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Airlines determine the price of
most airfares through computer programs that
calculate how many passengers are likely to book
seats on any given flight. In addition, airlines
might offer discount fares to avoid flying with
empty seats, and they charge more for flights
and schedules that are likely to be used by
business travelers. Ticket prices may also be
affected by competition with other airlines that
offer discounted prices. The result of all of
these things is that passengers on the same
flight could be paying as many as a dozen
different fares.
The back of all standard airline
tickets has at least 11 paragraphs of fine print
under the heading "Conditions of Contract." In
Paragraph 3, you will generally find a statement
that various "applicable tariffs" and the
"Carrier's Conditions of Carriage and Related
Regulations," are incorporated into the contract.
This means that each airline has filed with the
U.S. Department of Transportation a series of
statements about its obligations to its
passengers and its limitations of liability.
These tariffs and conditions are the terms of
your contract with the airline.
The Conditions of Carriage
cover everything from the number of bags you can
check to the type of compensation you receive if
your flight is delayed or canceled. Boarding
priority, check-in requirements and most of the
other fine-print terms that describe an
airline's responsibilities to its passengers are
set forth in the Conditions of Carriage.
Conditions of Carriage vary
from airline to airline. Although most airline
tickets look identical, the subtle differences
in the hidden terms can make a substantial
difference in your rights as a passenger. You
can obtain a summary of the hidden terms and
conditions of most major airlines' contracts by
requesting a copy of United States Air Carriers,
Conditions of Contract, Summary of Incorporated
Terms (Domestic Air Transportation) from the Air
Transport Association, Distribution Center, P.O.
Box 511, Annapolis, MD, 20701. Enclose a $65
check payable to ATAA. You can also call the
ATAA at 800-497-3326.
Tickets may have either of the
following restrictions:
- Nontransferable. A
nontransferable ticket can be used only by the
passenger whose name appears on the face of
the ticket. If the names on the passenger's ID
and on the ticket do not match, the airline
can confiscate the ticket. If a ticket is
nontransferable but refundable, however, you
may be able to cash in the old ticket and buy
a new one with the new passenger's name.
- Nonrefundable. If
you have a nonrefundable ticket, you cannot
get your money back if you decide not to
travel. But each airline has exceptions. If
you cannot make a flight for which you have a
nonrefundable ticket, you may be able to apply
the ticket toward a future flight or exchange
it for credit toward future travel. If the
fare has dropped on a flight for which you
have a nonrefundable ticket, you may be able
to get re-ticketed. In either situation, you
will probably have to pay a fee to make the
change.
In certain exceptional cases, the
airlines will allow nonrefundable tickets to be
refunded if you need to cancel your plans
because of the illness or death of your
traveling companion or a close relative.
Similarly, an airline may
offer a discounted fare (sometimes a minor
discount, sometimes a generous discount) when a
close relative becomes seriously ill or dies,
causing you to travel without any advanced
planning. Who must be ill or have died for you
to obtain a bereavement fare varies among
airlines. For example, some airlines will give a
discounted fare to attend the funeral of a
parent, child, sibling, spouse or in-laws only,
while other airlines include non-marital
partners and their immediate family members.
E-tickets aren't really tickets
at all, but are reservations for air travel that
are kept in the airline's computer system
instead of being printed on paper like a
conventional ticket. If you have an e-ticket,
you aren't alone: In 1999, the airline industry
estimated that between 40% and 50% of all flight
bookings were e-ticket bookings.
If you are booked on a single
airline and are flying only in the United
States, you will most likely have little trouble
using your e-ticket. In fact, you might find
that you like the convenience of the e-ticket as
compared with a traditional paper ticket. The
great value of e-tickets to passengers is that
there is no paper ticket to keep track of or to
lose. Passengers who have e-tickets just show up
at the airport on the appointed date and time.
To get a boarding pass for the flight,
passengers with e-tickets just hand over a
picture ID and the credit card that they used to
pay for the ticket. Simple as that.
