The recently merged carriers United and Continental Airlines announced new changes this week to customer services and products, in a move that paves the way for a single brand to emerge in the near future.

The biggest shift is added functionality on both brands’ websites—united.com and continental.com—allowing customers to shop for flights, obtain seat assignments and check flight status for both carriers on both sites. Passengers also can check-in and print boarding passes from either carrier’s kiosks in hub cities including Chicago, New York/Newark, Houston and San Francisco.

The joint company, United Continental Holdings, also has introduced Premier Access, a new package of priority airport services, including designated check-in counters, priority security screening, “front of the line” boarding through special Premier Access lanes, and priority baggage handling for elite-level frequent flyers and premium-cabin customers. The elite-service rebranding will be rolled out at airports over the next several months. Until then, elite-level frequent flyers and customers traveling in first, business and business-first cabins have access to United’s current premium/elite benefits.

Other consistency changes being made over the next several months include:

- aligned check-in and boarding processes across both carriers.
- free Wi-Fi and the same beverage choices in airport lounges.
- new “Choice Menu” in-flight food options, with the same choices and pricing for both carriers.
- aligned customer policies, procedures and fees.
- new signage and branding.
- single social media channels—@United for Twitter, and a new Facebook page.

Photo credit: United Continental Holdings

Related post:
$3.2B United Continental Merger Creates World’s Largest Airline

Ginger McGuire, a passenger onboard United Express flight 8080, was found alone and sleeping in the plane by the cleaning crew in Philadelphia at 3.50 am on May 25, over 3 hours after the flight landed after a short 65 minute flight from Dulles.

Sleeping on a plane

Trans States, the airline which operates the regional United flight, said it was standard procedure to make sure all passengers disembark after a flight. They’re still trying to figure out how and why Ginger McGuire got left behind on a small 50-seater jet.

McGuire is the third airline passenger in the last 2 months who has been forgotten by the flight crew and later found by maintenance crew in an otherwise empty plane.

Last month on April 7, Jessica Cabot, an 18 year old blind girl, was also flying on a United Airlines plane from British Columbia to Florida when she was left behind at a stopover in Chicago.

Jessica was told to wait until the other passengers disembarked, and then a flight attendant was supposed to escort her out. No one came, and instead she heard the plane door being shut and latched. The maintenance crew found her and escorted her out of the plane.

Two months ago on March 6, British passenger Kris Lines fell asleep on an Air Canada Jazz flight from Calgary to Vancouver, after a long trans-atlantic flight from Heathrow. He was woken up by a mechanic and found himself on an empty plane parked in an airplane hangar an hour and a half after the flight landed.

A few years ago, 63 year old Joan Cummings, a disabled grandmother, was left alone (and wide awake) on a Ryanair plane for an hour after the flight from Spain had landed at Stansted Airport. She was supposed to be waiting for a special lift which never arrived. The crew left and so did the pilot, and then even the cleaning crew left. She was eventually ‘rescued’ after a worker spotted her wheelchair outside the plane.

But the worst hangar experience was probably endured by Scott Bender, also from Philadelphia. He was still asleep on a US Airways plane when it landed at Birmingham International Airport, and got left behind. Unfortunately for Bender, he awoke all by himself.

The lights were off, the cabin was dark and he was all alone. Scott Bender assumed the plane had crashed and he was dead. When he get off the plane, he found himself in a different type of hell - detained by airport security for intensive questioning, because this happened in October 2001, just a month after 9/11. After he got through that, he found he couldn’t even get his baggage.

Photo – dreemreeper

On Sunday, May 02, 2010, the boards of United Airlines parent UAL Corp. and Continental Airlines Inc. agreed to a merger in a transaction valued at about $3.2 billion, creating the world’s largest airline.

United-Continental

The merger is based on a stock swap, with no premium. United will swap 1.05 shares for each Continental share, leaving United shareholders with a 55% stake in the new company, and Continental shareholders with a 45% stake.

The highlights:-

- The new airline will be named United, and will be based in Chicago.
- Continental CEO Jeff Smisek will be the new CEO, with United’s Glenn Tilton as the non-executive Chairman until Dec 31, 2012. 
- United replaces Delta Air Lines as the world’s largest airline.
- United will have a footprint of 370 destinations in 59 countries.

Before the merger, UAL ranks third among US carriers in terms of traffic and market capitalization while Continental ranks fourth. In addition to vaulting the new United into the top spot, the merger also creates a whole bunch of issues – for both airlines’ employees, for other airlines, and for consumers.

The merged airline assumes responsibility for 88,000 workers and $29 billion in revenues, based on 2009 figures. The two airlines put together showed a loss of $933 million in 2009. To justify the merger and return to profitability, United will be looking at ways to slash this large workforce and scrap overlapping routes. 

They’re expecting an operating profit of $600 million next year, with $1b to $1.2b in annual cost savings and new revenues by 2013.

With Delta-Northwest, Frontier-Midwest, and United-Continental now off the airline industry merger market, the focus now shifts to the remaining carriers still unconsolidated – specifically, US Airways and AMR Corp’s American Airlines. The merger fever might also spread to the discount airlines, with Southwest already keen for an acquisition after its failed bid for Frontier.

For consumers, the reduced competition will mean higher fares on routes where both airlines were competitors, and possible disruption of service while integration issues are sorted out, including pilot seniority and overlapping routes. Estimates indicate that they’ll be reducing the number of available seats by 8%, despite having a code-share agreement already in place.

The official announcement of the Continental-United merger will be made on Monday, May 03, 2010.

Photo by PhillipC

To protest the failure of year-long negotiations for a new labor contract, United Airlines flight attendants are picketing airports around the world on April 6, 2010.

United Flight Attendants protest

In addition to 11 domestic airports, United flight attendants will also be picketing at Frankfurt, Hong Kong, London and Tokyo.

The dispute goes back to 2002, when the attendants’ union  – the Association of Flight Attendants (AFA), made significant concessions after United filed for bankruptcy. They’ve now trying to walkback those concessions, since United came out of bankruptcy in 2006.

AFA says the 16,000 United flight attendants are working at 1994 wage levels and working 48% more compared with 2002 schedules and staffing. United, for its part, made a last-ditch offer to prevent the picketing.

United VP for Labor Relations Doug McKeen put out a letter outlining the proposal mirroring Continental’s contract with its flight attendants. Under this offer, payscales would go up, with some senor flight attendants getting a raise of over 10%.

It would also involve some changes in work rules, including the rules relating to hotels used by flight attendants, and the ability to slash benefits for flight attendants who trade away their flying time.

Here’s a comparison of the proposals made by both United and AFA regarding the use of hotel rooms by flight attendants (scroll down to Section 6). Under the United proposal, downtown hotels kick in for 32 hour layovers, with a $20 payment for not using layover hotel, and no hotel for sits under 5 hrs. It would also eliminate crew meals.

AFA wants a downtown hotel for layovers over 15 hours, $50 or 50% of cost of room for not using layover hotel, reimbursement for cabs, and increase in crew meals and parking reimbursements.

Greg Davidowitch, president of AFA-CWA at United Airlines, rejected United’s latest proposal, saying that “We will not agree to the wholesale destruction of portions of our contract to pay for any perceived improvements.”

What’s next? AFA-CWA says it has stepped up strike preparedness training and readied members for more public protests.

Photo courtesy AFA-CWA, AFL-CIO