Delta Air Lines was reportedly forced to pay out $1,500 per passenger when their Los Angeles to Tokyo Haneda flight was overbooked by 42 passengers. That’s $63,000. Update: despite a customer reporting a gate agent asking for 42 volunteers, Delta says that they did not pay out on this flight. Original post follows:
Flights have too many passengers for a number of reasons.
- Sometimes the airline sells more tickets than seats, and more people show up for the flight than expected.
- They may also swap planes for one with fewer seats. The original aircraft goes mechanical, for instance, and they substitute with a smaller aircraft.
- Weight restrictions may limit the number of passengers on board. They might need more fuel for the journey than usual because of winds. They may have too much cargo on board. In that case even though there are enough seats for everyone, they can’t accommodate all the passengers.
Airlines give out compensation trying to get passengers to voluntarily take another flight. In most cases (although not an aircraft swap) they are required to pay cash compensation to passengers if there aren’t volunteers, and they have to ‘involuntarily’ deny boarding to anyway. Here Delta was looking for volunteers, offering a lot of money to take the next non-stop flight.
Sometimes what to do is a real conundrum – one boyfriend got in trouble for taking $2,000 from Delta to delay visiting her. He should have spent half of it on her to make up for it.
Delta Air Lines at LAX
Delta pays out actual gift cards and not just their own travel credits like most airlines do. In fact they are the only one of the largest U.S. airlines that still offers such extremely generous compensation to avoid kicking someone off of a flight when they overbook. They’re willing to pay out far more than the legally required 400% of a passenger’s one-way fare not to exceed $1,550 for involuntarily ‘bumping’ someone.
Here’s an agent literally begging passengers to take $1,300 (not travel vouchers!) to give up their seat and take a later flight, because more people showed up than they had seats. And that’s for a domestic flight, where $1,300 may be more than four times the one way fare.
Shortly after the 2017 David Dao dragging incident on United Delta authorized gate agents to go up to $9,950. Around that time United gave one passenger a $10,000 travel credit for taking a later flight but they eliminated that generosity at the start of the pandemic.
Delta Air Lines at LAX
Delta still takes the position that when they make a mistake and sell too many tickets, it’s their responsibility to own the cost and make it worthwhile for passengers to take a later flight – instead of ultimately just falling back on legal minimum cash compensation if there aren’t enough volunteers at lower amounts.
(HT: Paddle Your Own Kanoo)
This flight was not oversold. It was weight rerstricted because of strong headwinds.
This should be the standard for ALL airlines.
Somebody can correct me but I thought there was just one flight a day out of LAX to HND (I’ve flown it once and MSP a couple of times). Unless you fly to DTW, SEA or MSP first. I fly ATL-HND every few months and the flight is always pretty full if not completely full. I’m afraid this isn’t as easy as just catching the next flight in a couple of hours.
@H2O … IF they gave you the $1,500 , AND booked you on JL or ANA same day flight , PLUS UPGREADE , would be worth it . PAX ought to hold-out for the best deal .
@Alert
You got that right! I’ve flown ANA and they are on a different level. I’d almost take steerage on ANA over business on US carriers.
Back in the 80s, on several occasions, I received a voucher for a round trip standby first class ticket to anyplace Delta flew in North America for volunteering to give up my seat. And back then first class was not always full, so it was not difficult to get standby seats.
@H2oman. Concur, you will not get a full-flat seat, but food is better on ANA or KAL in Y across the Pacific than on UA, AA, or DL in J.
Oh never mind, you losers will never get it.
It would be interesting to better understand the make-up of the passengers that took the $ 1500 offer. For the American passengers traveling to Tokyo for a 1 week vacation, it’s hard to imagine them giving up 1/7 of their vacation for only $ 1500 (and it could be even less, as it may be difficult to cancel the 1st hotel night so that nightly cost would come out of the $ 1500). On the other hand, for the Japanese passengers returning home from vacation in the USA, delaying their arrival back home may have a relatively low opportunity cost (however, there could be a USA hotel issue involved if Delta was not including a decent hotel voucher in addition to the $ 1500). Complicated math for each passenger for sure, not made easier as the time interval is typically short.
The first problem is that they decided to fly a US carrier over a Japanese one, what’s wrong with people?
this is precisely the reason why Delta ends up with the DOT’s 0.0% rate of involuntary denied boarding even though they have one of the highest rates of voluntary denied boarding.
And yet Delta still manages to be the most profitable airline on the planet. They clearly know where to spend the money and keep a situation from spiraling out of control and when to sell enough seats to keep a flight as full as possible.
And, it doesn’t take much to realize that being oversold by 42 is likely the result of payload restrictions.
Delta has said for quite some time that they want to operate all longhaul flights from LAX on the A350 but LAX-HND is on the A330-900.
I suspect that this flight in a year will be on the A350 and perhaps one of the ex-Latam A350s that are to begin the process of getting Delta standard cabins after the summer.
