United’s commitment:
United is committed to operating a reliable schedule for every customer. Weather and Air Traffic Control (ATC) issues, along with other operational challenges, can cause delays and cancellations. We aspire to make our customers who experience long on-aircraft or in-airport delays as comfortable as possible during the inconvenience.

United Airlines and its regional United Express partners have implemented a comprehensive policy to minimize lengthy on-ground airport delays. For the best accommodation of our customers, the policy is to:

1.      Taxi-out delays (the time the aircraft pushes back from the gate until airborne) – Proactively manage to minimize ground holds of more than two hours and prevent those of more than three hours for flights within the United States and Canada, or to/from Hawaii, Puerto Rico or St. Thomas and to prevent ground holds of more than four hours for international flights.

2.       Taxi-in delays (the time the aircraft lands until it is parked at a gate) – Proactively manage to minimize ground holds of more than 60 minutes and prevent those of more than 180 minutes.

3.       Diversions (a non-scheduled stopping point due to weather events, medical emergencies, etc.) – Proactively manage to prevent diversions of more than fours hours.

What this means for you:
Meeting customers’ essential needs during on-aircraft delays - When an on-aircraft delay occurs, we will manage the situation aggressively to minimize delays of greater than three hours and make every reasonable effort to prevent those with durations longer than two hours.

In the event of a lengthy delay, United has contingency plans to provide food, water, restroom facilities and access to medical treatment for customers onboard an airplane. In the event a flight exceeds the three-hour guideline for a taxi-out or diversion situation, or if we exceed the 90-minute mark during taxi-in – we will provide our customers with compensation, generally in the form of discount travel certificates.

These certificates have no blackout dates, minimum purchase or fare class restrictions, and they are valid for 6-18 months, depending on distribution date, with a one-time use redeemable at united.com.

Mitigating customer inconvenience resulting from cancellations and misconnections – In the case of a flight cancellation or delay, which has caused you to miss your connecting flight, our staff and systems will focus on rebooking as many customers as possible on alternate flights, either direct to the destination or via connections through other airports, whichever best accommodates the customer’s needs.

If rebooking options are not available until the following day, we will offer complimentary overnight hotel accommodations. However, if the cancellation is due to severe weather conditions, air traffic control decisions or other issues outside of United’s control, we cannot offer such accommodations. In these circumstances we will make reasonable efforts to provide information enabling customers to secure accommodations on their own.

Helpful suggestions:
You can visit EasyCheck-in Online® or My Itineraries on united.com to see if you are confirmed on another flight. If you are at the airport and do not have Internet access, you can use an EasyCheck-in® unit to check your flight confirmation.

We also recommend that you view our Travel Disruptions page for more information about what to expect when delays, cancellations and diversions occur.

While United offers meal service for flights more than three hours, no meals are available on flights lasting fewer than three hours. Customers are always welcome to bring food onboard any of our flights. Doing so may help ease your discomfort in the unlikely event of a long on-aircraft delay.

If you are traveling with children, be sure to pack extra snacks and beverages as well as diapers and changing essentials in preparation for a possible delay.