Delta’s brand new Naples to Atlanta flight melted down on May 27 before even leaving Italy. Flight 279 sat on the ground for more than seven hours, and was then cancelled outright. Roughly 200 exhausted passengers were herded onto buses and driven a dozen miles to a hotel where the airline had reserved just 13 rooms.
As the buses left, passengers were left in the parking lot with their luggage – and no rooms or onward transport.
@callmemomoney Do better @delta. This is absolutely ridiculous…
- 9 a.m. passengers begin boarding Delta 279 to Atlanta
- 9:30 a.m. – 4:30 p.m. rolling mechanical delays
- 5 p.m. flight cancels, passengers told to await hotel vouhcers
- 6:30 p.m. Two buses take everyone to a suburban hotel
- 7 p.m. travelers learn only 13 rooms are available; buses take off
Most everyone on the delayed flight was then left to scramble for taxis to take them to other accommodations at their own expense. Meanwhile, a Delta spokesperson maintains that All necessary accommodations were made… including hotel, transport, and meals.” I guess the word ‘necessary’ is doing a lot of work here, though the airline acknowledges they are “looking into” why customers were left outside with no rooms or return transportation.
Each passenger should be entitled to €600 in cash compensation for a cancellation under EU261, as well as hotel, meals, and ground transportation. Receipts for taxis and out-of-pocket hotels must be reimbursed.
When Delta famously failed to live up to similar obligations in the U.K., bailiffs halted check-in at London Heathrow and threated to seize one of the airline’s planes to secure the carrier’s $3,400 debt.
I’ve written about passengers hiring private bailiffs to collect on unpaid flight delay compensation, taking credit cards from airline staff in their offices to avoid seizure and sale of the office furniture.
Bailiffs once showed up at London Luton airport, delaying a Wizz Air flight to collect a refund that was owed to a customer. It caused a flight delay, and then Wizz Air owed EU261 compensation to all of the passengers on board! Former Slovenian Star Alliance member Adria Airways once even cancelled a flight to Vienna because they expected bailiffs to seize their aircraft over an unpaid 250 euro claim – which was weird, because everyone on the cancelled flight would have been owed compensation, too.
D-don’t
E-even
L-leave
T-the
A-airport
@Matt S–the incident you describe, where a Naples -bound flight had to divert to Rome because the aircraft type was too big to land at NAP, involved AA, not DL. It was a flight from PHL that was originally supposed to use a 787-8 (which is allowed to land at NAP) but was switched to a 787-9 (which is NOT allowed to land at NAP) at the last minute.
There ought to be lawyers specializing collect unpaid airline compensations. While they are not big payoff, but one full flight that should add up to a pretty penny. Also with airlines treating passenger like cattle calls, they are free to decide what to do to maximize profits. This is one area maybe people would be happy to pay lawyers to go after what they are entitled to according to FAA and IATA.
This incident sounds horrible to me. I suspect the EU will force Delta to pay up, big time.
That said, I suspect that a lot of the problem was where this happened. Southern Italy is beautiful, the food us amazing, and there are many reasons to visit, but in places, it feels more 3rd worldly than EU.
My worst experience with a flight delay on Delta happened at Tokyo Haneda Airport, late last year. It was a flight from HND to Seattle. We boarded (bused to a hard stand), sat there for an hour or more, and then the flight was cancelled. Upon return to the gate, we were processed by Japanese authorities through a special cancelled flight area that moved quickly, they had a plan to check duty free purchases so they could be reclaimed when the flight left, we got our checked bags back easily, a hotel voucher for an in-airport hotel we could walk to, etc. We were about 21 hours late getting home but I had no issues being reimbursed for meal expenses and we got an apology gift of 20,000 SkyMiles per person. Delta’s Japanese employees were extremely apologetic, even the next day when we checked in again. They seemed shocked when I told them they had done a good job handling the situation and that I wasn’t upset. (The captain had done a good job of explaining the mechanical issue the night before –it was a fuel pump they couldn’t start, which would have been a huge safety issue on a TPAC flight.). I love Italy but am grateful this happened in Japan and not Southern Italy.
STEVE FROM SEA, YES IT WAS DELTA!
AA HAD A DIFFERENT INCIDENT.
DELTA ABANDINED ITS CUSTOMERS!
@John–I don’t think you read or understand what I wrote.
I am not denying that this Delta incident occurred when they cancelled a flight out of NAP. I was responding to a previous comment by Matt S. Matt said that Delta had tried to send an aircraft to NAP that wasn’t capable of landing there so had to divert to FCO. THAT incident was AA, not DL.
It’s OK to blame an airline for its own problems. It is not OK to blame an airline for a different airline’s problems.