As follow up to its poorly received employee incentive program rolled out earlier in 2018, UA went back to the drawing boards and just announced a revised program for 2019.

Under the revised program, eligible employees can earn up to $125 per month bonus if airline hits two goals based on 1) customer survey result scores, and 2) achieves top spot for D:00 departure timeliness.

Here is story from Skift:

United Airlines’ New Employee Bonuses Factor in Customer Satisfaction
https://skift.com/2018/12/22/united-air ... val-goals/


Lets see how this revised program goes down with employees.

Personally, I don't like these generic goals that award everyone the same regardless of their participation.
I actually thought the program from earlier this year was richer for employees with ability to win all types of things including Mercedes car. Whole point of the program should be to not condition employees use to a regular pay stream, but create incentive they actually might win something special or unique and work towards it.

Also wonder how UA will do long term with DOT A:14 stats if they are so focused on D:00 instead?
Too me D:00 is too easy to cheat (sit at gate with brakes released) and does not account for delivering your customers to their destination anywhere near ontime.

UA does not use brake release for D:00 they use push back.

When you give a kid candy every day, the day you stop they throw a fit, and that is what happened with the employees who came to expect these payments as part of their regular pay. Sadly UA boxed themselves in and are stuck with the monthly candy feeding still.

Very easy to cheat D:00. Seen and done it dozens of time. Even open bellies up to continue loading bags. For a customer, I would say A:14 matters far more. They want to arrive on time.

janders wrote:

When you give a kid candy every day, the day you stop they throw a fit, and that is what happened with the employees who came to expect these payments as part of their regular pay. Sadly UA boxed themselves in and are stuck with the monthly candy feeding still.

Very easy to cheat D:00. Seen and done it dozens of time. Even open bellies up to continue loading bags. For a customer, I would say A:14 matters far more. They want to arrive on time.

The service industry is reward driven. It a certain degree of performance is required - Why not reward diligence?

Such incentive programs were never meant to be construed as regular pay, but over time many have come to expect them as such, and when the company proposed a new program that put that at risk, folks were up on arms.

Personally, I think the company was on the right track with program proposed earlier in the year, that offered fewer but richer rewards for employees if the company managed to meet its targets, and avoided this month monthly sugar fix that too many have come to expect.

And yes D0 can be gamed. As a customer, the arrival time (and even cancellation rate) is a much more important goal to meet.

People, the game UAL proposed earlier in the year was replacing a bonus that everyone would get with a raffle that hardly anyone would win, while saving the company a ton of money.

If you want to give a bonus, fine, but if you’re gonna turn around and create the cheapest bonus structure one can imagine and then put lipstick on it, because you’re a cheapo.... don’t be surprised if you go down in flames!

LAXintl wrote:

Such incentive programs were never meant to be construed as regular pay, but over time many have come to expect them as such, and when the company proposed a new program that put that at risk, folks were up on arms.

Personally, I think the company was on the right track with program proposed earlier in the year, that offered fewer but richer rewards for employees if the company managed to meet its targets, and avoided this month monthly sugar fix that too many have come to expect.

And yes D0 can be gamed. As a customer, the arrival time (and even cancellation rate) is a much more important goal to meet.

Disagree. If pay is given for doing your job correctly then it is nothing but job compensation. Naturally compensation is something people care about at a job.

Agree that D0 is a stupid metric that harms customers more than it helps. This is why gate agents stuff you like goats into the plane and flight attendants slam bins in your face and literally reprimand the entire plane for doing anything less than a six minute turn. I have no patience for it, I am the customer. I am fast... do not ever reprimand me for getting on the flight I paid for. The employees get visibly anxious and upset when D0 is threatened, even on a very challenging turn that should never meet D0 anyway. D0 incentives literally need to stop. Total bullshit.

I am not talking about any incident for myself, although I like to board pretty late. I’m specifically calling out the incoming arrival 20 minutes before departure time, then hustle everyboady onboard and THEN harangue everyone onboard the plane to sit the hell down, and shut up, so you can get your D0 compensation and we can arrive 36 minutes before scheduled at our destination. It happens a lot. The boarding door also shuts ridiculously early now, constantly to the detriment of stragglers, such as the elderly. Fine if the schedule really requires it. D0 has many drawbacks and no clear benefit to the customer.

