DullesJason

Tales From the Dark Side of United Gate Agenthood

INTRODUCTION

This admittedly huge post will be about my experiences as a United Airlines gate agent (at IAD) as it pertains to what is affectionately known (and loved) as "operational upgrades."

SPOILER: Don't expect anything along the lines of: "The 12 secrets of getting free upgrades--REVEALED!" LOL...

Many moons ago (this spring) I saw a thread here about "how to get" an
operational upgrade on United, elaborating on tricks, strategies and
the like. I found it amusing, mostly because I have been on the receiving
end of such efforts hundreds if not thousands of times as a United gate
agent--a job I had part-time for more than 6 years, until I quit in
March of this year. Greener pastures and all--most of you can imagine how
working for United and other airlines had diminishing rewards, etc. But
I digress. I have to say though, as I have scanned the forums since I
joined FlyerTalk in January, I have been very impressed with the
detailed breadth of knowledge many FTers have. In that thread about
operational upgrades, I made a quick post saying I might elaborate on the
operational upgrade process from a gate agent's perspective if it was
requested--I expected 2 or 3 requests. Much to my surprise, I got almost
bombarded by PMs, so I decided I'd be happy to make a (hopefully) insightful
contribution to the FT community by shedding some light on the O/UG
process--and my own experiences in the process . . . from the other side
of the podium. I regret I didn't do it this spring, but alas, here it is
and I thank those of you who PM'd me with requests. I hope you'll enjoy
this post.

(It's unrelated, but I wrote this paragraph in the spring, as an
introduction, right after the request for this post during my final days as
an employee)

Grrrrr. I am writing this while sitting in 10E on a 737-500 SEA-SFO
with my elbows plastered to my ribs in order not to cramp the Blackbery
toting finance type in 10D and not to wake the college kid in 10F. Why am
I in 10E when employees often fill the first & business class cabins,
leaving revenue customers in coach? Well, I am heading for IAD, and
spent 2 hours sitting in 6D (on the 757) on UA938 SEA-ORD while awaiting
the repair of a hydraulic leak. The attempted fix didn't work so at about
4:45pm, the originally schedule 2:17 departure was put on--get this--a
7:15pm "decision." I would miss my 9:15 ORD-IAD connection. We were all
deboarded. If I waited til the possibility of a departure at around
730pm, I wouldn't get to IAD until late the next afternoon, so I'm
SFO-bound, planning to land at 7:30pm and kill 3 hours waiting for the 10:30pm
red eye to IAD. It's the only way of getting home before 6:30am. But at
least the red-eye is booked only 1/3 and I will likely have 3 seats to
myself. I am sure you have all had days like this or worse--this is far
from the worst I have had. At least I have learned to somewhat roll
with the punches and not get too stressed. All airlines have mechanical
problems with their planes. Disgression over. Let us begin.


OPERATIONAL UPGRADES--WANTING IT

1. The Schmooze and the Reaction.

The truth is there really aren't a whole lot of "tricks" and "secrets"
to share in how to get them. For one, frequent fliers should (and often
do) understand that you generally don't "get" them; you have them given
to you, by a gate agent. But it's not as personal or arbitrary as you
may think. I blame this common misconception on how "free" upgrades are
given out on the travel media. FTers and travel reporters often think
that what it takes is to dress your best, approach the podium with a
smile and a compliment, then slip in some barely veiled request for a
freebie upgrade. It's amazing how many people try this. It's as though it
does not occur to them that the agent knows what they're up to. While
some of my former co-workers were kinda dim, the majority of them were at
least bright enough to recognize this tactic and see right through it.
When people have tried this "trick" with me, I thought to myself, "have
you no shame?" People often went further and literally would grovel
sometimes--and it was embarassing. If you're one of those people, all you
are doing is making an ... of yourself. You might say, "well it's just
a gate agent I'll never see again so I don't care what he/she thinks of
me" but personally I think I would have more dignity than come with
some story hoping that the agent will have pity on him or her and give
them an upgrade because we like the customer. Agents are generally smart
enough to know when customers aren't being sincere but rather, just
trying to butter them up with a nice smile and smooth clothing. It's not
going to work. Other airlines may have more liberal policies in giving
gate agents authority to upgrade; United doesn't. But there are
exceptions.

