Bob was in such a hurry to get off a United flight he left his iPad at his seat, and didn’t realize his mistake until he had crossed the security checkpoint. He tried like hell to rescue his lost tablet, even using the MobileMe function that’s discovered the whereabouts of many a swiped idevice, to no avail. He says United has been less than helpful.
Bob writes:
I was on a flight back on September 26th, from Denver to SeattleI left my expensive Ipad in the seat back pocket.
By the time I realized my mistake, I was already out of the security area of the airport
I tried every conceivable way to help them locate my iPad. I called everyone that I can find online and thru my contacts at United. All I have gotten is cookie cutter emails and answering machines. The customer service centers are overseas and have been absolutely atrocious
I have the Mobile.Me service that would help locate the Ipad if it were turned on
and removed from flight mode. It has been so long, that it would need to be charged
before it would do anything.My big suspicion is that the device went into a box and will eventually end up for sale at their overgoods center because no one will take a little bit of extra time to help find its owner.
I realize that I am the one who made the mistake and left it on the plane I could make excuses about how they made us late getting into Seattle and I was in a rush but, bottom line, I left it on the plane.
They have been absolutely worthless in resolving this matter.
If you’ve ever managed to retrieve a lost carry-on valuable, how did you pull off the feat?
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How is Bob sure that some other passenger didn’t pick up the iPad? Since it was in the seat back pocket, it might not be as noticeable (compared to if it was just on the seat) but maybe somebody saw it and thought “finders keepers”?
I don’t understand why he writes (in his email) “I could make excuses about how they made us late getting into Seattle and I was in a rush…” The flight still took the same amount of time (presumably) so it’s not like he was forced to de-plane within a certain time frame. Like if you know you’ll be landing in 30 minutes, you’d have enough time to put away stuff – none of which has to do with if the flight was delayed or not.
I’ve put my camera in the seat back pocket, and water bottles, but I’m pretty paranoid that I’ll forget something that I avoid putting stuff in the pocket unless it’s a really long flight and I’d be using the stuff periodically over the course of the flight. But once you know it’s almost time to land, wouldn’t you put the stuff away? (Unless this is an international flight to the US and you no longer have access to your carry-ons, 1 hour before landing? And before you say that Homeland Security no longer has that policy – it happened on a flight that I was on, about a month ago).
Life Lesson #909
I fly all the time. How come I am never lucky enough to score some idiot’s forgotten iPad? Not fair
Me thinks one of the airplane cleaners is playing Fruit Ninja on their brand new iPad right about now.
Note to Bob:
Did you purchase your iPad less than 90 days before it disappeared?
Did you use a credit card to purchase the iPad?
If the answer is “yes” to both questions, check your cardmember benefits. Many cards offer a replacement of items “lost, stolen or damaged” within 90 days of purchase. Read the card issuer’s terms carefully: some have loopholes excluding certain lost items. If you don’t have the brochure with the fine print of what’s covered, call the “800″ number on the back of the card.
It’s worth a shot…
“My big suspicion is that the device went into a box and will eventually end up for sale at their overgoods center because no one will take a little bit of extra time to help find its owner.”
My big suspicion is one of Bob’s seat-mates picked themselves up a slightly used iPad during their travels.
…Would Data Plans for the thing even work that high in the air? If so, that’s impressive…
My call, like anyone cares, is that the blame is 50/50.
Bob of course should be more careful of his overpriced status gadgets (That’s really jealousy speaking), so the final blame goes to him. if he had been more careful there would be no issue.
But United really dropped the ball too. If he hadn’t left the airport yet someone could have taken the “be a fucking human” ideal and made some sort of effort to help him out.
Sadly, I think all Bob can do at this point is chalk it up as a learning experience and choose a different airline from here on.
I agree. Of course, some other posters have brought up the thought that another passenger could have taken it and it wasn’t on the plane anymore so United couldn’t have done anything about that. It sucks for Bob but I doubt he’s getting it back at this point. He could keep checking the MoblieMe feature in case someone took it.
We left a bag on a Frontier flight that landed at 12:30pm. We made it through security before we realised the mistake. This was not just clothes, this was a bag full of several hundred dollars worth of merchandise for a con we were attending the next day. No one would let us back through and we were told that we had to wait for the next flight to come in (two hours later) before anyone could bring it through for us. Everyone in security and baggage pretty much stonewalled us. I ran to the ticket counter for Frontier and after explaining the situation to the agent, had a gate pass in less than 2 minutes. Got back through and retrieved the bag in less than 30 minutes.
