoz issued a statement “I apologize for
    having to re-accomodate these customers. Our team is moving with a sense of urgency
    to work with the authorities and conduct our own detailed review of what happened.”
    Munoz failed to acknowledge the injuries Dr. Dao suffered. The lack of empathy in
    United Airlines response added fuel to the fire and caused another wave of backlash
    towards the company, this incident highlights the power of social media, how one
    isolated incident can become a global PR disaster overnight. The debate over what the
    problem in this case is ongoing, was it a bad call by flight crew? Was it the fault of an
    uncooperative passenger?

    When I first watched the video I was shocked and horrified, I’ve paid close
    attention to the crisis, watching as the internet’s mob mobilized, while shaking my head
    at how United Airlines responded. It is not an impressive move, they could have offered
    a hotel room to whoever wanted to leave, and if no one wanted to volunteer they could
    upped the offer until someone did. Yes, they’ll probably get into scenarios where they
    are losing money. Tough but it is way better than having someone dragged out of the
    plane or they could revise their overbooking policy wherein the crew members can’t
    remove passengers who is already seated. What if we were to address the problem in a
    way that leads to a solution? The problem is not overbooking nor is it the unabashed
    pursuit of profit by airline CEOs. It is not even the chaos that arose when one passenger
    peacefully resisted the system. The problem is random cancellation, knowing that it’s
    the algorithmically driven selection of passengers to de-board, and not the initial
    overbooking itself that is the problem. We need a system that allows us to buy the
    predictability of being in or out of the category of passengers who will be selected for
    involuntary rescheduling. To do this, airlines could simply implement a new category
    between the stand by ticket and the basic economy ticket: the first bumped ticket.
    Airlines that wanted to overbook a plane by five percent would simply ensure that five
    percent of their tickets were sold as first bumped. Another avenue would be to make
    this a negative option: passengers could buy the right not to be bumped for a fee.
    However, this is implemented we would move to a system with greater transparency
    and predictability for passengers. This would make it possible for the airline to offer
    even lower headline fares and for semi flexible passengers to plan accordingly and
    enjoy the savings. Passengers would be able to read up ahead of time about the
    compensation they would receive for being displaced and airlines could communicate
    what their algorithms predict the likely delay to be. Consumers get the choice to pay the
    premium for a more secure seat. Airlines get the choice about how much to overbook
    flights. This would benefit everyone because the problem presented by the existing
    system is an inability to plan.

    Customers have long known about the practice of bumping, but never before
    have the exact details of how passengers are chosen to be bumped and the procedure
    of offering different amounts of incentives been such public knowledge. After this
    incident customers will now know if they wait longer the airline will offer more money to
    bump them. There is a significant difference in what airlines can and might do for
    voluntary and involuntary bumping. Given that Dr. Dao was involuntary bumped, United
    Airlines give him compensation to cover for his food and hotel room. How they handled
    Dr. David Dao case was completely unethical and unprofessional no one should ever be
    mistreated this way. Munoz exacerbated an already fraught situation with a robotic
    response and barely concealed contempt for his consumers. In a highly competitive
    price led industry dominated by few players, United Airlines failed to show empathy with
    its paying consumers and came across as uncaring, insincere, and brutal. Beyond that,
    the airline’s statements directed the blame away from themselves; first trying to
    emphasize that the issue happened on a United Express flight (rather than a mainline
    United flight), and then blaming the Chicago Airline Police for their actions (despite the
    fact the United Airline Crew cabin called them in the first place). These attempts to
    dodge the crisis gave the airline’s critics enough fuel to light a rage fire. Saying sorry
    shouldn’t be so hard. A good apology only needs to be said once then it needs to be
    followed up with action to demonstrate good intent. When we review this event, we are
    taken back because that could be anyone going through an ordeal like this as most of
    us fly. No matter where you are in life, we all can take cues from United Airlines and
    their handling of a crisis the wrong way. This also seems like a good follow-up study.

    References July 24, 2018


    1. https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2017/apr/10/united-airlines-video-
    passenger-removed-overbooked-flight
    2. http://www.abc.net.au/news/2017-04-11/united-airlines-passenger-dragged-off-
    overbooked-flight/8433104
    3. https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/united-airlines-response-
    mocked-corporate-speak-flight-3411-passenger-dragging-incident-overbooking-
    a7678421.html
    4. http://www.beliefnet.com/news/news-galleries/5-lessons-we-learned-from-united-
    airlines.aspx?p=7
    5. https://www.groovehq.com/support/united-crisis
    6. https://nordic.businessinsider.com/united-airlines-ceo-letter-employee-2017-4/

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