E-tickets are not foolproof,
however. The problems with e-tickets usually
arise from the fact that passengers have no
actual ticket as proof of their travel
reservations. The proof, as they say, is in the
pudding, and when the pudding is e-pudding,
troubles can occur. Problems most often crop up
for international travelers. Many countries
require that you show a "ticket" to gain access
to a boarding area, and some unlucky passengers
have found that showing their receipt and
itinerary hasn't been sufficient to get past
immigration officers. In addition, some
countries require that you present a roundtrip
ticket at the point of entry -- they want you to
visit, but they don't want you to stay. If you
have an e-ticket, you might have trouble
convincing officials that you have booked
passage out of their country. If you do decide
to travel internationally by e-ticket, make sure
you have your itinerary and your receipt for the
ticket with you.
Another trouble with e-tickets
is that airlines do not have access to each
others' e-ticket databases. If your flight gets
canceled and your airline tries to put you on
another airline's flight, it will first have to
print a paper ticket for you. This can be a
time-consuming process, especially if lots of
other passengers are clamoring for the same
service.
Similarly, if you book an
e-ticket on an airline that gets shut down by a
strike, you may be out of luck because other
airlines, who might be willing to accept paper
tickets issued by your airline, cannot accept
e-tickets because they have no way of verifying
that the ticket actually exists. If you have an
e-ticket and you hear news that a strike is
imminent at your airline, exchange your e-ticket
for a paper ticket as soon as possible.
If you purchased a traditional
paper ticket and have lost it, contact the
airline immediately. You will be required to
fill out a lost-ticket application. The airline
will either issue a replacement ticket (after
you sign an agreement to reimburse the airline
for the cost of the replacement ticket if
someone successfully uses your lost ticket) or
force you to purchase a replacement ticket at
the currently available fare (often outrageously
expensive because you do not get any advance
purchase discounts). In addition, you usually
have to pay some sort of service charge or
penalty.
After waiting three months to
a year, the airline will issue you a refund for
the price of your replacement ticket if your
lost ticket was not used during that time.
If a flight is overbooked, the
airline is required to ask passengers to
volunteer to take a later flight. Normally, the
airline will offer some kind of incentive such
as a free domestic or international round-trip
ticket. If an insufficient number of passengers
volunteer to be bumped from a flight, the
airline must begin involuntary bumping.
Generally, passengers with the most recent
reservations or those who checked in the latest
are the first to be bumped.
If you are bumped, you are
entitled to compensation if you have a confirmed
reservation (your ticket has an "ok" or
something similar in the status column) and the
scheduled plane has a seating capacity of more
than 60 passengers. Even if you meet both of
these requirements, the airline might refuse to
compensate you if any of the following is true:
- you did not comply with the
airline's ticketing, check-in and
reconfirmation requirements
- you are not acceptable for
transportation under the airline's usual rules
and practices (for example, you are drunk)
- the entire flight was
canceled
- a smaller aircraft was
substituted for safety or operational reasons
- you refuse an offer to take
a seat in a different section (class) of the
aircraft at no extra charge, or
- the airline offers to place
you on another flight or flights scheduled to
reach your final destination within one hour
of the scheduled arrival of the original
flight.
A flight is considered on time if
it arrives at its destination within 15 minutes
of the scheduled arrival time. Generally, a
15-minute delay will not affect your schedule
very much. Longer delays can have serious
consequences, particularly if you cannot make a
connecting flight.
If your trip is delayed
because of overbooking, the rules discussed in
the previous answer apply. If the delay is
caused by any other reason, your rights depend
on whether it's a domestic or international
flight.
- Domestic flights.
Generally, airlines are not obliged to provide
any compensation if the delay, diversion or
cancellation was caused by factors outside of
the airline's control, such as bad weather or
air traffic congestion at a particular
airport. On the other hand, airlines are
required to compensate you for problems deemed
to be in their control, such as mechanical
difficulties or late-arriving crew members.
The offered compensation can vary
substantially among airlines. Full-service
airlines are likely to offer more generous
terms, such as meals, hotels, alternate
transportation or even emergency toiletries in
the event of an overnight delay, while budget
or no-frills airlines may offer little, if
any, compensation.
- International Flights.
Recovering damages for an international flight
delay is very difficult if the delay was
caused by anything other than the airline's
overbooking. Under an international treaty
called the Warsaw Convention, an airline can
escape liability for damages caused by flight
delay if it can show that it took all
necessary measures to avoid the damage or that
it was impossible to take such measures. If
your international flight is delayed, you may
be able to persuade the airline that it should
cover direct costs caused by the delay, such
as meal, hotel or telephone expenses. To back
up your argument, you can quote Article 19 of
the Warsaw Convention which states: "The
Carrier shall be liable for damages occasioned
by delay in the transportation by air of
passengers, baggage or goods."
