When your flight is cancelled and you’re stuck somewhere overnight, the airline might give you a hotel room for the night. It frequently depends on whether the delay is ‘their fault’ – for instance, the plane had a mechanical problem, or they didn’t have pilots or flight attendants available to work the flight – or whether they consider the issue beyond their control such as weather or air traffic control issues.
If they give you a room, it’s often after a long wait, eating into the time you’re able to sleep. Even airlines that will provide you a room automatically through their app may not have any rooms available (at their discount rate) to provide you. And the room you get may not be the kind of place you want to sleep.
An American Airlines passenger shares that they were flying Atlanta to Dallas to Phoenix and was stuck overnight in Dallas due to a delay. The airline provided them a voucher to stay at the… Motel 8. They share roaches on the ceiling of their room, that they demanded a second room, only to be given one with stained sheets and hair on the bed.
@AmericanAir i was mistreated last week on your flight from Atlanta to Dallas and then from Dallas to Phoenix. Here are the videos of my room disgusting hair and stains on the bed in two different rooms pic.twitter.com/MCPyYSFBEw
— Bald William Dent act right heffias (@bougiegentleman) July 5, 2024
Ironically this passenger thought they were left out when others on their flight were given rooms at the Wyndham. That might not have been better.
For your review. This is how much you value your customer experience when providing hotel accommodations. pic.twitter.com/itFZKoNKKO
— Nellz (@Nursenellz) December 19, 2023
The elevators were non functional so we had to use the stairs. The hallway stunk and as you can see there was a big open hole in the ceiling tile. @WyndhamHotels pic.twitter.com/7nr761N2Aw
— Nellz (@Nursenellz) December 19, 2023
When you’re given a free hotel room, often it’s worth about what you pay for it.
Hey @AmericanAir you delay my flight 2 hours, lie about the reason, make me miss my connection, put me in a dump of a hotel with worms and broken locks, and expect me to be ok with it? I’ll await your reply. pic.twitter.com/o13sTTtBWU
— Jared Brown (@jaredb6061) April 29, 2024
The Biden administration pressured airlines to agree to cover hotel and meals during long delays that are their fault. But there was no pressure over the quality of those hotels, or the amount of food covered. This passenger got a voucher for $12 to spend in the airport (which is the American Airlines standard, consider adding it to your Starbucks app).
The quality of overnight delay accommodations is not just a U.S. airline issue. Air Canada has sent a man and a woman, who didn’t know each other, to a hotel to share a room. And in China, Hainan Airlines put passengers up in an S&M-themed hotel.
If you are in a position to do so, consider taking matters into your own hands even at your potential expense (though there are ways of minimizing the expense). If you rely on the airline for accommodation, you’re likely to wind up somewhere that you really do not want to stay. And it may take a significant amount of time to get even that – taking away from the limited time you may have for rest before returning to the airport for an early flight the next day. So what do you do instead?
- Rely on your credit card coverage. Pay for your ticket with a credit card that offers trip delay coverage, book your own room and save receipts for it, along with ground transportation and meals. IYou’re assured the property you are comfortable staying in. You won’t wait. And you can look farther afield if need be. Sure, airport hotels might well all be booked. But if you aren’t spending an hour in line to get the room is a 20 minute drive away from the airport (also billed to trip delay coverage) so bad?
Some readers might say that ‘you’re obligated to minimize the insurer’s loss, and foregoing a room offered by the airline fails to do that and obviates coverage’. I do not believe you are obligated to take any room, of any quality offered. And I have never seen coverage denied for this when claimed properly.
- Request a distressed passenger rate. If you don’t have credit card trip delay coverage, and you can’t find a good rate on your own that you’re willing to pay, one alternative to the long line may be the baggage office. Ask there about distressed passenger rates for hotels. If the line is long at your airline’s baggage office, or it isn’t staffed, be friendly and ask at another airline’s baggage office.
- Use points. Airline hotels often are great deals on points, with reward costs based on a hotel’s average daily rate which tends to be brought down by large airline contracts for housing crew. A few thousand points from your stash can get you a far better night’s sleep, more quickly, than relying on the airline.
Airlines may give you a free room when you’re faced with a controllable overnight delay. But you get what you pay for – you probably don’t want to sleep in the room they’re going to give you. There are exceptions, but it can be very much worth venturing off on your own rather than rolling the dice on free.
Airlines at US airports have tried to send me to the boonies or to dumps when they’ve stranded me for the night. The times last year and this year when they tried to make my hotel room plans after mechanical-related delays, I literally had no use for the hotel and/or transportation (+ sometimes a meal voucher) and just went on my merry own way and sometimes stuck the bill to the airline or insurance providers for my own arrangements.
I’m a United loyalist that got screwed by a badly handled flight crew timeout a few weeks ago and exerienced this. Had to stay overnight at LAX.
Everyone gets a text with a link to a hotel to choose. In this case they were all airport Marriott branded hotels.
Standard Marriott, Westin, Courtyard, Spring Hill, etc.