PPVRA wrote:

People, the game UAL proposed earlier in the year was replacing a bonus that everyone would get with a raffle that hardly anyone would win, while saving the company a ton of money.

If you want to give a bonus, fine, but if you’re gonna turn around and create the cheapest bonus structure one can imagine and then put lipstick on it, because you’re a cheapo.... don’t be surprised if you go down in flames!

Exactly. No one was concerned about the program changing, but going to a lottery system is just plain ridiculous. It didn’t reward people for going above and beyond. There’s already a program for that in the United 100. The way the proposed program worked was “everyone pulls on the same rope, but only a few people would be rewarded”. It’s easy it’s see why people would think that’s unfair.

Problem / overbooked passengers with only carry on will be at more risk, while passengers with bags in the hold will be safer.

Bet removed passenger feedback is excluded from the stats.

This is nothing new; AS uses controllable departures on zero (CD0) as a metric for quarterly operational performance rewards, ruling out WX or ATC delays that are outside the airline’s control.

Not a fan of D:00 obsession because it leads to more situations where the door is slammed in your face several minutes before scheduled departure time but the aircraft doesn't actually go anywhere for quite some time. Not such a big deal at outstations, especially when you've got everybody you're expecting. But at hubs obsessing about D:00 will lead to an increase in the most angering sort of missed connections.

UA paid employees $87mln for those performance bonuses in 2017. The lottery would cap payouts to a max of $18mln. I really think it had less to to about aligning performance motivation, with saving 70+ million dollars.

Focusing on D0 means nothing --- take a look at last month when United was last among all majors in on-time arrivals. Nobody cares that you leave on-time, it's all about arriving on-time. I feel like United has taken a few steps back in their operations as of late. They have added a bunch of new flying but not increased staffing levels much. It's having an impact.

knope2001 wrote:

at hubs obsessing about D:00 will lead to an increase in the most angering sort of missed connections.

Couldn’t disagree more; D0 is a critical success factor and by making it a priority, you actually decrease the likelihood of misconnects at hubs. Besides, you’re also arguing that avoiding making a small minority mad because they didn’t get to the gate on time is better than delaying the majority who did manage to get there on time.

flyguy84 wrote:

Focusing on D0 means nothing --- take a look at last month when United was last among all majors in on-time arrivals. Nobody cares that you leave on-time, it's all about arriving on-time. I feel like United has taken a few steps back in their operations as of late. They have added a bunch of new flying but not increased staffing levels much. It's having an impact.

Departing on time drastically improves the likelihood of arriving on time, does it not? Can’t say I’ve ever heard an argument where being indifferent to ontime departures led to an uptick in ontime arrivals.

An on time departure helps guarantee an on time arrival. WN has the Ten Minute Rule for that very reason, as well as to better utilize aircraft.

EA CO AS wrote:

knope2001 wrote:

at hubs obsessing about D:00 will lead to an increase in the most angering sort of missed connections.

Couldn’t disagree more; D0 is a critical success factor and by making it a priority, you actually decrease the likelihood of misconnects at hubs. Besides, you’re also arguing that avoiding making a small minority mad because they didn’t get to the gate on time is better than delaying the majority who did manage to get there on time.

I suspect that if you look at the A0 rate of flights that depart between D-5 and D0 and those that depart between D0 and D5, you will not see a statistically significant difference. So many factors - runway in use, ATC, timely arrival of w&b numbers for those carriers that do them after departure, gate situation at the other end, etc. - make a much bigger difference than those couple of minutes.

I think complaining about D0 stems from privileged entitlement. There is no way a plane leaving the gate on time is a bad thing. Personally, I hate boarding 20 minutes early then waiting for over 10-15 minutes past departure time for this, that and the other. As a customer, there is nothing better than pushing back at D0 or earlier, as it gives me confidence that the airline is on my side and hustling for my benefit.

usdcaguy wrote:

I think complaining about D0 stems from privileged entitlement. There is no way a plane leaving the gate on time is a bad thing. Personally, I hate boarding 20 minutes early then waiting for over 10-15 minutes past departure time for this, that and the other. As a customer, there is nothing better than pushing back at D0 or earlier, as it gives me confidence that the airline is on my side and hustling for my benefit.

Leaving on time isn’t a bad thing. The employee attitudes that infatuation with D0 can cause certainly are.

Arriving ontime is even better.

