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Why go to UA.com when you can talk to a person that can tell you about the plane loads, what has more availability with FC/B. Also if you're flying that day, they can tell you more about the backpressure on flights. Not everything has to do with the cheapest price.

Most of the airlines like to complain that people are only focused on the price. They market themselves and try to make themselves look at price. They don't offer a lot of transparency on their product and they complain why people are using their site as intended. (Or avoiding it with comparisons)

The flight was going to board in 20 minutes. I still needed to get through TSA, etc. I didn’t feel I could trust trying to book online vs. the person at the terminal in front of me.

Might be a generational thing.

It'd also make sense if their phone got broken unexpectedly.