United Airlines just updated its rules to crack down on customers buying multiple tickets to save money, banning video calls and viewing offensive content.
American Airlines has now updated its Contract of Carriage to reduce its liability for losing an damaging wheelchairs, and to make clearer how they’ll keep your money if they overbook a flight and downgrade you from your purchased premium cabin to coach.
Here are the two changes they’ve made:
- They’ll only count claims for lost and damaged wheelchairs if made within 24 hours for domestic travel, with defined periods for international. American damages more wheelchairs per passenger than any other airline. One way of reducing those numbers is just not to take the claims.
The older version of its Contract of Carriage did not include a filing deadline under “Mobility and medical devices” in the “Time limits for liability” section. Now, this new version says:
- Delayed mobility/medical device delivery must be reported within 24 hours (domestic) / 21 days (international)
- Damaged mobility/medical devices must be reported within 24 hours (domestic) / 7 days (international)
- Delayed mobility/medical device delivery must be reported within 24 hours (domestic) / 21 days (international)
- If they downgrade you, you only get 40% of your fare back. They used to list refunds for “downgrades to a lower cabin” and now they specify limits on what they’ll provide: “refunds are issued at 40% of the ticketed fare on the affected segment.”
That means if you buy a $1,050 business class cross-country ticket instead of a $200 coach ticket and they downgrade you, you get back $420 – rather than the $850 extra you spent. This seems like a big incentive for American Airlines to oversell and keep the money.
On an international trip it could be a $5,000 ticket in business class and a $500 ticket in coach (or less!). You get $2,000 back, instead of $4,500.
This seems inconsistent with DOT’s articulation of an airline’s obligation to “refund the difference between the original fare and the downgraded fare.”
I worry about wheelchair damage claims being denied where a passenger reports at the airport verbally but doesn’t get a formal file number (or the agent records it as “assistance issue” not “mishandled assistive device”), or if a passenger files something with Customer Relations instead of Baggage Service and it’s treated as the wrong report. Even if it shouldn’t be, getting that escalated and corrected through the bureaucracy isn’t always possible in a reasonable manner. Or a passenger initially reports it to the wrong airline on a multi-carrier itinerary.
Moreover, lots of chair damage isn’t obvious at baggage claim or gate delivery such as a bent frame, misalignment, electronics, or joystick control issues. If a passenger notices it the next day after rolling a bit, the clock may have run out. How about the baggage office is closed or with a long line, and physical pain, carefiver constraints or pain make it tough to wait and you come back later?
As for downgrades, I hear from readers all the time about challenges with the way American Airlines calculates refunds. I recently wrote about a comedian who bought first class tickets but was bumped down to coach for deadheading pilots. Even though he spent thousands of dollars on his ticket, he says he was offered $400. Usually I see American calculate a refund for the downgraded segment based on the most expensive fare someone paid for coach on that flight.
So in some cases, this change could harm customers less than American’s previous practice. Nonetheless, it’s completely unreasonable. A downgrade should entitle the customer to:
- The difference in either the prevailing fares at the time of purchase, or between the most and least expensive fares paid in the cabin. There should be a financial penalty for failing to deliver the product the airline sold! And the customer should be made whole – they would have chosen a different flight or airline if the product they wanted on their ticketed one wasn’t going to be available!
- Future travel as a make-good. If they bought first class and didn’t get first class, they should get first class in the future.
Unfortunately there’s very little potential redress. The Department of Transportation is likely to be of little help.
Seems like a good way to alienate premium passengers who have choices, not just downgrade them, but also not 100% refund
The timeline for reporting wheelchair/mobility device damage isn’t new. It has always been there, albeit unwritten. They are now stating it in the CoC. Don’t ask me how I know this…
The airlines may find 40% isnt going to work for those who do a chargeback on their CC. You must get what you paid for!
Isom can F off. Start suing people. That’s insane.
Corporations are not gonna treat consumers (or workers) better just ‘because’… this is where a baseline of reasonable regulations, enforced by our government, should be protecting us, except, the ‘bootlickers’ and ‘rugged individuals’ among us keep pretending we’re better off on-our-own. We aren’t. (Meanwhile, I suspect many of them don’t even live in the US… you know who you are.)
In these days of AI and technology, surely they can quickly identify exactly what they were charging for that coach seat on the date you purchased your premium seat. As much as you may hate these execs, you don’t hate them enough.