Airlines need to schedule realistically (block time, etc) and have the gates and staff to handle the arrival.

Simply pushing ontime can paper over the other reliability handicaps.

I forgot about how awful that other incentive program was. Sad that Kirby tried to execute that under Oscar's watch.

EA CO AS wrote:

knope2001 wrote:

at hubs obsessing about D:00 will lead to an increase in the most angering sort of missed connections.

Couldn’t disagree more; D0 is a critical success factor and by making it a priority, you actually decrease the likelihood of misconnects at hubs. Besides, you’re also arguing that avoiding making a small minority mad because they didn’t get to the gate on time is better than delaying the majority who did manage to get there on time.

And by on time you mean what... 40 minutes before scheduled departure?

Isn't getting customers where they are going the point of airlines? Is it something that can be dismissed so casually?

Anyway, we all agree at some point you need to leave people behind. We might disagree whether using D-minus-15 or even D-minus-25 is the correct time. I have run into cases where the gate agent early boarded everybody, 25 minutes to go, and they are pissed I roll up at 20-25 minutes, because they wanted to close out the flight. That is complete nonsense. Gate agent, you are paid exactly to wait for people to board the plane. That is the job you do. You are also supposed to be personable to the customer while you do that. I play the role of customer these days so my sympathy for these pain points has vanished over time.

D-35 should be the latest any first item on a mainline flight and D-25 for the RJs

Not like United has paid that much in incentives this year the goals are unrealistic right now.

For all you D0 critics out there, I'd love to see what would happen if any airline stopped intensely focusing on D0. NOTHING would depart on time and NOTHING would arrive on time.

LAXintl wrote:

And yes D0 can be gamed. As a customer, the arrival time (and even cancellation rate) is a much more important goal to meet.

I agree customers care more about the cancellation or completion rate but for the year (2018) I think the 3 legacies and WN are all averaging about 97% - 99% completion rate with DL leading the way with the lowest number of canceled flights however industry wide we are not seeing the high number of cancellations we were seeing 3 - 5 years ago airlines have gotten much better. Although passengers care about the cancellation rate if the incentive program were based on this UA would almost certainly hit the goal monthly simply because our cancellation rate is so low. Basing part of the incentive program on D:00 is actually much harder to hit than most people realize and as far as being able to cheat UA has taken care of that. Pilots don't report their out time the aircraft does it for them, however in order for the aircraft to register in the system as having departed there must be a full rotation of the tires. Truth be told it isn't just UA that pushing D:00 all three legacies and WN are pushing for better D:00 numbers because first and foremost D:00 saves a lot of money. What everyday passengers may not know is delays cost money depending on the type of aircraft. A one minute delay can cost an airline from $80-$95 dollars for a 737 to $340 dollars for a 777. When UA had 744 I think a one minute delay according to UA cost the company $480 dollars a minute.

Also another reason the incentive program isn't based on A:14 but D:00 is because is because employees have direct control over D:00 we have no control over A:14. How many times have we all been on flights that have left the gate on time but still arrived at your destination late? Once that aircraft pushes it is out of UA employees hands, pilots have to wait for clearance for takeoff, which can be effected by the air traffic control trying to manage congestion on the ground and in the air. We've all been on aircraft were it has taken 45 minutes or more just to get airborne. Normal taxi times are built into the block time which varies depending on time and location but there are always times and days when taxi time exceeds what has been allocated in the block time. In addition to long extended taxi/ wait times we've all been on aircraft that have been rerouted in the air by the air traffic control. While pilots can attempt to make up lost time in the air depending on the winds aloft and air traffic control that can be difficult to do and in some cases its not possible to make up lost time in the air. This is part of the reason why the incentive program is based on D:00 and not A:14, it isn't that UA doesn't care about A:14 I think our improvements in A:14 over the past few years speak volumes as to how serious UA takes A:14, but for the incentive program it is all about D:00 because that is what employees have the most control over.

One wonders if UA does not project to pay out as much under this scheme...

From my observation with AA, I did not see any meaningful difference in on-time arrival performance before and after the D0 initiative was rolled out.

The initiative at AA where I started to notice on-time issues was when AA went from rolling to heavily banked hubs then exacerbating the issue by tightening up ops with very tight connection/turn times.