When does it happen? Pretty much only when the customer's u/g request
is genuine. I once did it on a domestic 757 for an elderly and
handicapped lady who never asked. I don't remember why but it helped me out too.
I also recall giving it to one guy who did schmooze me (I think it was
IAD-MUC). I politely rejected his polite "free" upgrade request. I told
him it wasn't going to happen that day since we were only oversold by a
few seats, but he stuck around and quickly gave up all hope of
upgrading (as he should have). We began a conversation and he actually talked
at length about aviation and engaged me in a real conversation. The
flight was full, but I wasn't particularly busy (the only reason why I
engaged the conversation) as things were running smoothly. About 15 minutes
before departure time, when the flight was about 80-90% boarded and we
were primed for an on-time departure, I had a surprise situation where
one Y passenger who showed misconnect in the computer popped up at my
gate (she must have taken another airline), so I was suddenly precisely
1 seat in the hole. Guess who got it? "Mr. Aviation Conversation" had
just said goodbye to me and was in the back of the boarding line of
20-30 people, so I called him over and gave it to him. Why him? In a word,
convenience. He was a Premier Exec so I may have bypassed a 1K (maybe
not--many are already pre-upgraded), but he had the status and he was on
a B fare, so I didn't feel bad. But the convenience was getting the
seat I needed and a potentially bad situation resolved quickly so the
flight could depart on time. Since the flight was near close-out, I risked
a delay if I researched it and went on the plane to move any possible
1Ks up, when I was supposed to be at the podium finalizing flight
status, paperwork, etc. This is an example of a unique situation where it
would be OK to bypass a higher-ranking customer, but it is rare. This guy
got lucky because time was running out for me. Knowing his status and
his proximity to me (and his lucky decision not to pre-board as a 1P)
were the factors. But again, it is rare and he was lucky.

My conclusion for this section is to not bother with the song & dance
and the schmooze or the nice threads. Save your energy and spare
yourself the disappointment. Don't try to suck up to the agent and get a free
upgrade you can't support through authorized means. It's a waste of
time.


OPERATIONAL UPGRADES--GETTING IT

2. Why? Oversales.

You should understand that "operational upgrades" (free), in gneral,
are to be done only when there is "an operational need" to do so. For the
uninitiated, what that generally means is when we have overbooked the
plane and more economy passengers have checked in than there are seats
in the cabin. Hypothetical situation: Let's suppose we are flying today
on UA837 SFO-NRT. There is a 747-400 assigned to the route and the
configuration is 14-73-260. Let's say it is booked at 9 in F, 61 in C and
293 in Y. It should be fairly obvious that if more than 260 people show
for Y seats with Y bookings, something will have to be done. Is that
possible? Well, of course it is, with 293 booked. And what does the
airline gate agent do? He or she takes some of those people in Y and gives
them an upgrade to C. That's what an operational upgrade is.

3. The Scenario.

You're the gate agent--so who do you choose to reward with a free seat
in Business Class? Do you take the slick salesman with a nice smile
wearing an Armani suit, who has just has just told you how nice your hair
is and how great of gate agent you are and how you handle the stress of
the job so superbly? As I mentioned above, many travel reporters say
that is exactly who gets the upgrades more often than not. But at United
(and probably many other airlines), it's highly unlikely. United has a
policy that governs this process and it not only prevents agents from
picking favorties (adding to the stress) but also rewards the people who
deserve it. In spite of leading United to staggering losses since 2000,
United management is not altogether completely stupid! They have a
policy intended to give those necessary free upgrades to the top
fliers--the people who--frankly--deserve it.

Operational Upgrades are given on the basis of status and fare paid!
Not personal discretion. On the rare occasion when a Global Services
(UA's top-tier) passenger was planning to fly trans-pac in Y and didn't
already upgrade, we would go look at our elite list in the computer and
find a GS member is Y+. Bam! The GS passenger has been moved to C. That's
62 expected in C (up from 61 booked), presuming all C passengers show
up.

4. The Scenario Progresses.

You're still the gate agent . . . and it is 75 minutes before
departure. Check-in doesn't close for another 30 minutes and Economy has just
checked in to 257 out of 260 seats . . . and counting. That's 36 to go to
reach 293, or 35 to go to 292 now that you've done one upgrade. Well,
with 30 minutes left, it is becoming pretty obvious to you that more
than 260 people will check into the Economy seats they've booked and you
will be "in the hole." 4 more people check in and you're there. It won't
take much time. Sure, you won't see all 292, but you'll easily see 4 or
more in the next 30 minutes. So after you and your colleagues behind
the podium take care of some more people in the line, asking questions
that don't need to be asked, you find some time to look at the elite list
in Economy only--since that's the cabin you have to be worried about.
The only GS guy in Y has already been moved up so you now see there are
7 1Ks at the top of the list among elites seated in Economy. 2 of them
are on the upgrade waiting list already, willing to use miles to move
up. You soon realize after a handful more people check in, you're going
to be more than 7 in the hole, so all the 1Ks in Y are going to C
today. Some agents will process the 1Ks willing to pay miles through the
upgrade list and take their miles or certs, etc. Others, like me, are not
so inclined to take the "that's money for the company" view and instead
be rational: delete them from the paid upgrade waitlist and give *all*
1Ks in Y complimentary upgrades since they would get it anyway. So
you're not charging the ones who were un-cheap enough to put themselves on
the list and willing to spend miles or certs. It's fair and it's a nice
surprise for them--they didn't beg or grovel and they were willing to
pay the freight for C. Might as well give them the break they deserve
and not charge them since they were going to get it for free anyway, if
they weren't on the list. So you move all 7 1Ks up and with the 1 GS
already up there, you are now at 69 people in the C cabin, assuming all
those booked in C show up. You're down to as many as 285 possible
expected for Y.

