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Home » United Airlines » When You Fly United Express You Are Flying United!
United Airlines

When You Fly United Express You Are Flying United!

Matthew Klint Posted onMay 2, 2019November 14, 2023 10 Comments

a white airplane on a runway

United Airlines’ President Scott Kirby recognizes that when you fly on United Express, you are flying on United.

Speaking to United employees in Houston in a recording obtained by Live and Let’s Fly, Kirby addressed the “confirmation bias” of dismissing delays on regionals as being somehow divorced from United Airlines.

There is sometimes a confirmation basis with all of us that if something bad happens on a regional, we say–if there’s a maintenance delay, if there’s anything–that’s because it’s a regional.

If something happens on the mainline, we never say, well, that’s because it’s the mainline. We say, that’s because of maintenance, or that’s because of the weather. So there is a confirmation bias that all of us have, including me.

That said, we do have pockets where the region–well actually one thing that regionals are much worse, all of our regionals are much worse than the mainline, is completion factor.

We cancel a lot more flights on the regional. But if you look at their controllable cancellation rates, they’re actually close to the mainline in terms of things like maintenance delays. Mostly our cancellations at the regionals are because we tell them to cancel a flight. If there’s a ground delay program here in Houston and we’ve got to cancel 20 flights, we’re going to cancel 20 regionals instead of canceling a mainline airplane that has three or four times as many customers on it.

And so the completion factor is lower on them, but it’s really not their fault. It’s because if we are going to have to cancel flights, we pick on the regionals. We try to spread it around between markets, but we’re more likely to cancel regionals when bad weather than we are mainline just because it impacts fewer customers.

There is a lot of work underway with all of them, though, to get the operating metrics to be the same level as United, and the customer service to be the same level as United.

But we all agree we should manage them to the same standards. When a customer buys a ticket on United Airlines, they’re not buying a ticket on Mesa. It says United Airlines on the side of the airplane. It’s United Airlines, and we should treat them–they’re a United Airlines customer and we should treat it just like it’s a United Airlines plane.

(bolding mine)

It wasn’t just the David Dao incident in which United was quick to emphasize this was a “United Express operated by…” flight. This is a routine tactic by airlines to avoid responsibility when something goes wrong.

But Kirby’s words could not be clearer and his attitude is precisely correct.

To United’s credit, we’ve seen the introduction of regional jets that are (arguably) more comfortable than mainline. These jets feature streaming IFE and wi-fi and real meals in first class…a huge jump from a few years prior.

CONCLUSION

Kirby’s words are refreshingly candid and precisely correct. I’ve never understood the distinction, especially from a customer service perspective, between mainline and regionals. I’m glad that United understands that it must provide more consistent service.

image: Alan Wilson / Flickr

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About Author

Matthew Klint

Matthew is an avid traveler who calls Los Angeles home. Each year he travels more than 200,000 miles by air and has visited more than 135 countries. Working both in the aviation industry and as a travel consultant, Matthew has been featured in major media outlets around the world and uses his Live and Let's Fly blog to share the latest news in the airline industry, commentary on frequent flyer programs, and detailed reports of his worldwide travel.

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10 Comments

  1. ed lewis Reply
    May 2, 2019 at 10:04 am

    “Precisely Correct” is precisely correct. Finally an unequivocal statement on the true facts of the issue.

  2. 121Pilot Reply
    May 2, 2019 at 10:36 am

    I think your spot on and I wish more of the majors had the same view. They sold the ticket. It’s their customer and their airplane regardless of who is says “operated by” in fine print. I’m glad to see United taking that view and I hope it translates through their operation.

    Side note: Their was a fair amount of criticism in the comments on your other post about Kirby regarding his stress of travel remarks. I think much of that was unfair.

    As you might imagine I fly all the time in the back getting to and from work. That’s low stress for me. I’ve only myself to worry about and I know exactly what I’m doing. My stress on those flights such as it is comes from stuff around the airline I’m on and ATC delays that hold me up.

    But flying with my family is a completely different gig. Everything takes longer and is much harder with two little kids to wrangle. We have to arrive much earlier. Stand in more lines and deal with security which even with pre-check for all of us can be frustrating. Even as an expert flying with my family is simply stressful. And Kirby isn’t wrong to recognize that. Frankly when flying for leisure getting on the airplane is when I get to relax. And he and United would do well to recognize that just getting on the airplane is stressful. Which means much of what he talked about is accurate.