The airlines' treatment of
baggage is a constant source of passenger
complaints. At some point, nearly every airline
passenger has waited for what seemed like an
eternity for his or her baggage to show up on
the baggage carousel.
To be fair, most of the time
baggage does arrive in good shape on the same
flight that you were on. When your luggage is
damaged, delayed or lost, however, the results
can be disastrous. The best way to protect
yourself from the most serious losses is to
follow one simple rule: Never put anything
valuable or irreplaceable (such as jewelry), or
that you might urgently need (such as
medications), in checked baggage. Your
compensation will rarely cover your actual loss.
If your baggage is lost or
destroyed, the compensation that the airline
owes you depends on whether you were flying on a
domestic or international flight.
- Domestic flights. An
airline can limit the amount it must pay if
baggage is lost, damaged or delayed to $1,250
per passenger. You can get around this limit
by declaring at check-in a higher value for
the baggage, up to the airline's maximum,
which is likely to be between $2,500 and
$5,000. If you declare a higher value, the
airline will charge you a fee based on a
percentage of the declared value. The airline
then becomes liable up to the declared value
if it loses, damages or delays delivery of the
baggage, unless the airline can prove that the
actual loss was lower than the declared value.
- International flights.
The Warsaw Convention provides the rules that
determine the liability for lost, delayed or
damaged baggage. Unfortunately, these rules
will not work to your advantage. Damages are
calculated based on the weight of the baggage,
regardless of the real value of the baggage or
its contents. The Warsaw Convention states
that the value for lost or damaged baggage is
$9.07 per pound (or $20 per kilogram). If your
bag was weighed before the flight, then the
value is determined by multiplying the weight
of the bag times $9.07. For example, a
20-pound bag would be valued at $181.40. If
your bags were not weighed, the airline will
generally assume that all of your bags weighed
a total of 70 pounds, and will reimburse you
$634.90.
To add insult to injury, an
airline can completely avoid responsibility for
lost or damaged baggage if it can prove that the
damage was caused by error in piloting, in the
handling of the aircraft or in navigation, and
that, in all other respects, the airline and its
agents took all necessary measures to avoid the
damage.
While frequent flyer programs can
provide you with some travel bargains,
understand that there are few legal protections
for the credits you earn. Under the rules of
almost all frequent flyer programs, the airline
can change award levels, have credits expire or
even cancel the whole program without warning.
Some travelers who belong to only
one frequent flyer program will pay more for a
ticket or will take an indirect or inconvenient
flight on an airline just to get frequent flyer
credit. One way to avoid this frequent flyer
trap is to join more than one program. Although
you can get travel awards faster by
concentrating your travel on one airline, you
may get better fares and connections if you
don't restrict yourself to one airline. When you
compare tickets, keep in mind that frequent
flyer miles are worth approximately 2¢ per mile;
use that figure to help calculate which option
is best. The 2¢ per mile estimate was calculated
by dividing the average cost of a domestic round
trip ticket (approximately $500) by the number
of frequent flyer miles needed for such a ticket
(25,000 miles).
You can use your frequent flyer
awards or give them to anyone you choose, but
you cannot sell or trade them.
When an airline goes bankrupt,
you technically become one of the airline's
creditors in bankruptcy. If you file a claim in
the bankruptcy court, there is a chance you will
recover some very small percentage of the value
of the ticket, but more likely you will recover
nothing at all.
In the past, most airlines
would honor a bankrupt airline's ticket and
allow you on a substitute flight. But these
days, given the competitive nature of the
airline industry, this is rarely done.
Sometimes, as a gesture of good will (and a way
of luring new customers), an airline will offer
a special discounted fare for passengers holding
tickets on a bankrupt airline. If you have a
ticket on a bankrupt airline and are a frequent
flyer on another airline, try to negotiate free
or discounted travel using the bankrupt
airline's ticket. Trip cancellation or trip
interruption insurance can sometimes cover the
cost of a replacement ticket.
If you have an e-ticket, run
fast to the nearest ticket counter for your
airline and exchange it for a paper ticket. Any
airline nice enough to accept passengers from a
bankrupt airline will only accept those
passengers with paper tickets.
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