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How I lost my 1K status
If you followed this blog last year, you know that my quest to hit United 1K status ended with a December 26th trip from Denver to Washington DC. I left the house around 7:00am that morning and returned home that evening at 6:00pm, happily tweeting about the 30 miles I had to spare. And while I never want to make 1K again (that’s just too many miles to fly – especially back and forth from Denver to the east and west coasts, and in particular considering that I probably had another 20k miles on other airlines last year as well) I was pretty pleased with my achievement.
Fast forward about two weeks. I’m on my way to CES in early January. My (United) flight has already been delayed by two hours. They’ve loaded the plane, allowed us to sit on the tarmac and then pulled us back off the plane to try to locate a new aircraft. I’m four hours into my travel day and I haven’t gone anywhere and it’s not clear that I’ll be getting out at all. I’m sitting in the gate area downloading email when I receive the following from “United Mileage Plus” with the subject line “My Mileage Plus — Your updated account balance, 2009 Error in Calculation”:
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I’m already steaming about United because of the delay and here I find out that my little trip to DC was all for naught – I’m still 7,000 miles away from my 1K goal. And I had checked probably 3 times with United about my account balance (making sure all of my December flights were in the system, checking to see if there were any other ways for me to get the miles w/o having to take a vacation day trip, etc.). I can’t believe they had it wrong. I tweet about the note. I tell the people around me at the airport what just happened. But I decide to wait until I cool down to actually call United and tell them when I think about their “computer error”. I’m sure that I’ll talk my way back to 1K, but if I call them right now I’ll just end up yelling at them and likely won’t make any friends in customer service.
Eventually my flight takes off and as it turns out I land at about the same time as my partner Brad, so I send him an email to wait for me so we can ride to our hotel together. We sit down in the car and he turns to me to ask if I had called United yet. But with a curious smirk on his face. I tell him I hadn’t – that I was too mad at the time to do it but was planning to do so from the hotel. I guess he felt sorry for me after such a bad travel day, because he looked at me and said: “yah. that was actually me and pete” referring to Pete Sheinbaum, CEO of Mandelbrot Project (and email expert from his days running Daily Candy). Kelly Collins from Foundry had also been in on the act (she has my United creds so they could log in to get the exact mileage amounts). They had planned to tell me later, but he couldn’t let it go any further. I actually didn’t believe him. Of course it had never occurred to me that this was anything but legitimate. And as it slowly sunk in that I had been utterly and completely taken, I literally couldn’t stop laughing.
Brad, Pete and Kelly really really got me.
And I’m still plotting my revenge…
airlines just don't get customer service.
it doesnt cost them anything to upgrades customers who are close to elite status.
the only thing that could have made this better, is had it been on April Fools, or even better if they had convinced you to go to the Customer Service desk and filmed you ripping them a new ass!
That's brutal. You'd think Kelly — who seems so sweet — wouldn't be involved. Ouch.
Of course, the only reason the prank worked is that it was totally believable that an airline would screw you over in that way.
Still… Ouch.
Seth – would highly recommend you X out your MP number. United does not have many safeguards against redeeming mileage awards over the phone if you know the MP number and member name (and occasionally zip code).
BTW – this really sucks, did not they not give you any sort of e-certificate as "a gesture of good will"?
Meant to add a :sarcasm: note there btw, since that is United's response to everything
This is freaking awesome. That's when you know you're loved…
i suppose anyone who would go through that much trouble!
i didn’t even think of that… thanks for the heads up.
understood. i love when they give you a $25 certificate to make good on their 3 hour delay (oh and by the way – with all the restrictions you won’t even be able to use the certificate anyway!)
That is beyond awesome.
I had a colleague who used to find out what flights people were on and then adjust their meal and seating preferences in all kinds of unpleasant ways… just a thought
it really was beyond awesome greg. and thanks for the prank ideas. keep ‘em coming!
That is hilarious! I had respect for Brad as a board member at a former employer, but now I'll think of him in a new light. Recommend you redact that mileage plus number ASAP!
now i just need some suggestions on how to get back at him. thoughts?
took down the mp number as well – didn’t realize they were so lax on using those…