Did you wait for the 1Ks to come to you with a smile and assess whether
or not their clothes are nice enough to warrant the business class
upgrade? Hell no. You paged them up by name, repeatedly if you had to,
until he or she responded and collected the business class boarding pass.
Most of those 1Ks were nice enough to thank you for that and usually you
smile and say "you're welcome" but let's be honest, you didn't do that
1K a favor really, you upgraded that 1K because you had to upgrade
someone and it makes perfect business sense to choose the best passengers.
Not only is it a company directive, but to my mind, that's the fairest
way to go.

5. The Balancing Act.

52 minutes before departure. In 7 minutes you will be able to close
check-in and bring the flight "under gate control" which means all
functions will be handled at that time by you, the gate agent at the gate, not
the ticket counter. But here is where you have to start paying
attention to balancing the appropriate amount of upgrades--don't do too many
and don't do to few. And most of all, for heaven's sake--be especially
sure you don't do any upgrades too late and jeopardize an on-time
departure!

So . . . after handling a few more quick tasks, you check to see that
Economy is now checked in to 267--even AFTER you have done 8
complimentary operational upgrades. DAMN! Where did all those people come from?
And so fast! You're 7 in the hole! Even after doing 8 upgrades! Grrrr.
But there is light at the end of the tunnel--you take gate control in 6
minutes, 43 seconds. At that point there will no longer be any more
check-in surprises. You know you're going to need to do more upgrades,
but you're 7 in the hole and you only have 4 Business Class seats to
use. Remember? You went from 61 to 69 seats in C after your 8 operational
upgrades. Hmmmmm. So 3 of your Economy people are in limbo.

Now that GS & 1Ks have been cleared from the 'elites in Y' list, 1Ps,
the Premier Executives rise to the top of the list. There are 15 of them
still sitting in Y. Well, you decide in the next 6 minutes to fill the
C cabin--you put 4 1Ps in to C class seats. How do you choose which 4
of this 15? It's easy, the computer has sorted that too, generally by
booking code. A 1P on a Y fare goes higher than a 1P on a B fare, M, H,
Q, W, V, etc. You have 4 1Ps on Ys, Bs & Ms, so they go to C with just a
few keystrokes. Now you have filled C to 73 passengers, assuming all
those booked in C show up. Only 1Ps on H fares and lower remain in
Economy.

You thought that makes you only 3 in the hole, as opposed to 7, since
you moved 4 more up. But you'd be wrong. It's now exactly 46 minutes
before departure and you discover that 5 *more* people checked in to
Economy in those last few minutes. So your 263 in Y turns into 268. UGH! You
piss and moan for 60 seconds and take care of a customer issue. It's
now 45 minutes 'til departure: Time to take "gate control." Fortunately
for you, you notice that in spite of upgrading 12 people people to take
your C cabin from 61 booked to a presumed count of 73 (full), in fact,
C shows it is checked in to only 67. You're thinking "that's cool, but
why?" Well, 6 C class customers have not shown up. That's not uncommon
because they have fully flexible tickets and no penalty to change dates,
so they just don't show up. The people in Chicago who authorize
overbooking depend on this type of thing. Now, for those 6 people who have not
shown up for their C class seats, they lose their seat assignments at
45 mins til departure, but not their reservation (and C booking) until
30 minutes before departure. Most of those 6 won't show up in the next
15 minutes, but one or two might. So you decide to take the next 3 1Ps
on the list in Economy (all H-fares) and bring the C cabin up to 70,
holding back a few more upgrades.

