English 2100 Fall 2023:  What Goes Unsaid?

Attention Travelers….

United Airlines has added a new boarding policy for their passengers that’ll reportedly could save up a couple of minutes of boarding time. The way this system is supposed implemented is by first and foremost boarding all priority seating passengers. Which consists of first class, people with disabilities, and a high frequent flyer status passengers. With this new system economy class who have window seats will be boarding the plane next. So, for every main cabin economy ticket holder who has a window seat will be the next to board the plane after priority. Followed by middle and aisle seat passengers. The name of this system is WILMA and it was implemented at the end of October. United confirms that there is a lot of benefits for this new way of boarding. Such as faster boarding and more overhead space for those who book window seats. Fun Fact: Airlines could save up hundred millions of dollars per year for even one minute being reduced by boarding. However, I wonder as a window-seat lover myself, are tickets going to be more expensive now and or harder to book because of its perks. As of right now that is not the case but maybe in the future if this new system works out in their favor. I also wonder are other airlines going to try and test out WILMA like a Delta, Jet blue, Southwest, etc. Ultimately, is this going to be the new thing for passenger boarding and will it stick a long time? Personally, I am not a fan of this system of boarding because I find that more structure leads to more complications and headaches especially regarding passengers who want to get on the quickly and who probably paid around the same amount of money for that aisle or middle seat. It sounds like the only ones who are benefiting off of this is United and Window-seat passengers which isn’t fair for everybody. In my opinion, everybody should board according to their main cabin number not by their seating.