8/28/2024
Last month I travelled to San Francisco with United Airlines. I am a relatively frequent flyer and have never previously encountered any problems with managing my severe nut allergy.
As I usually do, I made the airline aware of my allergy before I flew. I was told that there wouldn’t be any problems.
On our way out to San Francisco, I was told that they would be serving almonds to first class passengers and that they wouldn’t do an announcement as it was ‘not their policy’. I asked if they could refrain from serving nuts but was told that the couldn’t as ‘they had nothing else to give.’ I was lucky in that the flight was relatively empty so I could sit isolated from other passengers and as far back from first class as possible. Even so, it was still a stressful experience for me.
The way back was even more horrendous! When I spoke to the check in employee her response was ‘what do you want me to do about it?’ When is suggested that they do an announcement, she said that they couldn’t and that her had never heard about this before. This seemed to be a stock response as the flight attendant I spoke to on board also responded with ‘what do you want me to do about it?’ She then dismissed me.
On seeing that I was upset, another flight attendant asked what was wrong and did concede to asking the people I was sitting next to not to eat nuts. She asked if peanut butter counted and seemed to disagree with me when I said that it did.
As expected, I did have a reaction which, although not anaphylactic, did result in me coming out in hives and becoming very wheezy.
I contacted United Airlines to express my disappointment in what appears to be their policy around allergies and did receive a reply which offered me two 50-dollar vouchers for flights. Unfortunately, I do not feel confident enough to fly with an airline who have such a relaxed approach to allergies.
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