It doesn’t sound overbooked by that many seats. The A339 has plenty of range to get to Japan but the jet stream is currently positioned to not only significantly slow part of the flight where it has to be crossed but it is also in a place that causes the flight to be diverted further north of a great circle route. Going on a great circle route would use even more fuel and be slower with an even greater weight restriction. $1,500 sounds like a lot but probably a lot of passengers paid near that range for a round trip ticket. If a passenger is connecting in Japan, taking the money could have additional costs and collateral costs. I would be in a position to take the money because I fly out of LAX and I would spend less than $200 for transportation home and transportation back the next day. Maybe the airline should have contacted the passengers to see which ones could take earlier flights when the jet stream forecasts were published days in advance and offer them a lesser but still significant amount of money. That would also be a deal that I could possibly take advantage of. Also, there may have been high revenue cargo on this flight that was kept on it while passengers were given money to take a later flight.
On a similar note about 2 decades ago, I flew DL from ATL to JNB with a stop in DSS. Nearly purchased a non rev seat. However, when my sibling tried to list me, a window popped up on his computer which stated that they really discourage non rev on that flight.
Found out on the flight that I could have gotten bumped off the flight from paying cargo picked up in DSS. Probably unlikely, but I’m glad I just went ahead and purchased a ticket as at the time as there was only one flight a day and the crews stayed at a property about 30 mi away from the airport.
I guess that there are a couple of other considerations such as how long passengers would have to wait for the next flight and whether any vouchers for food, room Skyclub access (just kidding), etc. were offered if the wait was more than a couple of hours.
Flights to and from HND are frequently weight and balance restricted between all Delta hubs.
Seems like they saved 500 per pax since 1500 is the cap anyway? While they may appear to be the most generous, they are starting the bids well below the federal mandate of 400% of the ticket price. It’s doubtful most pax know their rights to claim that much if they get bumped. Of course, Wx and ATC delays are exempt.
Finally, how long is it going to take for United to overcome the shame of the whole “Dr. Dao” drama? What is the point of bringing that up now, seven years later? It wasn’t even on United metal (it happened on Republic Airways, their regional carrier). He was the last person in seniority to be involuntary bumped, he wouldn’t cooperate with crew and employees, at that point he was interfering with operation of the flight and had to be forcibly removed. I would have handled that differently (deplaned everyone) and I think that’s how airlines do it now, if they don’t get volunteers at the gate.
Furthermore, Dao only received the worst of his injuries when he ran down the jetway to try to reenter the plane. The O’Hare police (not CPD, who hadn’t arrived on scene yet) beat him down to prevent a possible flight deck breach. Were they a bit heavy handed. Possibly.
But play stupid games at the airport and that’s the result…. Oh, that and his million dollar settlement from United.
Can we stop using him as example now?
Peter,
no, we can’t just forget Dr. Dao because he is part of the history of the airline industry and the amount that Delta pays is directly related to the incident.
and the police didn’t just show up because they were in the neighborhood. They showed up because they were asked to be there by United’s agent.
In US law, agents act on behalf of their employer/contractor.
There is nothing amiss in continuing to bring up Dr. Dao every time denied boarding is mentioned.
and it is interesting that you accurately note that wx and ATC is exempt from federal DOT regulations and then (or before) argue that customers don’t know what their rights are. In fact, Delta was offering something that they didn’t have to do to avoid a crisis.
Delta’s flight from LAX-HND today is expecting to take 12 hr 48 minutes which is longer than average but also the same amount of time that yesterday’s SEA-PVG route took which also operates on the 339.
triggered tim alert
when delta operated md-11s ATL-NRT 1 of 3 westbound ops had to stop at ANC for gas regardless of what the computers said
the last time i had access to the data, delta was regularly starting every day oversold by 500 across all ops from the us to europe
none of this is new, only the visibility
pro tip: the one time i was in this situation, i went to the red coat quietly directing traffic, told him i would be happy to walk away without informing the entire plane of the 4x requirement, if i walked away happy
i quietly walked away happy and arrived 14 hours late with my terms satisfied
ymmv
Getting thrown off the plane. Just another Delta premium experience.
Good on Delta. They understand the simple art of avoiding drama. The antithesis to AA.
hagbard,
delta last operated MD11s precisely when?
jake 1 gets it.
No one was thrown off any flight.
for whatever reason, they could not carry a full load. Instead of treating the situation as a reason to screw anyone, alot of someones got rich. and they did so voluntarily.
Next.
Not impressed….I received an $1100 gift card for a flight from LAX to PHX, on Delta.
Delta shareholders need to get the executive team replaced. They are not returning the maximum short term benefits to them like United and American. There are a couple of executives from Boeing that are now available.
We had the same issue coming out of ATL bound for Incheon South Korea in November. While generous, Delta should be focused on the core issue of preventing these types of scenarios. Our travel included time sensitive documentation at our destination which posed significant risk to a smooth arrival at our final destination of Kathmandu Nepal. Our baggage was also lost in the process and we went almost a week waiting for it to be found and delivered in a complex destination. Our party was fortunate to be able to split and accommodate the delays without too much hiccup, but other travelers were not so flexible. Stronger risk assessment, increased ethics in booking practices, and standby aircraft in the event of needing to reconfigure would be smart options for Delta going forward. I am sure the costs of these errors cannot be beneficial to the companies bottom line.
