United Airlines

UA977 DXB-IAD "Businessfirst". Check in and boarding were smooth professional and efficient. Unfortunately that was the highlight of this flight. Food was mediocre at best. Filet was well done and not done well. Smoked salmon appetizer and salad were disappointing-small in portion and bland. Passed on dessert. Lie flat seats were coffin like in a flat position. Service was spotty. Honestly I can't understand this legacy carrier. Emirates' CEO was right when he said his economy product was better than most carrier's business class. A total disappointment but shouldn't have been surprised. Switching to Emirates in 2015.

MAN-EWR 24/8/14 Flight UA80. I have never experienced a flight in which the crew have seemed almost desperate to pick a fight with passengers! I'm sure they were all tired and keen to get back home but aren't they being paid to attend to the needs of passengers? As well as the staff being incredibly surly I was amazed that they chose to serve a chicken dinner at 10.30am in the morning! They can't even use the rationale that they were working on the destination time zone as we were flying to the US and it would have been 3am there! Luckily the food was absolutely inedible so it wasn't an issue in the end.

ATL-ORD-LAX 27 Aug 14 UA3542. United likes to change your itinerary at the last minute. My reservation was ATL to LAX thru Denver when made but when I went to check in I was routed through Chicago. It was an agonizing trip lasting much too long. United doesn't even give you basic horrible airplane music or rerun TV episodes. You have to pay for everything. Bad business. Not flying United for a year or 2. Maybe never.

Unless you want to have hours of intimate contact with a stranger do not fly United! I am a small women in my 60's. United's seat size just fits me. I was in a window seat when a medium-large gentleman a little round around the edges sat next to me. This man was not obese. He overflowed his seat enough that every time he moved we were shuffled together from butt to knee. I put up with it for half an hour and then excused myself to the aisle. I paced in the back of the plane for an hour. The attendants were serving whatever they serve and saw that I was near hysteria at the thought of returning to what awaited me in my assigned seat. They did find a solution eventually. A United employee was flying coach and they switched me out with him. But the new seat was only 3 rows in front of the gentleman who had been next to me and he had to watch this seat change knowing his size overlapping mine was the cause. These conditions are set up by United in planning an aircraft with seats that are way smaller than the human population of these times. They know this and leave it to their flight attendants to deal. Other airline carriers are tight too but I have heard and witnessed that United is the worst.

SFO/IAH/SJO (San Jose Costa Rica) /IAH/SFO in First on domestic Business on the international flights - 737-900 and 737-800 - pleasantly surprised by the service which was almost perfect (only 1 FA on 1 flight was rude when I was forward enough to ask about whether there would be dessert). New lounge at SFO is still pretty bad considering it's a UA hub and supposed to represent the USA to the Pacific Rim but it was adequate (although be warned the bar closes at 10.30pm sharp not so good for those of us on midnight flights). Food on 1 flight also not so great (overdone tasteless steak) but otherwise good - I think they serve starbucks coffee because it tasted so burnt I could only drink 1/3 cup even though we were going on 30+ hours with no sleep by the time we were landing in Costa Rica. All in all we were happy with the flights unexpectedly so given some prior experiences with the carrier.

We were on a trip from Newark to San Diego. The nightmare began when we noticed that we (as two friends travelling together) had been assigned seats that were not located next to each other. But we were okay with this. The flight attendants were pretty friendly but drinks were only served 2 times and food was not served at all (on a 5.5 hours flight). There was the option to purchase food but in my opinion it should go without saying that complementary food is offered on a long-distance flight. Onboard entertainment was also not available for free. Furthermore the TV screens could not be turned off so we were exposed to continuing advertising which lasted the whole flight. When we finally reached our destination in San Diego we were tired starving and thirsty.

IAD - SAV in August. Flight was on schedule both ways which I gather is unusual. The CRJ 200 equipment designed to be uncomfortable was pretty scruffy around the edges. Non stop on this route is convenient. I fly Asian carriers where I live. The FAs while maybe not as professional as they might sometimes be are always friendly well turned out and exquisitely polite. Those on the flights I take back and forth to the US are even more impressive. So imagine my surprise when arriving at the top of the gangway I was greeted by the assigned FA's not inconsiderable rear end. Have good manners been unbundled from the basic ticket price also?

My wife and I booked a flight through last minute.com it was really a last minute thing because we had to be in Auburn by the 22nd August 2014. We got a flight for the 21st August which involved a couple of stops. The flight was from Birmingham UK stopping at Newark NJ and then at Washington Dulles then Syracuse (outgoing). First the flight was supposed to leave Birmingham at 09.00hrs that left 3 hrs late due to technical trouble. Got to Newark NJ so late we missed the 14.50 connection to Washington Dulles. They then booked us on another flight from Newark to Syracuse that was leaving at 21.04hrs that never turned up until about 22.30 and because there was a little downpour of rain the flight was delayed it had never left Attica. We went out on to the tarmac to board the plane and was confronted with a plane that looked like something from the Fred Flinstone era. This was a tiny DHC8 turbo prop plane and we were buffeted around like a roller coaster. So for that trip we were delayed for about 12 hours. Not even a cup of tea or a glass of water was offered to the passengers. The way back was even worse we were supposed to leave Syracuse at 19.10hrs on the 2nd September 2014. Next thing you know the rain started to fall again flight cancelled for 24 hours. We had to spend our own money for a one night stay in a hotel. So instead of going from Syracuse to Washington to Brussels to Birmingham we now had to go from Syracuse to Washington to Dublin then Birmingham. I won't be travelling with them again or recommending them to anyone.

Flight UA3789 August 27 2014. Boarded an almost new plane that was in pristine condition comfortable seats (travelling on miles and paid for upgrade to premium seating). Ready for a great flight left on time. The flight crew were terrible there were glares from the front of the plane to the back. Almost no eye contact with customers rude finger pointing. When the snack trolley came by they simply walked past directed their comments to the air in front of them and continued on - likely very few sales there! When coffee and drinks came by they were already past before we could even request a drink (we weren't really asked you see) and we had to call them back to get a coffee. When I went to the toilet the crew simply jerked their finger at me without saying anything and gestured me into a seat that was vacant to wait. They scowled at everyone. By the time we left the plane the people in the seats behind me across from me and the seats near the toilets (I heard them talking as well) were totally turned off by our crew. This was the fourth bad experience I have heard of with United in the past year from co-workers and friends. In fact I have as yet to hear a good experience from any of my colleagues. Also when deplaning they gave out erroneous information. They said that those with connecting flights would have their luggage forwarded and they did not need to collect it. It was wrong in that they do need to collect their luggage to go through customs. Fortunately customs officials were asking people to make sure they had their forwarded luggage. Terrible service. I was flying on miles so the value was great the plane was new and comfortable the experience the pits!

JFK-SFO. Ground staff at JFK could not have been more helpful. We had a connection to NRT with ANA and our reservation had some issues but it was efficiently solved by the staff and our luggage was directly tagged to NRT avoiding luggage fees despite being on two separate reservations. Flight was ahead of schedule both departure and arrival. Service on United has always been warm friendly and efficient. I'm a big fan of their service and never had an issue. While they are not as polished as most Asian carriers are they are interactive with the passengers and their service makes you feel at home. BOB options were extensive and quality was excellent. They also did frequent beverage runs despite only being a 6-hour flight. IFE system is wonderful the movie choices were great and most of which are recent Hollywood movies. The system was responsive easy to use and the moving map was of excellent quality. Overall a very pleasant flight with United.