Project Description:

In April of 2017, United Airlines overbooked Flight 3411 flying from O’Hare International in Chicago to Louisville, Kentucky. Generally, airlines resolve overbooking problems by offering travelers vouchers or travel credits towards future purchases with the airline if they voluntarily agree to change to a later flight. In this case there were no initial volunteers despite United Airlines increasing their travel voucher amount twice. Ultimately the airline randomly chose four people to involuntarily bump to allow other United Airlines Employees to board the plane instead. Three of the four customers left without any problems. The final customer that was asked to leave said that he was a doctor and need to get back home to see his patients. The situation escalated when the customer said that the airline was targeting him because he was Chinese. Finally, the man was pulled out of his seat by a plain-clothes security officer and dragged down the aisle by his arms.
Our group created a Stakeholder Analysis & Proposal, Policy Analysis & Plain Language Translation, White Paper, and Consumer Brochure that publicizes policy changes to consumers to accompany our proposed policy changes to United Airlines’ overbooking procedures. Each group member contributed to writing and research across project components. I created the overbooking consumer brochure, edited for cohesion, and combined our project components into one final document using Adobe Acrobat DC.

Collaborators:

Vishal Nair, Mackenzie Cour, JordynMae Wishard