Picked the Westin and while the rooms were old and beat up, it was a fine place to stay with a nice “Westin lobby”.
I was even shocked to see I got a qualifying night and Bonvoy points out of it.
Not sure if I got a better list of hotels to choose from because I’m 1K, but I don’t think so. Surprised AAL is using Super 8s.
Make sure you’ve reviewed the fine print of your credit card trip delay coverage if you plan to go that route. The Citi AA Exec card states coverage is available with a 6 or more hour delay. But hidden in the fine print is the caveat that your *first* flight must be delayed by at least 6 hours in order for trip delay coverage to apply.
So in practice, a 5 hour delay on your first flight that then strands you in overnight situation at your connecting airport causing say a 12 or 14 hour total trip delay is not covered.
What Citi markets as Trip Delay coverage on their most premium card would better be called First Flight Delay coverage.
My wife and I received vouchers for a night at a quite nice hotel. However, when the shuttle bus arrived, the driver indicated that he didn’t think there were any rooms available. We all crowded onto the bus the see if we could get in a room. I wound up on the front seat and my wife was in the rear row. I texted her: “You tend to the luggage; I’ll dash inside ahead of the group to try to get a room.” Wife opened the text and read it aloud. Very embarrassing.
The foto is simple clickbait. It is not actual photo. Yes the story is tragic enough without the false embellishment of the foto
Here’s what I do. I call Alaska airlines reservations and explain the situation. I tell them if the deposit $250.00 in my account as a credit, I’ll take care of the food and beverage myself. They usually agree to this and while other passengers are dealing with gate agents, I’m sleeping peacefully.
Part 2 of my previous comment. I’m a Hilton diamond member, so I usually get an upgraded room and I get HH credit and extra points for my stay using my amex Hilton Aspire credit card
Never understood why people are so cheap they will wait to get a poor quality “free” room and a cheap meal voucher. If you can afford to travel you can afford an unplanned night and meals. I book it, usually from the plane, if I know we will be stranded. Last time SEA-DFW-CLT flight got disrupted and wouldn’t make connection. Booked DFW Hyatt as we were leaving SEA and enjoyed a nice night before heading home the next day. BTW by time we arrived all local hotels, including both airport Hyatts, were sold out
Why connect when you have 3 airlines flying direct??
Making a connection in DFW late in the day is just asking for trouble. I call DFW the abyss, the blackhole, where delays are the rule and not the exception.
I don’t understand why people wait in physical lines, but they do. If you know you are going to miss a connection, save yourself headaches by booking a hotel near the airport (yes on your phone, I use Expedia.com and it works fine) and then decide if you want to get compensation later when you are **WAY** less busy and not competing with dozens of other people in line.
-Jon
I was Flying American and weather caused a huge number of flights to be canceled. The line at customer service stretched past two large gate areas. It was late by the time the last flight was canceled. However, a gate agent started giving hotel, taxi, and food vouchers. The guy in front of me had the choice of far away or Motel 6. Then I was given the lovely Canopy hotel, which was close, and taxi and and a food voucher good enough for a cup gumbo the next day.
Yup. If you travel even semi-regularly, this is one reason in and of itself why it can be worth it to pay an annual fee for a card with proper coverage.
Of course, it doesn’t cover everything. I remember a few years ago, we were connection onto the last flight to PHX from IAH, flying with my older daughter who was maybe 3 or 4 at the time – departure time was something like 9pm and arrival probably around 11. At the gate at boarding time, they announced a flat tire and that they didn’t know how long it would take to get maintenance to replace it. Thinking I didn’t want tos tick around with the little in case it was really late, I opted to just book at the airport Marriott and have them put us on the 8am next morning. No, travel insurance (nor United) was going to cover that $200, but well worth it to get the kid some sleep rather than wait around in the terminal to see when (and if) that flight was going to depart. Turns out it was only something like an hour, which in hindsight, and if I knew that were going to be the case, I might have just opted to wait. But even if they had announced an hour, you just never know and still glad I waited. Again, well worth it.
If you are traveling and don’t factor in for delays, you are going to be disappointed.
I wanted to add my two cents in here and say that maybe it is time that the Airlines companies started to improve or upgrade there vouchers to travellers for places to stay due to problems with flights. I certainly don’t get why airline companies would send travellers to places that are complete dumps-surely they can do better ! Unless the airline companies get off on being stingy Cheapskates
I had a mechanical delay create a misconnect on UA with an overnight at the connection point. Got a meal voucher proactively in the app but didn’t get offered a hotel. Since it was for biz just went and booked the most convenient hotel.
Later I (a 1K) asked UA customer service if they could help offset the cost, and they offered their max of $200 to reimburse. It was a $400 hotel attached to the terminal so $200 didn’t fully cover but I suppose given what’s in the comments above if i asked for a hotel during the delay i might have received decent options without needing reimbursement.