I doubt UA will experience substantially better operational performance because of D0.

jumbojet wrote:

jagraham wrote:

D00 is worse than useless. Not a UA problem, but I bet that the situation where a DL pax was made to sit in a feces stained seat was due in large part to a D00 related metric. That plane left on time, but was it worth it???

Cant really seem to see why you have to drag DL into this topic like you did. Totally irelevant and flame bait statement to make. Its posts like yours that derail perfectly legit discussions

Seems quite relevant. Delta refused to delay a departure to meet some metric and a passenger is forced to sit in someone else’s feces.

EA CO AS wrote:

knope2001 wrote:

at hubs obsessing about D:00 will lead to an increase in the most angering sort of missed connections.

Couldn’t disagree more; D0 is a critical success factor and by making it a priority, you actually decrease the likelihood of misconnects at hubs. Besides, you’re also arguing that avoiding making a small minority mad because they didn’t get to the gate on time is better than delaying the majority who did manage to get there on time.

If departing exactly on time means leaving behind several passengers whose connecting flights were late, you simply wind up with unhappy customers. That is said as a customer.

jayunited wrote:

I agree customers care more about the cancellation or completion rate but for the year (2018) I think the 3 legacies and WN are all averaging about 97% - 99% completion rate...

That difference of 2 points is an extra 100 cancellations a day for DL, AA or UA when express ops are added in. That's an extra 12,000 POd customers on average.

Justapax wrote:

EA CO AS wrote:

knope2001 wrote:

at hubs obsessing about D:00 will lead to an increase in the most angering sort of missed connections.

Couldn’t disagree more; D0 is a critical success factor and by making it a priority, you actually decrease the likelihood of misconnects at hubs. Besides, you’re also arguing that avoiding making a small minority mad because they didn’t get to the gate on time is better than delaying the majority who did manage to get there on time.

If departing exactly on time means leaving behind several passengers whose connecting flights were late, you simply wind up with unhappy customers. That is said as a customer.

You do realize passengers on that plane have connections as well? It makes no sense to delay an entire plane full of people (most of whom have connections themselves) to wait for 10 passengers arriving late. Of course, exceptions should be made if it is the last flight out. The best way to keep all passengers happy is to keep the entire the entire operation running on time!

Delaying five flights because connecting passengers are coming in late off of one flight just makes the problem worse and gets exponentially worse as the day goes on because now you have 5 flights of people late connecting to 25 flights and so on and so on.

The first step in arriving ontime is departing ontime. D0 goals are nothing new. DL, AA, and UA have been doing it for years, and it played a big role in their ontime arrival improvement.. This is simply an incentive for to achieving it. Sure, sometimes a passenger gets the short end, but as a whole it's tough to argue that departing ontime isn't passenger-friendly.

MSPNWA wrote:

The first step in arriving ontime is departing ontime. D0 goals are nothing new. DL, AA, and UA have been doing it for years, and it played a big role in their ontime arrival improvement.. This is simply an incentive for to achieving it. Sure, sometimes a passenger gets the short end, but as a whole it's tough to argue that departing ontime isn't passenger-friendly.

Departing on-time is not evil in + of itself. But D0 is not what we should be measuring. If you are delaying several passengers 1,000 minutes by closing the door early, just to make everybody else 37 minutes early instead of 36 minutes early, that is a poor outcome.

Passenger minutes delayed @ arrival is the metric I would start with. All passengers checked-in (whether they are onboard or not) would be included in the statistic. Whether the airplanes fly on time is actually irrelevant. Running a perfect S:00 operation with zillions of passenger delays is a bad outcome.

Flighty wrote:

Agree that D0 is a stupid metric that harms customers more than it helps. This is why gate agents stuff you like goats into the plane and flight attendants slam bins in your face and literally reprimand the entire plane for doing anything less than a six minute turn. I have no patience for it, I am the customer. I am fast... do not ever reprimand me for getting on the flight I paid for. The employees get visibly anxious and upset when D0 is threatened, even on a very challenging turn that should never meet D0 anyway. D0 incentives literally need to stop. Total bullshit.

I am not talking about any incident for myself, although I like to board pretty late. I’m specifically calling out the incoming arrival 20 minutes before departure time, then hustle everyboady onboard and THEN harangue everyone onboard the plane to sit the hell down, and shut up, so you can get your D0 compensation and we can arrive 36 minutes before scheduled at our destination. It happens a lot. The boarding door also shuts ridiculously early now, constantly to the detriment of stragglers, such as the elderly. Fine if the schedule really requires it. D0 has many drawbacks and no clear benefit to the customer.

