Tag Archives for involuntary denied boarding.
An American Airlines passenger scanned their boarding pass, answered the exit-row questions, took their seat, and thought they were on their way home to Austin. Then, after the whole plane had boarded, the airline gave that seat to a standby traveler, told the original passenger they were somehow “not checked in,” and forced them off the aircraft – even though the plane left with empty seats.
American Airlines was reportedly offering passengers as much as $4,000 each to volunteer off an oversold flight to Aspen, a stunning number for a carrier that usually avoids paying much to solve these problems. The twist is that saying yes may have been the best deal in the cabin, because the original flight later diverted to Grand Junction and passengers wound up finishing the trip to Aspen by bus.
American Airlines has a new internal playbook for oversold flights — and it changes how you should think about taking a voluntary bump. A leaked memo lays out two rules that matter to passengers: everyone is supposed to be paid the highest offer the gate makes, and the third offer is usually the ceiling unless managers approve more. If you want the most compensation, that inside detail is now part of the strategy.
George Santos, the former New York congressman whose fraud case left him owing hundreds of thousands of dollars, bragged on social media about refusing a $900 Delta offer to give up his seat on an oversold shuttle flight.
The latest DOT Air Travel Consumer Report shows Delta avoided bumping passengers entirely, while American led the industry in cancellations, mishandled bags, denied boardings, and passenger complaints.
A passenger on Frontier Airlines flight 1449 from Atlanta to Denver Friday evening says they were bumped from the aircraft after they had already boarded in order to make room for staff. She says she was “threatened with arrest” if she didn’t give up her seat, and she missed the wedding she was headed to. The flight wound up taking off without her.
On busy travel days flying can be profitable. Your seat has value, and you can sell it. One Delta passenger found themselves on an overbooked flight, and took $2,000 as compensation to take a later flight. That later flight wound up overbooked, too, and they took $3,000 to volunteer for a bump from that one. That’s $5,000 in a day.
Friday’s United Airlines Newark to Dubrovnik flight was reportedly oversold in business class. United doesn’t normally sell more tickets in business class than they have seats, and it doesn’t appear that the aircraft was swapped to one with a smaller business class cabin.
Nobody would take the airline’s generous offers of compensation, even though “[t]hey offered 2500 and then 3000.”
Michael Trager, who runs frequent traveler and casino loyalty site TravelZork, had one of the most interesting “bump” stories I’ve heard in a long time. He was involuntarily denied boarding on an American Airlines flight last week, and airport staff refused to provide him any compensation saying that they “do not care about DOT Rules.”
Delta Air Lines overbooked a flight, so as is common they offered passengers gift cards to give up their seat and take a later flight. One passenger who had already boarded the flight in Atlanta accepted their offer of $700 but when he got off the aircraft the airline would not pay.
Gary Leff is one of the foremost experts in the field of miles, points, and frequent business travel -- a topic he has covered since 2002.
Co-founder of frequent flyer community InsideFlyer.com, emcee of the Freddie Awards, and named one of the "World's Top Travel Experts" by Conde' Nast Traveler (2010-Present) Gary has been a guest on most major news media, profiled in several top print publications, and published broadly on the topic of consumer loyalty. More About Gary »
