Originally Posted by noflynomore:
However once selected this person clearly refused a lawful instruction from the crew to disembark
Lawful instruction? This was a Civil matter, the passenger was no threat, and was minding his own business until the Airport security / police came to have him removed.
How many millions have United made on over-bookings, where Pax have not showed up?
This is part of the game of over-bookings, you win some, you loose some. In this case the simple solution would have been for United to keep upping their offer until they had enough takers to accommodate United's crew DH.
It is very interesting to know on what grounds the Airport security / police was called to resolve this situation.
Also unfortunately there are sometimes overzealous ground agents and cabin crew, who feel extremely empowered with their position. And many Captains give their full support to Cabin Crews observations without taking a to close look at the actual events going on in their aircraft when on the ground.
Specially for less experienced Captains, such a situation can easily runaway from them, if lacking communication, life experience and certain service orientated skills.
I have seen situations where overbooking happen and passenger and managed to come onboard, and everybody turned on the passenger, ground handling, security and cabin crew, I found this incident disturbing, considering he was flying on holiday with his family, and he was bumped of, taken of by the police of the aircraft.
The point was that the passenger did not have a leg to stand on, as everybody was watching their own back, and the easy solution was to blame the passenger.