I am a lifetime 1K and flew over 4 million miles on Northwest traveling on business within Asia. Some things happen beyond the control of airlines. Deal with it. I don’t feel sorry at all for any of the people mentioned in the article. These hotels have been inspected by local health agencies and declared fit. OMG! Stains on the ceiling! For pete’s sake, deal with it. Life can, and will, get a whole lot tougher at some point.
I don’t understand hotel vouchers (paper or electronic) and hotel availability.
I’ve had friends issued vouchers on American and United, and then when the arrive at the hotel, it is sold out.
Don’t the airlines have some sort of system that eliminates issuing vouchers at sold out hotels?
Do they take a look early in the day, choose hotels and then hope for best?
It seems crazy when they issues these vouchers there isn’t some kind of block on the hotel inventory or a way to prebook the room.
I usually get my own room in these cases. I use points for my stay and then I request for the room rate in cash to be reimbursed to me. I have been successful more often than not.
Here’s another reason to Luv Southwest. A few years ago they had to put me up in a hotel in Newark NJ (where they no longer fly). They put me into a nice hotel, next to a large, modern shopping center. Safe and clean. My only regret is they rerouted me onto a 6am flight, so it was an early wake up call! But they took care of me, and I couldn’t have asked for anything more.
Having status with the airline or alliance can also help. I recently had a mechanical diversion to Phoenix which meant a certain misconnect in Dallas to Florida. Worked out the reroute in the AA lounge, avoiding the long lines at the main CS desk. After we figured out the best flights I asked for a hotel voucher. The angel working the lounge desk asked if I had any preferences and I said Hilton since I usually get upgraded to club rooms. Given a measly $12 voucher for food by AA, but when combined with the $15 voucher from Hilton for status, it was enough for a fantastic Reuben sandwich at the main lobby dining venue. I’m OWE (Gold with British Airways) and so got great service; not sure what those without status received but would almost always second the idea that often it’s best to just pay and reimburse rather than wait in a long line for a voucher to a bad hotel. European airlines have “duty of care” so they will always cover reasonable overnight expenses (i.e. under $250) though sometimes it takes more than one email.
I’ve only had to get a hotel room twice this century because of flight cancelations. First was not bad (AA at ORD). The second was last August with DL in BOS. I was able to select my next day routing through the app. I was able to summon my paid for Lyft to and from a quite adequate hotel. My only problem was the hotel was near a restaurant that you could not get to on foot. Since I was a member of their rewards program, I qualified for a goodie bag that served its purpose.
“Do they take a look early in the day, choose hotels and then hope for best?”
“Don’t the airlines have some sort of system that eliminates issuing vouchers at sold out hotels?”
This is very simple..
The airlines have no idea what a property’s actual availability is. How could they? By in large, the airline waits until almost the last second and then they, or sometimes they farm it out to the 3rd party company that handles their crew scheduling, start calling properties. This usually takes a while because no one property can usually take full cancelled flight(s) of people so this involves them roping in multiple hotels over a wider geographic area.
Ideally, they ask the property if they offer breakfast or if they have a shuttle and if that shuttle can be used to transport people to & from the airport, but overall their concern is strictly how many rooms do you have (not what type – just how many) and what’s the price.
Airlines over time have burned hotels a lot with this. They call and ask for 60 rooms and then only use/take 25. If you bill them for the other 35, they simply don’t pay or if you somehow do get a method of payment from them, they will initiate a chargeback. Just like they’ll ask for 60 rooms but then send 100 rooms worth of people. They also drag their feet bigtime on providing a method of payment.
Until I receive a valid card to charge (no direct bills on this stuff as airlines have the utmost abysmal track record on paying their bills), my inventory is wide open for anyone to book as I know I stand a better chance of getting paid by John Q. Public 1-12 then I do by American.
If this means that I have 70 rooms to sell and I tell American they can have those 70 but it takes them a few hours to provide me with a valid chargeable card, how many of those rooms are getting booked via the usual hotel channels? That’s how you get the oversold hotel angle on this.
HI Gary
I usually agree with you, but here i think you are not correct.
We have been overnighted 5 times this year on United. They alwasy give us a choice of three hotels.
One is usally very good ( Gayloard Resort in Denver) and they give you $20 for each missed meal. So between $40 and $60 per person for food. Perhaps the example you gave had the person on a basic type economy fare. I feel that if you pay for the least expensive ticket, you should not expect to be put up in a very good hotel if there are issues. Also American is not really known for their customer service, so you may want to advise people to choose a better airline!
What happens if you use points and pay taxes or fees with a credit card. Will the travel interruption be covered? We mostly fly on points.
We had a flight delay for the first time ever coming out of Jacksonville to Dallas and onto LAX.
I booked a room at the Hyatt that’s within the Dallas airport. Went to the help desk and they said to go ahead and stay there and then request reimbursement.
Intereraction with AA customer service was that they usually don’t allow this. But, on a one time basis they would give me $120 and $300 flight credit. The room was about $400. So, I don’t know if they’d ever let me do this again.
It took 10 minutes to walk from our hotel room to TSA which was GREAT for a 6a.m. flight.