As a travel agent, I have a love-hate relationship with programs like United’s “Easy Update” and American’s and Northwest’s “Flight Status Notification.”
These are programs the airlines use to update passengers on fllght delays, cancellations, etc. These notifications can be incredibly helpful, but they can also be incredibly wrong.
Usually the issues are relatively minor. Any delayed flight can have several different updates before it departs, and they have been known both to overlap and contradict. Several clients have also reported that the frequency of these updates can become annoying.
The problems start when those updates are flat-out wrong. Most airlines routinely underestimate turnaround time for a delayed plane, so they might send a message that a plane will leave say, at 6 p.m., when simply checking the airline’s computer will indicate the plane isn’t even coming in until 5:55 p.m. Which means that people often panic for nothing.
And last winter, for one example, United Express sent one client a message announcing a new flight departure time. Yet simultaneously their computer showed the crew for that flight arriving on a flight 30 minutes later than that time. (Which turned out to be correct; the plane left a full hour after the message announced.)
But yesterday might have set a new standard in misinformation. A client who uses United’s “Easy Update” sent me a panicky email from Asia — “What’s going on with my plane?” When I checked the flight, which was scheduled to depart February 19 at 7:25 p.m., in United’s computer, the flight information (FLIFO) said it was leaving from Tokyo at 10:30 a.m., almost nine hours EARLY. This just doesn’t happen. But since it was now almost 8 a.m. in Japan, it was a little worrisome.
I called United, and luckily got a competent reservations agent, who confirmed the FLIFO. She rushed to a supervisor, who made another call, and the mystery was solved. The same flight on February 18 was delayed about 14 hours, and while it wasn’t scheduled to leave at 10:30 a.m. on the 19th, it had been at one point and someone had simply updated United’s computer incorrectly. The airline fixed it immediately once they realized the issue.
Leaving aside the issue that FLIFO should have a number of fail-safes to prevent such an error, I can only imagine how many of the over 200 people booked on the plane got the message, which simply said:
“Flight update message — The following flight time has been revised – Estimated departure time 10:30 a.m.”
I just hope most of the passengers called United or their travel agent and didn’t rush to the airport. The flight did, by the way, depart about five minutes early and took off at 7:35 p.m.
But what about you, Tripso readers? As dismaying as this was, I can’t imagine it’s the only major automated notification snafu of the year.
Stories and comments encouraged.
Janice Hough is a California-based travel agent a travel blogger and a part-time comedy writer. A frequent flier herself, she’s been doing battle with airlines, hotels, and other travel companies for over three decades. Besides writing for Travelers United, Janice has a humor blog at Leftcoastsportsbabe.com (Warning, the political and sports humor therein does not represent the views of anyone but herself.)