This so true and obvious on many flights where this kind of incentive is in place. The customer is the enemy.

The aircraft arrives late and then they try to blame customers boarding for not departing on time. They bark stupid orders like:

When you find your seat, step in and allow the passengers behind you to get by.

Think about that a minute. WHEN has an FA ever done that? Found his/her seat; stepped into a space you can not even stand up in (re: seat pitch); placed their carryon on the seat to let other passengers by while they looked around for bin space; bent over in some contorted fashion to place their bag in the overhead bin while not blocking other passengers; then sat down. NEVER!

The outbound crew should be measured on the turn time. That’s in their control and doesn’t negatively impact the customer experience. If they can reasonably make up the time during the turn without impacting the customer experience, that’s great.

Flighty wrote:

Agree that D0 is a stupid metric that harms customers more than it helps. This is why gate agents stuff you like goats into the plane and flight attendants slam bins in your face and literally reprimand the entire plane for doing anything less than a six minute turn. I have no patience for it, I am the customer. I am fast... do not ever reprimand me for getting on the flight I paid for. The employees get visibly anxious and upset when D0 is threatened, even on a very challenging turn that should never meet D0 anyway. D0 incentives literally need to stop. Total bullshit.

And will you whine when you miss a connection following your delayed flight because the previous three legs left 10 minutes late?

D0 works great in DEN... Heading to SFO. Im happy with D+30....

usdcaguy wrote:

I think complaining about D0 stems from privileged entitlement. There is no way a plane leaving the gate on time is a bad thing. Personally, I hate boarding 20 minutes early then waiting for over 10-15 minutes past departure time for this, that and the other. As a customer, there is nothing better than pushing back at D0 or earlier, as it gives me confidence that the airline is on my side and hustling for my benefit.

USDCAGUY,
you nailed it!!!!!!using a premier uax carrier as an example(gojet) plus my neighbor is a gojet soon to be a southwest pilot, long story short they have been instructed to board 5 early than what united sop is, close the door asap as their out time is when the door closes and the pilot releases the brakes and they always release the brakes then set the brakes again to get the out time knowing that the aircraft is chocked and visually look on the walk around to see if the tow bar is hooked up to the push tractor ....then have the cabin crew close the bins do the check list that he admits should have been done prior to door closing and call for push, he admits that they usually take 10-15 minutes after the out time is recorded before they get around to pushing...meanwhile back at the ranch, they have a early out time but this is how their a:10 or a:14 times are always bad.....they have learned the united game and until they get a full rotation of tires then nothing will change....i waived the bs flag when he was telling me this but after watching a few of them he is correct, well done hulas

Giving people a bonus for doing a job they are already paid to do.
Everyone gets a trophy!

usdcaguy wrote:

I think complaining about D0 stems from privileged entitlement. There is no way a plane leaving the gate on time is a bad thing. Personally, I hate boarding 20 minutes early then waiting for over 10-15 minutes past departure time for this, that and the other. As a customer, there is nothing better than pushing back at D0 or earlier, as it gives me confidence that the airline is on my side and hustling for my benefit.

USDCAGUY,
you nailed it!!!!!!using a premier uax carrier as an example(gojet) plus my neighbor is a gojet soon to be a southwest pilot, long story short they have been instructed to board 5 early than what united sop is, close the door asap as their out time is when the door closes and the pilot releases the brakes and they always release the brakes then set the brakes again to get the out time knowing that the aircraft is chocked and visually look on the walk around to see if the tow bar is hooked up to the push tractor ....then have the cabin crew close the bins do the check list that he admits should have been done prior to door closing and call for push, he admits that they usually take 10-15 minutes after the out time is recorded before they get around to pushing...meanwhile back at the ranch, they have a early out time but this is how their a:10 or a:14 times are always bad.....they have learned the united game and until they get a full rotation of tires then nothing will change....i waived the bs flag when he was telling me this but after watching a few of them he is correct, well done hulas

KICT wrote:

Giving people a bonus for doing a job they are already paid to do.
Everyone gets a trophy!

Calm down Ebenezer. People who are given terrible pay in dangerous and unpleasant working conditions sometimes need some incentive to do more than the bare minimum.

