United Airlines

London to Costa Rica via Newark. Check in was quick and efficient. flight to Newark left on time and we landed 20 minutes early. The 777 was clean well equipped and comfortable. In Flight service excellent and food and drinks plentiful and good including the ice cream and caramel that was very impressive. Transit through Newark was somewhat long but that is nothing to do with the airline. Flight Newark to Costa Rica was on time. Aircraft was a 737 of some age but the seat was fine and the crew excellent again. Food and drinks again good for a short haul flight. So my experience of United was a good experience and well worth trying as the tickets are good value and extremely competitive against other carriers.

MDT-IAD-LAS-ORD-MDT. Other than the leg from Dulles to Vegas the trip was largely a non-event. Even that leg the only real complaints I have is that it (B-737) was fully booked and the WiFi system on the plane was spotty. I do not recommend paying for the on-board WiFi systems until you've spent some time in the 'complimentary' area to make sure the system is working properly. The MDT-Dulles leg was a 25-minute trip not especially worth discussing. The Embraer 145 is a nice little plane the single-seat arrangement on the one side of the cabin does make a nice opportunity to get both a window and aisle seat. LAS-ORD was aboard an older 757. Seats were more comfortable than the 737 but in-flight entertainment was limited to basically an old Discovery Channel program on overhead CRTs. On the other hand it was free so I guess you get what you pay for. This plane was also fully booked but got lucky with a smaller woman in the center seat. ORD-MDT was aboard an A-319. Seats were comfortable. Inflight entertainment was available over a wi-fi connection to my tablet. Worked like a charm. Large selection of programming. Plane was about 80% booked and I got lucky with an empty center seat. On all 4 legs cabin crew was attentive and reasonably pleasant. Flights were on time or at least close enough that I had no trouble making connections. Notes: Bring a tablet or something to occupy yourself with. When the in-flight entertainment is right it works well. When it's not you'll be twiddling your thumbs without some way of entertaining yourself for hours. Do use the United app. Having the boarding pass on the smart phone - and getting all the necessary updates through the app - made things easier. It worked reasonably well. When traveling within the US (on any airline) don't go non-stop coast to coast. 5 hours on a fully-loaded plane is miserable (and lets face it they're all close to fully loaded today). An hour layover in some place in the middle is now a welcome respite and no longer a nuisance. Be prepared for delays. Stuff happens on every airline - mechanical and weather. My reading of the other reviews complaining about United strike me as largely problems that every airline is guilty of in some way shape or form. It is simply the reality of airline flight in 2014. Airline travel just isn't what it was 20 years ago when the planes were half full so there was more room and the cabin crew was not so rushed.

Flight 914 from CDG to MCI with connection at Washington Dulles on Jan 14 in Economy class. The product featured by United is sub-standard. Of course ageing aircraft in the main leg (767) is clean and well maintained and this is the minimum you can expect from one of the largest airlines in the world. Check-in boarding operations baggage everything ok. Seats are standard. VOD is poor with very limited options and not user friendly. The music program was out of order for this flight and films not plenty. Besides on individual screens maps are not detailed and this system is less advanced than 20 years ago (I am not joking) in Asian companies. Also flight information is given exclusively in feet inches miles just if the metric system does not exist in the rest of the world! Regarding meals they are almost edible. We had chicken with some sauce (more sweet than sour) a large salad with a too smallish cup of dressing (good) and a kind of sponge cake pompously christened crumble – wrapped in a cello paper printed European quality but made in Alabama. All in a very small slippy tray complimented with picnic cutlery (100% plastic). And of course passengers have to pay 7.99 $ for one beer. Ridiculous. By the way a sandwich (not bad) was served before landing but do not expect more than water between meal and snack. Fruit juices ice creams and other open bar is a dream out of reach at United. Attitude of cabin crew very professional (attendants have apparently about 20/25 years experience) working efficiently but not cheerful (friendly skies really?) in very bland uniforms which could be copied from Railways of the 70’ Being familiar with Asian and Middle East airlines I find United well below what you may expect from such a large corporation.

United Premium Economy is a gamble it seems to be directly dependent on the type of aircraft you are flying. On a 777 the seats are nice and spacious the services (seatback entertainment) are premium and you can really feel the extra legroom making the extra charge totally worthwhile. On a 747 the opposite is true I had more room in Economy on an Airbus than I did in Premium Economy on a 747. On the 747 I couldn't even fit my very small backpack under the seat in front of me and what little legroom I had was obstructed by a large piece of plastic. The aisles were noticeably narrower as well which made every beverage service an exercise in getting smacked with a cart (not fun on a 13 hour flight). I did notice there was an extra seat in every row on the 747 which is probably were all that extra room went. Also relying on the old school movie screens meant that even if you were trying to sleep a bright light was shining in your face. On the bright side as always the crew were nice courteous and professional. Long story short though? If you're going to spring for the Economy Plus make sure you're on the right type of plane it makes a big difference.