6. Getting Tricky.

You're now at 70 in C & 265 in Y. You see that if you are later able to
upgrade 3 more, you will be full in C, but then you'll be down to 262
checked in in Y, or 2 more people in Y still without seats! OK, so
you're short of 2 seats, but of course, your ace in the hole is the F cabin.
But you can not double upgrade anyone of those 2 from Y to F. Policy.
So, 10 minutes later you are at 35 mins til departure and no more C
bookings have checked in. So you take 2 more 1Ps and move them to C. Your
70 & 265 passenger count in C & F turns into 72 & 263. You wisely decide
to hold one C seat back for 5 more minutes until the cut-off, which is
a good thing because a few minutes later, just 32 minutes before
departure--SURPRISE! A 1K comes running up to your podium sweating like a pig
and breathing heavily at you across the podium (his breath stinks of
course) because he is wheezing from all the running! He is your last
pre-booked C cabin passenger. Why isn't he checked in and how did he get
through security without a boarding pass? He flew in to SFO on Alaska
Airlines--they couldn't give him a boarding pass so he had to check in
at the gate. Of course his AS flight was late so he barely gets to the
gate in time--just 2 minutes to spare. He checks into not the C seat he
was pre-assigned (he lost that at the :45 mark), but the last C seat
you have--a middle. But oh well.

So now your numbers are 73 & 263. You now have *3* people in Y without
a seat BUT . . . remember that F cabin with a 14 capacity and only 9
bookings? Well, the good news is . . . 8 of your 9 F bookings have
checked in, so 6 seats are open in F! You need 3 more seats in Y--and in
order to get them, you don't upgrade the last 3 1Ps from Y to F; rather,
you go in and pull up the elite list already holding tickets in the C
cabin--meaning they are in C without upgrading. Global Services passengers are at the top of the list of course, and there are 5 of them. However, 3 are upgrades--only 2 are full fare C tickets. You move *only* those two up to F. Your numbers are now at 10
& 71 & 263. Next on the 'elites in C' list are the 1Ks. You take the
first 1K who is on a C ticket (meaning not an upgrade) and move him/her to
F. That's 11 & 70 & 263. You then have 3 seats in C open to move another
3 1Ps from Y, which frees those last 3 seats in Y and you assign them
to the last 3 people waiting for their seats in Y. That puts you at 11 &
73 & 260. You're done . . . with the seat management part anyway, there
are other issues but that's another post.

. . . . That's how operational upgrades work.


SUMMARY:

7. When "On-time" Is Jeopardized.

"On time zero" is the God to which all United management prays and
therefore, the obsession with on-time departures spreads throughout the
operation and the company in general, naturally, it is the thing that
determines if a gate agent does a good job or not. Most gate agents have
enough pride to at least try hard to meet on-time objectives when working
flights. A good gate agent gets a flight out on time in the face of
multiple challenges, such as:

* oversales
* misconnections,
* long standby lists
* understaffing
* too much attempted cary-on baggage
* customers draining the time resources of the agent with both petty
and valid complaints, etc.

8. Keep In Mind.

Sometimes an agent has to cut corners to make it all happen, especially
when more challenges than usual arise. Oversales mean customers who are
confirmed on flights check in and don't hold seats--something the gate
agent has to deal with--a further demand on time resources. On
occasion, circumstances beyond the agent's control conspire to make it
virtually impossible to get the flight out on time if the agent works the
flight "by the book." Perhaps the confirmed customers without seats have had
to wait a long time for their seat assignment and by the time the agent
has a chance to "onload" those customers to their seat assignments, the
cabin they booked (usually Y) is full. Doing it by the book means you
take the elite fliers from their seats in Y (they may have boarded),
move them up a cabin and get the waiting Y passengers in Y seats. But if
on-time would be blown by taking the time to do that, sometimes a few of
those customers (usually known as BP2s) get put in C or even F at the
last minute to get them on quickly and prevent a delay. Quite often,
good planning by the agent will prevent that, but there are times when no
amount of planning can prevent it. You never know what last minute
surprises will come upon a gate agent.

It's supposed to be very scientific and done by *status* and *fare
paid*, not by smiling, making compliments or wearing nice clothes. It
almost always works this way. And to me, that is an area where UA has got
the policy right. However, there are exceptions. I remember a few years
ago working IAD-CDG on a 777 that had capacity of 12-49-197 and was
booked something like 2-13-241. Hahha! That's very rare so it was more of a
free-for-all and few Premiers or above were even on the flight. So lots
of people without status got a Christmas treat. That's a VERY rare
exception.

To use a baseball analogy, every once in a while, the gate agent sees a
curve ball that breaks over the plate hard enough that he/she can not
hit the ball and still get the flight out on time. So the agent must
ad-lib, close the book or do whatever to fill the seats any way he or she
can in order to go on time. It's not the way it's supposed to be done,
but sometimes you've gotta bend the rules a little to make the God of
"on-time-zero" happy!

