Triangle Trip

On my last United flight, I had already selected by seat online, but I always like to look when I get to the airport when I go to the kiosk. The first kiosk approached rejected my credit card and said see customer representative. I had to go next door to the next kiosk which recognized my credit card. Using the credit card is probably the easiest and quickest method to pull your information.

I selected my flight, pressed check in, and then onto checking the seats. I like to check seats to a) get a better seat b) tell me about the # of people on the plane. This time however, the kiosk touchpad was a little out of sync. I had to press the button a few times to get each button to work. The worst part was I accidentally hit another seat number. I ended up with a ridiculous back middle seat. Immediately I tried to go back to my original seat, but the UP arrow button did not work.

For newcomers to seating, the kiosk only displays a few rows at a time, and you have to click up or down to seat the next rows. I looked for a cancel button, but didn’t see anything. I clicked EXIT thinking that would cancel but it didn’t. I had to start all over again and put my credit card in. I checked seats again, and confirmed it DID change my seat number to the back middle seat. I swiftly clicked back on my original seat. Fortunately no one in that span of time took my seat.

With a sigh of relief, I continued on the check-in process, I click next on the bottom right. The NEXT page is immediately an upgrade page. And the upgrade button is on the same spot as the next button on the page before. This is very tricky of united, because you have a tendency to hit next, next, next in the same spot. The DECLINE button is actually on the bottom left, the other side.

For experienced United travelers, we all know how many upgrade options they try to buy, or more mileage for more money. United travelers beware of the kiosk, it doesn’t let you zip through unless you really know it.

Big A out.

I recently got a new business credit card and started using it to purchase flights.  I swiftly bought a Virgin America ticket with the new credit card, no problems.  Next, I had to fill up gas, and like always I use a credit card to pay and in the more sketchy neighborhoods they always ask for zip code, so I prepared by getting the zip code, and actually the entire billing address.

Later that week, I purchased a United flight, and it asked me to input the billing address, so I entered my mailing address to see it if worked (since I had the card sent there), but no, it didn’t, I had to use the business mailing address and it worked.

I realized, Virgin America didn’t check the address at all.  I’ve recently purchased another VX ticket, and I don’t have the business address stored anywhere. For the extra security, I would be gladly take the burden of entering the correct address to the credit card.

For you readers out there, what about the other airlines?

I travel through a lot of different airlines, and each airline has their own boarding strategy. I have a rough estimate of what boarding group I will get with the seat I pick.

It would be nice to have the boarding group # displayed when selecting your seat # on the different airline sites.  Also, it would be nice to display the number of tickets seats purchased with priority boarding.  This way I would know when to pack lighter for a smaller carry on, or at least expect to check my luggage in to pick a seat with an earlier boarding assignment.

Different carriers have different number of boarding groups and strategies. United has 4 groups and board by outside-in, 1 status, 2 window, 3 middle, 4 aisle seats. Other carriers do back-to-front (4 groups), while others even do a reverse pyramid strategy (usually more than 4 groups).

Back window seat will guarantee you at least a boarding group 2, B, if you are status-less on most airlines and have no clue of the airline boarding strategy.  Guaranteed luggage in overhead, except maybe United since the majority is group 1, which is a different story.