I flew to London on the so called "Dreamliner". United is so bad they have now changed out the seats in coach to the same tiny seats for short commuter flights. United plus is not a better seat or service just more leg room which is the least of the issues unless your over 6 feet tall. Beer and Wine are now $7 each! They are free on European airlines with more comfortable seats. I used to be bothered when they cancelled direct flights from Houston to Paris. Now I don't have to chose between United and Air France!

We had truly horrible service from the first flight out to the last flight of the return trip. United booked us to fly into Newark to connect with a flight out of JFK - we got the joy of finding this out when we checked in. On the return flight from Zurich the cabin crew announced that they were short staffed due to management cut- backs. Translation in our case where we were seated near the rear of the plane is that we got one small sandwich six hours into the flight. I would have killed for a glass of water and maybe some food. Then our connecting flight to Raleigh was cancelled due to 'weather' and therefore we were responsible for our own sleeping arrangements. The 'weather' in Raleigh was drizzle. Our bags went American and arrived on time. A complaint to United was not even met with an apology. Instead they offered of a $100 voucher for future travel with them!

I try to avoid flying United when I can but as I was with Continental I sort of inherited their frequent flyer program. So my review is of a recent flight this last summer but also of their frequent flyer plan which unless you are a Business flyer I would avoid. It's almost impossible to move up to Gold with them. I flew 50K miles flew on them 4 times but failed to spend 5000 dollars on their tickets because I live overseas and usually fly Turkish and claim the miles because I thought they were in the same alliance which it turns out isn't really true - at least not for United. The flight we took was from London to Houston. Cancelled because it's United and we were placed on a flight to NYC in an effort to get us to a flight that connected to Texas which we missed so then they put us on a flight to Chicago so that they wouldn't have to pay for a Hotel etc ad nauseam. Funnily enough our flight back to London from Texas had one leg cancelled because it's United and they told us to drive from Austin to Houston but that's another story altogether. The plane we were on from London to NYC was just about clean enough my gluten free meal was gone because it's United (My flight had been cancelled and my meal with it) and the entertainment system was down because it's United. Needless to say I am now with the FF program of Turkish Airlines and will never fly United again unless it's impossible due to US monopolistic practices. Don't fly United.

LAX-MEL - B787-8 - Overall a good flight. Equipment changed from a B787-9 to a B787-8. Not too disappointed since it was still a Dreamliner but the change to the smaller aircraft had the consequence that a baby was moved from the forward business class to the 3 Business rows in the mid-section. A baby on 16 hrs flight - not recommended. Flight departed from LAX 1.5 hr late. Basically waited on board for 1.5 hrs. Everyone had already boarded so we were in this plane for at least 17 hrs. Flight uneventful new Dreamliner is a really great airplane large windows very airy cabin. Seat is good except that not every seat has direct aisle access. Inflight Entertainment great good selection of movies TV shows. Service was attentive (above usual United average) Food was decent. Unfortunately United does not supply their Business customers with Fast passes for Melbourne Airport Immigration so waited almost 1 hr to get through on top of the 1.5 hr delay. All in all a great plane and can recommend if you are traveling to Melbourne.

I am currently sitting on the flight that was supposed to depart at 6.05 am from NY to Dayton. It is 6.40 am and we have not taken off. We have been sitting on the plane for almost an hour due to "maintenance issues." I am not going to make my connection and this is after the exact same issue on the flight I took to NY. I was sceptical to book a flight with United based on anecdotal experience with friends and family but now I am experiencing it first hand on both legs of the trip. The first flight of the day and it is delayed? It is evident how United does business. By the way no word on when we are leaving.

MAN to EWR RT BusinessFirst. I have been a loyal CO customer for about 20 years and have tried so hard to like the new United but my patience has definitely worn out. The service inboard is simply too hit or miss and increasingly miss. The FA's treat passengers like a necessary evil to be served minimally and with zero smiles or grace. The service is functional at best and once completed the FAs hide behind the curtain. Worst still their planes are already showing signs of ageing - on the outbound flight my moms seat reclined minimally and then jammed so she had to spend the rest of the flight bolt upright (she refused to switch with me). Notably the same seat was still broken 10 days later when she took the same flight home on clearly the same plane. Crew were indifferent to the seat problem. BA and Delta both have far more dependably good service and UA has simply stopped trying. I did a DL Gold status match for 2015 so will ditch UA after all these years. Shame but they just don't deserve my business anymore.