Oversold … or was it due to weight restrictions b/c of wx conditions? Which is it?
Another Delta premium experience. Getting thrown off the plane.
Delta makes premium payments to its premium guests.
@dunn
+++
hagbard,
delta last operated MD11s precisely when?
+++
before you were born
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+++
@kathmandu/matt
backup metal? delta is no better than anyone else in these situations but (DUNNTRIGGER) because of the latlong of the miraculously beautiful chosen hubs they acquired 95 and 37 years ago, and the former PDX hub, DL has historically found itself with the wrong metal (contemporaneous to the other options available) on it’s transocean ops, and it’s a historical accident that this has effected DL more than others
the L1011-500 never matched the DC-10-30 and i’ve already recounted the MD-11 situation
the L1011-1 and L-1011-250 were spectacular machines so DL was locked in to that airframe but the -500 was a letdown
in the era of the 744 that was too much machine for DL and MD-11 was the only other US metal on offer; in the late 80s the idea of DL going to Toulouse was inconceivable
additional timtrigger: AA dumped their MD-11s within 5 years because they had the same problem; only KLM could figure out that bird
Ted,
you do realize that Delta is the most profitable airline in the world?
There might be many reasons that Delta is leaving something on the table but it would be hard to argue that $63K matters.
Chris and Matt,
weather including enroute winds impact the ability of an aircraft to carry a payload.
There may or may not have been aircraft specific issues on that flight that caused it to be able to carry less payload than it otherwise should have – we don’t and can’t know that – but I noted that SEA-PVG had the exact same flight time within a day or two. We have no idea of the load on that flight but the A330-900 is capable of 13 hour flights; Delta has operated plenty of them. There is a known issue on the Trent 7000 engines that Rolls-Royce is providing parts to fix. I have no idea of that was a factor here or not.
ATL-ICN has run as long as 17 hours. Delta does not have the number of high performance A350-900s that it needs to run its network. They are supposed to get 7 new ones this year and 4 are sitting in France in various stages of preparation for delivery. Delta has said they will use their deliveries this year to put on routes that have had payload issues. ATL and DTW to ICN are likely two of those routes.
According to my source at DL: Winds eventually changed, allowing for a normal departure. All pax were boarded and flight operated normally. No $1500 payments.
wow, that’s interesting
DL flight 7 has been running 20-30 minutes longer than normal but not beyond the range of the 339
This should be law. Deregulation really s*ck*.!
Peter Westwood,
Thanks for saving me the typing. People simply remember the Dao case incorrectly. You do not.
Delta should have kept their 777’s, then range and winds would not have mattered
Lol flying ana or jal economy in long haul to avoid American carriers biz. Absurd.
I’d much rather fly American j than Ana j right now and I’ve flown both quite a lot in the last two years (not the new Ana biz which is rare).
My buddy and I were late arriving from Sapporo to narita years ago on a connection to Sydney. As we were late we were bumped off the oversold flight. Jal put us on the next flight an hour later via Brisbane. Then upgraded us to business (my first time in a premium cabin), and gave us lounge access, and $400usd which was almost the price of our return ticket to Australia!
We were just happy to be on the next flight!
Overselling sucks but it makes flights cheaper in general so I’ll take it. Especially if decent compensation. If you’re a backpacker or a student then for sure take the $$ and stay an extra day wherever.
Myers,
Delta only had 10 777-200LRs which are the only planes that could have operated many of the routes that the current 19 A350s are operating.
Payload restrictions are fairly constant in the deep of winter so there isn’t much doubt if they will have to block seats. There are few payload restrictions in the summer because winds are much less. The challenge is precisely this time of year and in the fall when weather can change fairly quickly – and based on what someone said here – not become an issue when it was previously thought it might be.
I fail to see the problem when they had enough volunteers and then didn’t need them.
Why don’t they just have employee planes? If half million pp are bumped for an employee then I think they can afford to fly employees only flights too!
I experienced something similar but considerably more money being offered. A flight in October 2023 from Atlanta to Seoul was overweight (rumor of a valuable cargo, plus heavier than expected headwinds) and they were offering $9000 per person to take a different flight. Eventually they required everyone in premium economy (middle of the plane) to take another flight because of “weight and balance.” What is even more remarkable is the same flight the night before had a similar problem and some of the people on my flight had received $4000 the night before and were now receiving $9000 this night. I was fortunate to meet a Delta representative who was traveling on my flight and explained their systems and even helped the local agents to explain to passengers what needed to happen. Even worse is the flight never actually made it to Seoul, instead being diverted and forced to land in Seattle!!! It seems like planning could have made this better for the passengers, the crew, and for Delta’s finances.