Contact the local PD. Tell them that you now believe that the item was stolen. A detective will be assigned to you. S/he will contact United. S/he will also contact Apple. They will lojack your iPad.
My guess is the same as everyone else, some Flight Attendant has it. When you find out that a UAFA stole from you, feel free to let us (and UA corporate) know how well you were treated.
Where do you live that the police department has enough detectives on the force sitting around doing nothing. he left it behind, it was not stolen. the detectives in most cities have a back log of real crime to deal with. They don’t have time to trace your lost toys for you.
It sucks when others won’t pay for our mistakes with their own time/money/effort. United is in the airline travel business, not the returning a lost iPad to a yuppie turd business.
It has been a long time since I worked at an airline, but as I recall, electronic items that didn’t immediately find new owners with sticky fingers, would end up in bins in lost luggage. An effort would be made to find the correct owners but if there was no name on the device or no report filed then that would be it. And even with the report filed some items weren’t returned for various reasons — imprecise report, item was found at a different time the report was filed and the two never crossed paths (pre-computers aside from ticketing) etc.
If he thinks it is in a box, he should go back to the airport terminal to see if he can look for the device in lost luggage. More likely the iPad has a new owner by now and probably had the new owner minutes after he abandoned his iPad.
I left my PSP in the back of the seat in front of me. And left security as well. I went to the United person near the baggage claim and asked them to call back to the plane and see if the cleaning crew recovered it. About 20 mins later my psp came down the baggage claim in Denver Airport and I was on my way. I thought it was odd that the baggage guy would just throw it on the luggage transporter but I am glad I got it back.
Can’t say I feel bad for Bob.
I left an iPod in a rental car once. Called and they said they’d look for it but I never heard anything about it again. Do I blame the rental car company? No, it’s my fault. If someone stole it, congrats to them, they have a new iPod because I screwed up.
Bob should be more mindful of his expensive electronics in the future.
What’s funny is ppl are actually blaming United for this, when it’s the OP’s fault he left it. And then let’s say they told the attendants something was left, what if somebody already picked it up. Would the OP want United to search everyone off the plane? Then if they did that they would be another article on here about someone bitching that “United search me off the plane. That violates my rights.” You can’t have it both ways.
Of course, if you make a mistake ask for help, but when you don’t get help on something that is clearly your fault, you can’t someone else worthless, when you were just as if not more worthless for letting it happen.
I wish it were otherwise, but stuff left behind on planes vanishes without a trace. I left a year-old $20 wool scarf — pink, green and lavender, very girly and flattering on about 15% of the human race — on a JetBlue plane. I realized this 15 minutes after I left the plane and it was already too late — there wasn’t a single human being who could help me. After 24 hours of hopelessly calling JetBlue numbers, trying to reach a human being, I got lucky: The scarf was at the gate, and if I went to the airport, I could pick it up.
Drive out to the airport: No scarf. No word of what might have happened to it.
Go figure. Yeah, I know: Don’t lose stuff. But it’s not just iPads that go missing. It’s also cheap-o, kinda ugly (according to some of my friends) scarves.
In the end, it was easier to call the original store in Dublin, describe it in my American accent to the Irish salesperson and have a replacement shipped to my home in California.
Bob’s misfortune is Bob’s fault and no one else’s. Imagine if the airline devoted the resources to tracking down every posession left on their planes. You think ticket prices are bad now?
I left my glasses on a Cathay Pacific flight from Toronto to Hong Kong. I was in Shanghai before I realized it and called the customer service number. They already had my glasses (Hong Kong is their hub) and they said I could pick them up on my way back through Hong Kong about 10 days later.
On my way back through Hong Kong, my flight was delayed so my layover was super short. A Cathay Pacific employee met me at the gate for my flight back to Canada so I didn’t have to go out through security to pick up my glasses. I was sooo grateful and they were so friendly and helpful about it!
No sympathy for forgetting a $500 device on a plane.
were you the very last one to get off the plane? no?
another passenger swiped it most likely. you left your iPad on the plane, YOU FAIL!
He doesn’t say anything about going to see the United staff at the airport. If he was still at the airport, then he could have talked to one of them, and they could have called the gate and grabbed the iPad. I have had United do this for me when I left a BlackBerry once.
If the plane had already left, it is highly probable that the iPad is now in new hands, and those hands do not belong to a United employee.
iDiot
Actually, if you look at it, he pointed out the fact that it was his fault. He also provided the fact that United has been, for lack of better wording on my part, worthless in assisting him on the return of the left behind item.
Think for a moment if it was you and you did this. Would you be so quick to judge the OP then?