There’s nothing worse than an entitled passenger on an airplane. Once you’re in the air, it’s frowned upon to kick them off! Airlines may have different policies in place, but that doesn’t mean people won’t try to see past them because their think they think they are special. Here, people share the time they witnessed a deplorable airplane passenger face justice.
All stories are edited for clarity.
Any Takers?
“Years back I was waiting on a flight from Cleveland to NYC. This was back before 9/11 so gate access was much freer. It was a Sunday afternoon and it was the last flight out to NYC until the following morning.
Long story short, there was a mixup and the woman checked her bags with the skycap but didn’t actually get a boarding pass/seat assignment and the flight was completely sold out, so she didn’t actually have a seat when she arrived at the gate.
She was calm about the situation, but her boyfriend who was accompanying her went OFF THE RAILS. He probably would have been arrested if it happened post 9-11. The boyfriend was SCREAMING at the gate attendant, swearing at her, and getting right in her face. He started a rant about how his girlfriend was so important and she was a member of the airline membership club and that they MUST bump some other ‘peon’ so that his girlfriend could be accommodated. Then he added that she had a VERY IMPORTANT meeting in NYC the next day that she COULD NOT MISS because she was ‘THE MOST IMPORTANT PERSON’ taking the flight that day.
The gate attendant let him go on and make an ass of himself until he was done, while the girlfriend was pretty much cowering in the corner, mortified by his behavior.
When he paused to take a breath, the gate attendant calmly said, ‘Listen, there is ONE person in this entire airport who can get your girlfriend on that flight and that person is ME. Go calm yourself, sit down and I’ll see what I can do.’
Well, the guy didn’t like that his girlfriend wasn’t getting on the plane IMMEDIATELY. After just a few minutes, he started another tirade at the gate attendant. At this point, the gate attendant was done with him. She looked at him and said, ‘SIT DOWN. Until I get this plane boarded, I won’t know if I have a seat for her. The longer you stand her screaming at me, the longer it will take for me to board the plane. SIT DOWN or I’m calling security.’
The boyfriend finally sat down grumbling under his breath about how everyone was ‘stupid’ and ‘incompetent’ and he could ‘buy and sell these people.’ At this point, the other passengers, myself included, were aghast that someone who appeared to be a grown man could act like such a petulant, entitled child.
Truth was, I had nowhere to be that night. I could have easily spent the night in Cleveland and flown out on the morning flight, but after that man’s disgusting display, there was not a snowball’s chance in hell he was getting my ticket.
The gate attendant boards first class, business class, and then families. Then, when that was done, she says over the loudspeaker, looking DIRECTLY at the asshole man, ‘It appears the flight is overbooked. Would anyone be willing to give up their seat and fly out tomorrow?’ She made some nominal voucher offer with it as well, but I don’t recall what it was, but it was the minimum they could offer. The silence was deafening. One more time, she says, ‘Any takers?’ while staring at the boyfriend. Again, total and complete silence.
‘OK then,’ she said, ‘We’ll board the rest of the flight. Any customers not boarding this flight will be rebooked on the first flight tomorrow morning.’ I guess at that point the guy knew he was defeated and went off in a huff with his girlfriend saying he was, ‘Never going to fly with the airline again. Bunch of idiots.’
I wanted to tell the man, ‘You get FAR more flies with honey than vinegar, asshole.'”
Don’t Come Back
“I used to work at a very small airport for a small airline. There were only 3 flights a day. Due to a technical issue, a flight from Oregon could not come in so the departure flight was delayed for more than twelve hours. Even though it was a small airline, the passengers were provided with a stay at a nearby hotel. However, a group of entitled businessmen gave the agents a tough time at the gate.
Everything was fine until the flight came back the next morning. I was in the cockpit finishing up my job signing some docs with the pilot. I told him what happened yesterday with the rude passengers. Being that he was an ex-air force pilot, he didn’t seem all that amused as he listened to their rampant behavior.
As everyone boarded, around 6-7 of the businessmen came near the aircraft but refused to board.
Their reasoning?
They wouldn’t board the plane unless they are given a cash compensation for the inconvenience yesterday. Every agent and manager tried and explained how that wasn’t possible, but they were stubborn. It was embarrassing to see how belligerent they were acting toward the poor employees.
Because of their antics, they were delaying the flight further. Finally, a manager decided to send the flight without them. Unfortunately, they wouldn’t give us their baggage or ID tags because due to security purposes, a check bag could not be on a flight without the passenger.
They wouldn’t give us their names or boarding passes or any details to find about their bags either. Having had enough, the pilot came out of the cockpit and asked us to offload every baggage and to make the changes in documentation.
Then he went on the PA to announce to the passengers on board the plane that he apologized for their baggage not coming on the flight and promised them that their baggage would be sent to their home.
Meanwhile, the businessmen kept up their charade. When they finally gave up and tried to enter the plane, security stopped them and they were handed over to the cops.
In the end, they were all blacklisted and they cannot travel with the airline for 5 years.”
A Change of Heart
“I’m a pilot.
We were flying from Chicago to Milwaukee and back which would have concluded a four-day trip. We were definitely wanting to get on with it and go home.
We were all boarded and waiting for the de-icing truck to come to spray us because it was snowing. After waiting for over an hour for the truck, they finally sprayed us down and we started pushing back. As we were pushing, one of the flight attendants called up and announced that there was a lady that wanted to get off the airplane immediately.
The captain and I told her we couldn’t allow it, so the lady then informed the flight attendant that her baby was having a medical emergency and had to get off right away. Of course, that couldn’t be ignored, so we pulled back up to the gate and let the woman off.
As she passed by the front of the plane, I gritted my teeth seeing that the baby looked absolutely fine. I then asked the woman if she needed paramedics. The woman denied any medical attention and refused to take the baby to the clinic that was literally fifty feet away. She also had checked bags, so we had to call rampers to dig through the cargo hold to find them.
Finally, we had the woman and her belongings off the plane and we were getting ready to lift off. The flight had been delayed by 2 hours at this point. As we were getting ready to close the door, the gate agent ran up and said that when the lady found out that we were the last flight up to Milwaukee, she begged to get back on the airplane and come with us.
So her ’emergency’ was us not taking off quickly enough for her.
The captain and I looked at each other in shock, told the gate agent there was no way in hell she was getting back on the airplane, and got out of there.”
False Alarm
“I used to work for an airline. Of course, this meant I got to fly for free as a standby passenger.
One day I was taking a flight to New York. There was a girl from our airline who worked as a gate agent there with a bunch of her friends. Being a non-revenue passenger can be a delicate matter at times. There are a ton of rules that the airline makes you follow so you don’t tarnish their image.
These girls were boarded and immediately started acting like entitled, stupid people who had never been on a plane. It was a bit warm on the plane so clearly the APU hadn’t been connected to allow the plane power to run the AC.
As soon as the APU was connected and activated, the AC is turned on and something starts blowing out the vents. At this point, the plane was fully boarded but people were still putting their belongings in the overheads. Then steam started coming out of the vents, a natural occurrence. The girl who worked for the same airline as me, who should have known better, and one of her dumb friends decided to shout, ‘FIRE! THERE’S A FIRE ON THE PLANE!’
The girls all started cackling loudly, but the damage was already done. People started anxiously talking amongst themselves. Some even started to stand up in an effort to quickly deboard. It was awful.
Needless to say, the flight attendants did not find their stunt hilarious and they were all escorted off.”