Great business idea. Offer premium tickets at high last-minute pricing. If someone buys pocket the higher amount and downgrade someone else and give him a pittance
Refunding anything less than the difference you paid is a total rip off. If anything in the event of an involuntary downgrade there should be additional compensation. Total money grab.
American is a millipede that never runs out of feet to shoot itself in.
@George Romey — Thank you, George. Consumers should be united on this. I mean, American. LOL.
I see a nice class action suit in the future. It’s downright criminal to not deliver a service that was sold and to refuse to refund the cost of that service.
American doing what it does best, F people over!
LOL, American doesn’t even bother trying to contest chargebacks. If they downgrade me, I’m getting 100% of the entire fare back every time. I have done that frequently for simply missing a PDB. Don’t mess with premium credit card holders.
@Lori – please go ahead and try a chargeback. First of all the airline will dispute it (you don’t think credit card companies just paid these without approval from the vendor did you) as they complied with the contract of carriage you agreed to when you bought the ticket. Secondly it is well known that many airlines and hotel companies shut down accounts, take back miles/points and put customers on the “do not do business with them” list when they file chargebacks. Trust me it isn’t worth whatever you may eventually get.
Wow….i wonder if that holds up in a circuit court.
@Retired Gambler — @Lori is still right to try. Most of us have been through this. Gotta dispute, then appeal, and appeal again, if necessary. It often takes months. Win some, lose some. Those contracts of carriage aren’t like normal contracts either; it’s adhesion, no negotiation, etc. This is why we need better regulation, because consumers alone aren’t going to ‘win’ this if companies get greedy (and they nearly always do).
@David P: “I see a nice class action suit in the future.”
I have bad news for you about the Airline Deregulation Act and preemption of state consumer protection, fraud and common law suits.
I don’t know if it would matter, but I always screen shot the fare for my itinerary in all classes of service. I almost always fly paid F. If I was asked to downgrade, I would simply ask to be moved to a new flight in the class of service that I paid for. I wouldn’t accept a partial refund and have them steal the rest from me.
This new 40% rule at American Airlines is a complete and total nonstarter for me. I will immediately add the airline to my personal “no-fly list” (which also includes Southwest, Spirit, and Frontier).
I am a big guy (6’3″ and very broad-shouldered). For me, first class on domestic flights and business class on international flights is an absolute necessity (for both my own comfort and the comfort of fellow passengers).
There has been a lot of discussion lately about how big-and-tall passengers should be considerate and book seats at the front of the cabin instead of inconveniencing others in coach. Well, I do that on every flight, but now the airline wants to force me back to coach when they overbook, to both pocket most of my money and make the other passengers angry at me for accidentally encroaching on their space (because the seats in coach are too small)? Absolutely unacceptable!
American is an airline with an awful culture, no matter how much they may claim to be otherwise. They won’t see another penny from me until they reverse this policy and stop overbooking first class. Fire Robert Isom and any other executives involved in approving this terrible policy.
That 40% is totally and completely outrageous and is further reason to move my (paid first class) business away from AA and to other carriers. One more reason among many.
Another part of the “pivot to premium” is giving your paid premium passengers a big middle finger.
I am sure a part of this is how frequently they are having to downgrade paid premium passengers due to the stupid pilot deadheading thing and the number of broken/malfunctioning seats in their premium cabins.
What the hell are they thinking? They are trying to go out of business? Someone mention that trying a chargeback won’t work. If you don’t try, then it surely won’t work. Keep the documentation. Here’s where I paid for this. This is what they did and only gave me back XX% of the difference between what I paid for and what I got. Regardless of the “contract of carriage”, if you don’t try…you get ZERO. I agree that someone will start a class action. I would also file a complaint with your US senators and representatives by SNAIL MAIL along with a copy sent to American’s executives.
@Win Whitmire — Well said!! Gotta fight to win. In the aggregate, consumers still have power.
This is involuntary denied boarding in your purchased class of service and should be handled as such. IF you accept 40%, all good. If not, confirmed on next flight same class of service and appropriate compensation.
I have never accepted a downgrade and have only demanded and got placement on another flight in the same class, plus expenses if delayed overnight, and IDB compensation. Is anyone suggesting that they may stop doing that? Because that would be the game-changer. Short compensation for accepting voluntary downgrades is a long known risk.
There is redress. Take a screenshot for the same itinerary in coach so that if you’re downgraded you have proof of what the difference in fare was at the time of purchase.
