United Airlines review!

G and I visited the USA in August / September and used United Airlines for four of our internal flights (the others were Alaskan and our long haul were BA).

Unfortunately on our flight from Chicago to Vegas we were unable to purchase food on the plane as we didn’t have a united account or a US phone number - something we had not been told beforehand.  You did not have the option to purchase food using your normal debit or credit card as food needed to purely be ordered on the App - as a result they refused to serve us any food on the flight.

This is not something that we were told on any of our other united flights. They just refused to accept a card payment.  I totally understand flights going cashless, this is not an issue, but card less… ridiculous.

Luckily my mum is always prepared (thats what 30 years of being diabetic does to you), but this is extremely poor on the part of the airline.  One of the flight attendants did eventually offer my mum a sandwich after I explained to her that my mum was diabetic and had to eat to be safe… but as this was end of service the options weren’t that great, and my mum ended up having her trusty nature valley bar instead (these were extremely useful for travelling around the US and Canada, because you can only plan so much!!).

This is just something to be mindful of because had I been able to download the app on the plane and paid through it (kind of like our starbucks app), then it honestly wouldn’t have been a problem. But telling us at 34,000 feet in the air, with no wifi, and no other payment options, was a bit ridiculous… and even some of the staff realised this and tried to help.

With this being-said, united proved to be a super reliable airline for us in other ways. We only had one seating complication (on all 4 flights), where I was allocated a seat but my mum had a TBC seat, even though she was guaranteed on the flight.  However, I spoke to the lovely lady on the front desk at the gate, and she soon had us sitting together with no problem. One cheeky litle perk of this is that I got new boarding passes printed at the desk, I was able to save and put these into my USA scrapbook!,, as a super sentimental person, I loved this!!!!! We also experienced one delay whilst on our trip, and although only a minor 2 hour delay, this was to be expected due to the foggy conditions we were arriving into in San Francisco. Apart from a slight confusion at the check in desk where the attendant couldn’t find our flight on the system at all, and a little bit of worry on our faces, after a while everything was cleared up, our new flight confirmed, seats allocated, luggage ready to go, and we took the extra time to work on some vlogs/blogs! The communication in regard to the new flight was brilliant as always. I loved having the united app, and really recommend adding your boarding passes to your wallet too, super convenient, and you get frequent updates about your flight, without having to check the airport boards constantly.

They also give you the option to check your hand luggage in as checked baggage at the gate for free…  I love this and the UK could deffo take some notes. On our second stop of 7 (Washington) we realised that we would need to purchase a second carry on bag so we headed to TJ Max in Washington DC  and bought exactly that. This bag ended up being included in our luggage allowance for all flights, as my suitcase was in the hold, and my backpack was my personal item, so my flight price also was already including a second carry on (and it could be a case), so this was fab. However, we thought we would be smart and just fill it with all our denim, so our hold luggage would weigh a lot less… and therefore we could buy more souvieniers (DUH!)..  Every time we made our way to the gate to board, I  would say to the attendant at the gate that I would volunteer to check this bag. There was only one flight where I didn’t do this as it was a super empty flight so there was plenty of space and I didn’t need to have the bag checked. But it was a great option to have, as it meant we didn’t feel any pressure to get on the plane asap to guarantee overhead locker space! It just made our travel day a little less stressful.

So I would say that United is like the US version of Easyjet; however I’ve been on many an Easyjet flight where they have no food to purchase, but what they do have you can pay for using your card.! They are definitely a no frills airline but as we were only travelling internally, our flights were all relatively short.  Their App for check in online is great and the price of our internal flights was ridiculously cheap - we would pay more to get from London to Edinburgh by train!!

So, whoever you fly with, enjoy your travels

Georgia and Tracey xx

Check out our other blogs on our US adventures and beyond, or watch our vlogs on You Tube at Georgia Louise Travels