Cactusjuba wrote:

UA paid employees $87mln for those performance bonuses in 2017. The lottery would cap payouts to a max of $18mln. I really think it had less to to about aligning performance motivation, with saving 70+ million dollars.

You absolutely got what management was trying to do!

What do all these things mean?

D:00 departure
A:14
Ten Minute Rule
A0
D-5
D-15
D-25
D-35
POd customers

It would be nice to be more inclusive and explain to the forum what D:00 means. I’m assuming pushing on time but it wouldn’t take much effort for the OP to explain what it means. Or is this meant exclusively for United employees?

KICT wrote:

Giving people a bonus for doing a job they are already paid to do.
Everyone gets a trophy!

Indeed. But the generation who were told that everyone’s a winner and everyone deserves a participation prize are now hitting the workplace.

Personally I’m all for individual targets. Very hard to track performance though I should imagine. Instead you’ll have lots working super hard to achieve it whilst you have many who won’t be bothered and won’t make the effort yet they’ll get the same bonus. Sounds like socialism to me.

sevenair wrote:

It would be nice to be more inclusive and explain to the forum what D:00 means. I’m assuming pushing on time but it wouldn’t take much effort for the OP to explain what it means. Or is this meant exclusively for United employees?

Anyone in the industry knows these terms. Most if not all US carriers use this metric. D0 is basically a countdown clock to scheduled departure time. If pushback from the gate occurs earlier than scheduled departure the D clock would be in the positive. ie: Flight Scheduled at 1445 pushback at 1440 therefore D05. late departures show in the negative. ie: 1450 D-05

To the poster who asked what A:14 and the 10 minute rule. The A refers to arrival and works the same way. The ten minute rule is the policy most carriers have in place for most flights that states the gate/boarding door will close 10
minutes before scheduled departure and will not reopen because the flight has been "closed out". So be on time.

POd pax means a really pissed of traveler

UA will never have truly clean operation performance wise unless it manages to address staff morale and adequately place crucial fixes front to back and back to front. UA has made some key strides in 2018 in on time performance, but a quick glance at their app to see why flight delays happen reveal what everyone is already aware of when it comes to UA that follows this. The airline has a higher percentage of maintenance issues than its competitors, is hobbled by having a very strong route network but 3 hubs in challenging air traffic and weather locations (EWR, SFO, ORD), and the fact that flight attendants, though now unified under a single contract, not everything is in place yet and there are often crew shortages that delay flights. UA also has a high aircraft utilization rate, which is a squeeze on operations generally, with bad weather or congested hubs, or both.

Flighty wrote:

Disagree. If pay is given for doing your job correctly then it is nothing but job compensation. Naturally compensation is something people care about at a job.

Agree that D0 is a stupid metric that harms customers more than it helps. This is why gate agents stuff you like goats into the plane and flight attendants slam bins in your face and literally reprimand the entire plane for doing anything less than a six minute turn. I have no patience for it, I am the customer. I am fast... do not ever reprimand me for getting on the flight I paid for. The employees get visibly anxious and upset when D0 is threatened, even on a very challenging turn that should never meet D0 anyway. D0 incentives literally need to stop. Total bullshit.

I am not talking about any incident for myself, although I like to board pretty late. I’m specifically calling out the incoming arrival 20 minutes before departure time, then hustle everyboady onboard and THEN harangue everyone onboard the plane to sit the hell down, and shut up, so you can get your D0 compensation and we can arrive 36 minutes before scheduled at our destination. It happens a lot. The boarding door also shuts ridiculously early now, constantly to the detriment of stragglers, such as the elderly. Fine if the schedule really requires it. D0 has many drawbacks and no clear benefit to the customer.

First and foremost the person who started this thread part of their original post is wrong UA is not pay employees $125 dollars per month in incentives if we hit goal that $125 dollars is paid out quarterly. Also the $125 dollars is before taxes not after. So this notion that employees are herding people like goats onto airplanes just to make D:00 is ridiculous. United Airlines is paying out a hell of a lot more money in overtime than they are in incentives.

