The Return Of United Meal Vouchers

David J. Danto

Business travel thoughts in my own, personal opinion

eMail: ddanto@IMCCA.org Follow Industry News: @NJDavidD

Return of the Meal Voucher… – March 2023

These are things I haven’t seen for a while. Your mileage may vary of course, but in the last decade or so I haven’t really seen United meal vouchers – instruments given out to delayed passengers when the airline admits it’s their screw-up. Most of my horrific experiences had United using “the dog ate my homework” blame game. United said it was the weather (on perfectly clear days) or the FAA or some other third party that wasn’t their fault. With (what I perceive anyway) as the more frequent distribution of mea-culpa vouchers, is United finally admitting they’re screwing up?

The most recent meal voucher I received was in Ottawa, when the incoming aircraft from EWR had to turn back to EWR to be repaired / replaced. We were 4 hours late for what was clearly a mechanical at EWR (all be in on Republic dba United Express.) We got $20 (Canadian) for lunch.

The most recent meal voucher my wife received was last Wednesday at EWR. My wife had a nearly five-hour delay that was a result of a series of poor maintenance and bad operations decisions there. Her flight to MIA blew a tire on take-off which started a string of insanely poor planning and actions resulting in her getting to her destination at around 2am the next day. (If you’re curious about the details feel free to read the thread on Twitter here.)

When you combine these personal experiences of mine with serious questions the FAA had on the air-worthiness of United aircraft, the indicators point to lax maintenance and a disaster waiting to happen.

The return of the vouchers is nice to some extent, showing that United management IS actually able to admit when they messed-up, but these events are not confidence-building as it relates to their ability to safely maintain and run an airline.

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Fellow United flyers – what’s your experience? Have you seen more meal vouchers lately? Are you living through more mechanical delays than before in recent days? Please drop me a note and let me know and I’ll publish the results.

This article was written by David Danto and contains solely his own, personal opinions.

All image and links provided above as reference under prevailing fair use statutes.

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