Vacations Blog

This post was contributed by Mark Britton, founder and CEO of Avvo.

With this year’s American Airlines groundings, flight consolidations and difficult weather, a lot of people are once again talking about passengers’ rights.  Being the ex-general counsel at Expedia and now running Avvo and its free legal advice Q&A forum, I am often asked about these rights. Most people are certain that they have them, but are less certain about what they are.

Allow me to disappoint up front by telling everyone that passengers’ rights are a myth.  Just as the Greeks ultimately learned that there was really no Zeus to cast lightning bolts at their greatest enemies, it is time for travelers to realize that there is really no one to help them if an airline treats them poorly.  What about the Federal Aviation Administration?  What about the Department of Transportation?  While these illustrious federal entities set some guidelines for the airlines, since airline deregulation in the late ‘70’s and early ‘80’s, virtually all of your rights are dictated by the airline’s carriage agreement.

What is this mysterious carriage agreement, you ask? When you buy an airline ticket, the airline clearly discloses that you are entering into an agreement (i.e.a binding contract) with the airline. You agree to give them your hard earned cash, and they agree to give you certain services in return. If one of your “rights” is not in that agreement, then it doesn’t exist.  “But hold on,” you say.  “I hear about passengers’ rights all of the time on the news.”  And you are correct. The problem is that you are talking about legislation that has been either PROPOSED at the federal level or OVERTURNED at the state level; so while we hear a lot about passengers’ rights, nothing currently exists.

While bills have been proposed by both the U.S. Senate and House of Representatives, both bills have largely stalled in the face of the formidable airline lobby. Frustrated with Congress’ inaction, a number of states (including Arizona, Florida, New Jersey, New York and Washington) began mulling over their own legislation relating to passengers’ rights.

The first to act was New York.  In response to, among other things, nine JetBlue flights that sat on runways at New York’s John F. Kennedy International Airport in 2007 for more than six hours during an ice storm, the New York State Legislature enacted the Consumer Bill of Rights Regarding Airline Passengers.  In general, the legislation required that airlines provide passengers on aircraft delayed more than three hours with electricity for fresh air and lighting, food, water and clean lavatories.  t also created an Office of the Airline Consumer Advocate and gave New York authorities the power to seek substantial civil penalties against airlines for violations.

Fearing that multiple states would follow New York, the Air Transport Association (ATA), the heart of the airline lobby, filed a suit in federal court attempting to stop the New York legislation.  In a nutshell, they argued that federal law conflicted with (and therefore preempted) the New York law.  While the lower court upheld the law, earlier this year the U.S. Court of Appeals struck it down, largely relying on the ATA’s preemption argument.

And so the vanguard of passengers’ rights legislation died an untimely death.  Whether Congress or any state will pick up the torch again is anyone’s guess.  With galactically high oil prices and an airline industry hanging on its teeth, I am guessing that it will be hard for any legislator to throw a new punch.

We shall see.

If you have any more questions about your rights when you travel, or any other legal question, get them answered at Avvo.  You can go directly to our free legal advice Q&A forum to ask your personal legal questions-anonymously if desired-and real attorneys will answer them.

Happy traveling.

Mark Britton

Founder and CEO

Avvo, Inc.

Photo courtesy of  Oishi Kuranosuke