Perhaps someone will automate this (AwardWallet are you listening?) so enough people are armed with the information that the DOT takes action but meanwhile the rest of us get what we’re due.
Don’t wait for the DOT to take action. File a formal complaint with the DOT, Better Business Bureau (can’t hurt with the BBB!), your credit card company, even try your local TV/radio “consumer affairs” reporter. Like a puppy, if you rub American’s nose in their own s***, they might catch on! Well, maybe! YOU are the customer. You may not always be right, but you ARE the customer. “Sell no seats…don’t get no paycheck”, American
American will ban those that do disputes on their CC
they hold all the power
They can crush us like unwelcome cockroaches
Sad but true and unless the Government steps in and demands new protections we are screwed
@ Gary — I wouldn’t take a downgrade for 40%.Instead, Ill take 40% and a rebooking on another flight with the proper seat that I purchased.
I started work in the Travel Industry in 1976. Used AA all but exclusively. Then other biz and chartered planes from them to the Caribbean. Their personnel went above and beyond so many times, it’s innumerable. “93, changed professions. AA was still staffed by 98% great people, corporate, not so much. Also worked with lawyers for decades and other ‘stuff’.
A few years ago, AA tried to screw me out of a voucher (1-year expiry ) for a mistake they had made. I was reasonable and calm. Admin said I was shittouttaluck. Ahem.
Filed in small claims court (easy, some places you can even do it online, tiny fee).
Their legal team tripped over their feet rushing to settle full value and a few bucks for my time.
I doubt this policy will last, as it’s insane. Keep small claims in your arsenal as a potential weapon.
Not a lawyer, but I’d love an interpretation of the clause quoted below. It MIGHT be than you get at least 40%. It seems like 40% would be a potential bonanza for a PE to Y downgrade. Would 40% be automatic with more, if applicable, later?
“We promptly and automatically refund customers for:
The ticketed fare, including taxes and fees, if there is a cancellation or significant flight itinerary change, when the customer chooses either not to fly on the changed flight, accept rebooking on an alternative flight, or accept other compensation. Eligible flight itinerary changes include:
●Changes to itineraries for 3 or more hours (domestic) / 4 or more hours (international)
●Changes in origination / destination airports
●Downgrades to a lower cabin – refunds are issued at 40% of the ticketed fare on the affected segment
●Increased number of connections”
There shouldn’t be any damn downgrades to start with!
dwondermeant, can you imagine the s***storm that would arise if American “banned” someone for exercising their right to dispute the charge? Maybe they don’t care as, apparently, even bad press for American is better than no press. However, if banned for standing up for one’s self, then, as I said before, write SNAIL MAIL letters to the DOT, FAA, BBB and state and federal representatives. Start putting the heat on them from above. Say and do NOTHING libelous or slanderous. As Sgt. Joe Friday used to say, “Just the facts ma’am.” This is what I did. This is what they did. Here’s my proof. This is wrong and I want restitution in the form of XXX and YYY. Quick, lean and simple. You can also go to small claims court in the county in which you live. Sue for your actual “damages” and the maximum allowable as punitive damages. You may or may not win but if you don’t try…you surely won’t win.
I get it that if one spent significant time and effort with letters, disputes and lawsuits one might eventually be made whole with AA. But why fly them in the first place? They once gate checked (forcibly) a bag of what I told them was new expensive electronics and I literally viewed from the wing as they threw it onto the tarmac shattering everything. I ran off the plane to tell the gate agent. They said to file at destination. I did and was denied because they said I should have filed where it happened. I’d never ever fly them again at any price. At this point, everyone knows they’re terrible so flying and then complaining seems foolish.
For international travel, I’ve decided to just fly foreign carriers going forward. I’ve done so in the past and have had no issues. I figure it will be less stress even if I have to fly to a gateway city the day before and overnight.
David P posits a class action. That is not straightforward because AA’s COC purports to disallow class actions. Instead each individual must sue separately, including hiring own lawyers.
R T, you reference the Airline Deregulation Act. Under Wolens v. AA, claims grounded in an airline’s self-imposed obligations are still viable. If an airline promises first class and delivers coach, I say that’s a violation of a self-imposed obligation.
Can they legally only give a 40% refund if the federal law says they are required to refund the fare difference?
I am not a lawyer, but I would like to know if this is even legal?