United Airlines had nothing to do with beating the poor doctor

[MADem]

88. I have no doubt attempts will be made via the legal system to gain justice

for Dr. Dao. Those attempts will serve two purposes:

They will threaten to bring the issue back up in the public eye after UNITED has tamped it down somewhat and is trying to shift blame to the police (after the attempt to call Dao a nutter failed);

They'll encourage UNITED to up the ante and provide a larger settlement amount to keep this issue out of the news.

The bottom line, though, is that UNITED does have that "arbitration first" clause if you are a pax suing them about your treatment. Someone can bring them to court, of course, and re-ignite the issue, even if the case is eventually referred to arbitration (the whole "standing" thing doesn't go away just because Dao hired a big shot attorney). And of course, if arbitration fails, the courts are still there as a recourse. It's not "arbitration or bust," it's "arbitration first."

It's in the interest of UNITED, all that said, to throw money at this mess and get it behind them. Start with "settlement" and see how it goes. They'll now have to provide two good paydays--one to Dao, the other to his lawyer.

The article provided incorrectly makes an issue of "overbooking" as if that's a hook upon which to hang their complaint - but the fact of the matter is, this flight was NOT overbooked. It was fully booked, and then. subsequently, the airline had a need (probably because of a delay elsewhere in the system) to get a crew to a base because, most likely, the crew that was supposed to take the flight they were meeting had exceeded crew rest parameters. Those crewmembers were non-rev deadheaders enroute to an assignment--not "overbooked passengers." There's a distinction there, and a difference. Again, the fuckups came from SCHEDULING--they'd have been better off shifting a reserve crew from another base that was perhaps further away but with more opportunities to accommodate non-revs, perhaps on more than one flight. This was a management problem, not an overbooking problem.

Also not mentioned in that article are the people who actually dragged the guy off the plane--UNITED worked swiftly to brand them as assholes when all they were was good little robots doing as they were told (and who knows WHAT they were told, really...if someone needs to be removed from a plane, the status quo is to assume the pax is "disruptive" and some sort of FAA breach of conduct is the cause). The police have a very good union--you're not going to hear the NAMES of those officers, who are on leave, with full pay. They're better protected by their agency and union than Dao, the victim, was, certainly. They'll probably go back to work after receiving a bit of "guidance" (i.e. after the heat dies down).

UNITED is like most corporations--quantity over quality, fast dimes are better than slow dollars, charge the most for the least you can get away with, etc. And that includes their WORKERS, who are a) Paid in the dark with ever-shrinking benefit packages, b) Overworked and harassed by management to push senior people out to be replaced by lower-salaried newbies, and c) Not backed up by corporate management when they do what management tells them to do.

It's real easy to find the "blame" lying at the feet of a flight attendant or gate agent (who isn't the "Captain" of the aircraft and doesn't get to make decisions of that nature as to what happens on said aircraft) and ignore the demands coming from the Scheduling Department, as passed down by the Board of Directors in order to squeeze a few more dimes outta the system. It's a pernicious thing. The torches and pitchforks tend to gravitate towards the easiest and most likely schmuck to burn/stab--i.e. low-level employees who do the grunt work, not their bosses who order them about.

The fact of the matter is that the UNITED CEO, who eventually shuffled onto TV and gave a teary, heartfelt interview, is the guy who should have gotten out in front of this first with a flat out "WE fucked up and WE are sorry," and not tried to blame everyone from his own junior personnel to the cops to the victim.

His policies, coming from his boardroom, caused the incident in the first place.