So nothing is 100% in this process and I would guess some of you may
have received UGs in circumstances different to the policy and of course,
agents are human and every once in a while, an agent will like a
passenger who gets an upgrade ahead of a more deserving or loyal 1K, but I do believe those situations are extremely rare, as they should be.

I guess my advice to people who want free upgrades is not to waste your
energy on asking for one--those seats are that are worth a lot and
agents are not empowered during normal situations to give them out
arbitrarily. And don't go looking to create an abnormal situation. It has to be
for a good reason and the agent usually knows when to make exceptions
and when no to. The best thing to do if you want to avoid the monotony
of normal coach seating is just spend the cash ($79 on internationals
last I knew) to get into Economy Plus for more legroom until you earn
enough status (Premier at the 25k level) to be entitled to it for no extra
charge. And of course you can always work on earning the miles it takes
to get to business class. Commercial airline tavel sucks. I say you
just gotta deal with it.

Well that just about wraps it up. I've put a lot into this post and my
fingers are tired! I hope some Fters will have been entertained by
this post and perhaps feel they understand the process better.

-DullesJason

qasr

Wow, that wasw quick... great post! ^ ^ ^

Mike Jacoubowsky

An awful lot of talk about GS, 1K & 1P, but...

not one mention of 2P.

Are we completely ignored in the grand scheme of things? The reality is that I've been treated very well, and had more than my share of op-ups. But why? It sounds like hell would have to freeze over before something good happened to a 2P.

Great, well-thought-out post. But still curious about the role of the 2P.

qasr

It is still a great post, and I knew it... But, one question. You said that full fare C GS's get upgraded to F, then full fare C 1K's get upgraded. Does that mean a 1K on a C fare trumps a GS on a D or Z fare? I've always wondered about that and it was a curious omission from your post.

Really, great post! ^ ^ ^

lucky9876coins

What a wonderful post! Thank you so much for taking the time to write it! ^

ButIsItArt

DJ, great post -- informative and interesting! Hope to read more Tales from Behind the Podium ^

UAalltheway

Great post!! ^^ Thank you so much for sharing!

UA_Flyer

Great post. Thanks for puttng in the effort to explain the upgrade process. I have more appreciation of GA's work after reading your excellent post.

^ ^ ^

karenkay

terrific post, thanks for taking the time to write it all out.

i'm still going to wear my nice clothes and compliment the ga, though...it may not get me an upgrade, but it can't hurt

Flyin4MAG

Thank you very much for the post. It is always good to hear the perspective from those that have been on the operational side of things.

DullesJason

Thanks qasr.

It's important to note that I said C fare meaning that it was a purchased and ticketed C class ticket as opposed to an upgrade. I will edit to reflect it.

To clarify: If memory serves, GS on any business class ticket and fare basis code generally will go ahead of any 1K because last I knew that's how the computer sorts it. It may now be that Z would be excluded--not sure about that. Then there are gate agents who might proactively go for all full C people and skip D fares but that's not how it's supposed to be done. Most CS supervisors wouldn't object. That's a bit of a gray area.

qasr

Interesting. As a 1K who travels frequently on intl Z fares, I have usually seen a fair number of people getting op-ups before me. AFAICT, it was a mix of GS's & 1K's, so I was curious. Of course, sometimes I have been op-upped and the only 1K in the cabin...

I will wait for the next thread explaining paid buy-ups to C & F and ask my relevant questions there! ^

DullesJason

Hell wouldn't have to freeze over, but you might want to be on the IAD-CDG leg on Christmas I mentioned at the end of the post. Hardly any elites.

LOL. I didn't mention 2Ps becaue I was referring to a 3 cabin flight (SFO-NRT), which I think is likely to be loaded with the highest ranking UA elites and therefore not very common that the need for operational upgrades would get as deep as 2Ps. If often doesn't even get to 1Ps and often doesn't include all 1Ks. Some flights are more likely to have few top-tier fliers and get to 2Ps for op-ups. I gave out many op-ups to 2Ps in my time at United. Just not as many a 1Ps, 1Ks, etc., naturally.

mahasamatman

Thanks for the post, DJ.

I have a question about couples traveling together. In your "op-up dance", if you are currently at the stage where you want to allocate a single seat, but a couple is next on the list (let's say they both have the same status, as my wife and I do), will you skip over them, or wait until you know for sure if you'll only have one seat or can op-up both of them?

qasr

Or ask if they're willing to be split up.

I'd like to know the answer about split statuses, e.g. only 1 1K on the list, multiple 1P's, but a 2P is travelling with the 1K.