    There is no doubt United needs to do better. United should do better. Providing good customer service is free and their leadership should be giving the front line the tools to make that happen and then insisting they execute on that.

    Now if only we could also get them to think about their loyalty program as a method to actually inspire loyalty and drive marginal spend.

    • Steve S Reply
      May 2, 2019 at 12:38 pm

      Any plans to fly and review the new CRJ-550? I’ve heard they are mostly operating out of ORD? But I’m interested to try because I love the E175s.

      • Steve S Reply
        May 2, 2019 at 12:41 pm

        Sorry I meant this for Matthew not as a reply to you 121Pilot.

        Coincidentally I completely agree with you. Travel by myself is seamless and unfrustrating. But traveling with the family means checking bags/car seats, wrangling little ones, etc and I have to dig deep to summon my calm and collected business traveler mode.

  3. Dick Bupkiss Reply
    May 2, 2019 at 12:12 pm

    Which of their regional jets are “(arguably) more comfortable than mainline”?

    I generally avoid flights on regional jets if I can — unless I’m going to a smaller city that’s only served by the regionals. If I’m flying from SEA to LAX or SFO (especially when connecting to an onward longhaul), I generally will switch airlines to avoid a domestic leg on a regional jet. What great options have I been missing?

    • Matthew Reply
      May 2, 2019 at 12:20 pm

      All the ERJ-170s/175s. I find them more comfortable than mainline, especially in the solo seat on the A side.

    • Steve S Reply
      May 2, 2019 at 1:40 pm

      Avoid E145s, CRJ-200s, maybe CRJ-700s but those are typically OK. And obviously any Bombadier options.

      E170 series are great and whether Mesa or Republic I’ve found them all to be newer, clean, comfortable, and functional.

      • Sunny leveson-jones Reply
        October 11, 2019 at 9:52 pm

        You do realize the CRJ-200 and CRJ-700 are bombardier products?

  4. JoEllen Reply
    May 3, 2019 at 12:28 pm

    “But we all agree we should manage them to the same standards. When a customer buys a ticket on United Airlines, they’re not buying a ticket on Mesa. It says United Airlines on the side of the airplane. It’s United Airlines, and we should treat them–they’re a United Airlines customer and we should treat it just like it’s a United Airlines plane.”
    ——-
    Then why do Mesa and other regionals have different names on their books??? When things go wrong, the flying public has no clue that the company airline they have flown and had a problem with is MESA, not United. MESA has a CEO and other employees who are not paid by United, so why try to convince people that MESA is United. Their paycheck comes from Mesa, not United. Another psychobabel rant by Scott Kirby, I don’t care who sold the ticket.

    • Aly Reply
      January 9, 2020 at 6:29 pm

      JoEllen, I agree they should be managed the same when flying as an Express/Regional partner but the fact is, you’re right, they are not the same! They are a whole different entity paid by a mainline to run shorter routes for them. I particularly don’t care for regionals and try to book mainline all the time. The flying public aren’t the only ones that this confuses.

      In many states there are also an issues for divorced parents with long distance visitation clauses because of the way the flights are marketed and ran. United, MAJOR CARRIER, sales the seat but it is then run by United Express, the REGIONAL BRAND, and operated by one of numerous REGIONAL CARRIER airlines and you have court documents that state you can only flight them on a MAJOR COMMERCIAL CARRIER from an airport close to each parties home, people misconstrue the REGIONAL CARRIER being a MAJOR CARRIER because they are selling the ticket and want to send kids on REGIONAL CARRIER flights run by whatever airline just because it is sold by United’s website.

      One parent understands that they can only fly them on a MAJOR COMMERCIAL CARRIER, United, and books a flight at the closest airport, say 1(1/2) hours away and the other parent won’t drive to that airport because they see the REGIONAL CARRIER on United’s site with a flight scheduled at the REGIOANL airport on one of the numerous airlines and just refuses to send the kids to visit the other parent. So many visitations are denied because someone doesn’t understand that the two United and United Express are not the same in the eyes of the court systems.

      Sad. I wish that they would define what a MAJOR and a REGIONAL are on the websites as well as in court documents so that parents could see their children with no headaches.

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