10 Thousand Dollar Seat

A woman got bumped off a United flight from D.C. to Austin, Texas on Thursday.  And clearly the gate agents wanted to avoid another public relations disaster . . .

United Airlines has gotten some of the worst press of any company in the past year, starting with when they dragged that old guy off a plane and most recently when they killed a woman's dog by forcing it into the overhead compartment.

So a gate agent at Dulles International Airport in D.C. made SURE there wasn't going to be another public relations nightmare on Thursday morning.

A woman named Allison Preiss was on an overbooked United flight from D.C. to Austin, Texas, and they asked for volunteers to give up their seats.  No one did . . . so Allison got bumped because she'd paid the lowest fare.

And as she sat there arguing with the gate agents, one of them offered her a $10,000 VOUCHER and a seat on the next flight to Austin as compensation.  And she obviously took the deal.

Allison says, quote, "I'm not going to lie, I'm pretty pumped."

So what's the lesson here?  Obviously, try to get bumped by United and then argue until they give you five figures worth of free flights.