Secondly C.S. agents and FA's are not the determining factor in D:00 those decisions are made by people most revenue passengers will never see. Every hub and major line station no matter the airline has a Station Operations Center (SOC) AA, DL WN and other airlines may call it a different name, but somewhere at the airport behind the scenes is an operations center. There are people in that center whose job it is to make the decision if we go ontime or if we delay a flight. For United the people whose input goes into those decisions cross many divisions. Each hub has several connect planners (again other airlines may use different terms). The connect planners are looking at all inbound connections for the hub but they are also looking and talking to other hubs to make sure we are not blowing connections at the downline station. Also involved is the gate manager, the FODM, FA and pilot crew scheduling desks, zone controllers, dispatchers, CCS, people here at the NOC, all of these departments are involved in D:00. To everyday passengers it may seem like D:00 does not benefit them when it actually does. Making D:00 can be the difference between a flight departing or being severely delayed or even canceled especially if the crew FA's or pilots are low on their duty time for the day. Once a crew runs out of duty time a simple 1 to 5 minute delay can then turn into a 3 plus hour delay especially if UA is forced to call in pilots from home. One minute can be the difference between FAMP and a cancellation because the FA's either won't waive or don't have enough duty time remaining for waiving to even be an option. Going back to the connect planners just earlier this week UA left 30 passengers behind on EWR-BOM. The flight was already delayed 25 minutes for ATC and even though those 30 passengers were schedule to land in 20 minutes after the initial 25 minute ATC delay. The extra delay when combined with ATC 25 minute delay would have put the flight crew up against their max duty day threatening a cancellation for a 77W full of passengers. Should UA risk dis-servicing the 336 passengers who made the flight to wait for 30 additional passengers even though their delay was do to ATC or do we go 25 minutes late and leave people behind? What everday passengers didn't know is even if the flight had left on time it was scheduled to arrive in BOM over an hour late to do enroute weather reroutes. So while you may be thinking why not wait for those 30 passengers, delaying the flight even longer for those 30 additional passengers put 336 other passengers at risk of a cancellation. Is it worth canceling a flight to hopefully make 30 connections? To some this may be extreme but these are the conversations that are taking place behind the scenes and this is an everyday multiple times a day occurrence in the airline industry. Take for instance ORD-SFO; no enroute weather, no issues with departures or arrivals at either ORD or SFO but we have 50 passengers on a flight who have extremely tight international connections at SFO not only to UA international flights but also foreign carriers. Do you blow the downline international connections waiting for 5 domestic passengers at ORD who have no connection to make at SFO or do you go ontime or even early rebook the 5 misconnects to give the 50 passengers onboard and their bags enough time to make their connections at SFO? There are so many factors that are taken into account when making a decision to delay a flight or go D:00 another factor that I discussed in my earlier post is the cost per minute of the delay which varies depending on aircraft type. What doesn't factor into the decision is the incentive program.
I will end this by saying there is never an excuse for an FA or a C.S. agent to herd people onto aircraft or to be rude and treat passengers like children and slam overhead bins that behavior is not appropriate but they are under a lot of stress to still turn that aircraft around and get the ontime. What sucks is if you don't get the ontime either the supervisor or manager is calling you into the office to explain why you took yet another delay. I know from my years on the ramp if you take a delay they are on your A*S in some cases the delay was beyond your control but the higher ups don't care all they see is a percentage that is trending higher not lower and they want to hold someone accountable for the delay.

Rdh3e wrote:

UA does not use brake release for D:00 they use push back.

They use brake release again. It used to be limited to the Boeing fleet for pushback as it was based on the wheel making a full rotation, but that has been disabled on the Boeings

jayunited wrote:

I will end this by saying there is never an excuse for an FA or a C.S. agent to herd people onto aircraft or to be rude and treat passengers like children and slam overhead bins that behavior is not appropriate but they are under a lot of stress to still turn that aircraft around and get the ontime. What sucks is if you don't get the ontime either the supervisor or manager is calling you into the office to explain why you took yet another delay. I know from my years on the ramp if you take a delay they are on your A*S in some cases the delay was beyond your control but the higher ups don't care all they see is a percentage that is trending higher not lower and they want to hold someone accountable for the delay.

When you give frontline staff this sort of negative incentive, how exactly do you expect them to act?

No one is suggesting that ops folks behind the scene shouldn’t make decisions or denying that those decisions will sometimes inconvenience some customers. That’s not the problem. Rude employees are. Pressure on frontline employees leads to that rudeness (and also to bad decision making, like gate checking far too many carryons).