Essential Travel Tips and Passenger Rights This Holiday Season
With the busy travel season approaching, keep these rights and travel tips in mind.
1. Refunds
You are entitled to a refund whenever an airline cancels your flight or significantly changes your flight schedule for any reason. You are also owed a refund if your flight is delayed by three or more hours. Note, you are entitled to the refund only if you refuse to take your changed/delayed/replacement flight. However, because same-day fares are incredibly expensive, the best option often is to accept the new travel plans.
2. Compensation
In some instances, you will be owed flight delay compensation. For flight delays and cancellations of more than three hours within the control of Southwest, Alaska, and JetBlue, you are eligible for a travel credit or voucher. You will be entitled to EU compensation for any delays when flying out of the European Union, or on a European airline when arriving to the EU.
The Montreal Convention also provides passengers with flight delay compensation, up to approximately $6100, for damages suffered by a delay in international travel (provided the other country is a Montreal Convention signatory).
3. Meal Vouchers
The top 10 U.S. airlines offer meal vouchers for controllable delays and cancellations over 3 hours. All 10 except for Frontier will also provide hotel vouchers for overnight disruptions and ground transportation vouchers.
4. Bumping
Airlines routinely overbook flights, preferring to pay compensation rather than risk empty seats. Airlines will first seek volunteers to receive travel credit. If you have flexible plans (and there is no significant weather or technology-related meltdown occurring), a passenger may want to at least consider the travel credit. But these come with expiration dates and other restrictions. You should be aware of your rights when you are contemplating what to do.
If the airline involuntarily denies you boarding, you are entitled twice the amount of your one-way fare, up to a maximum of $775, if your alternative flight is scheduled to get you to your destination more than one hour, but less than two hours late. For anything over two hours, you are owed four times your one-way fare up to $1550.
5. Baggage Issues
Knowing your rights when the airline delays, damages, or loses your bag is vital. First, the airline has the responsibility of returning the bag to your location. You do NOT have to return to the airport because of the airline’s mistake.
When your checked bag is delayed, you are entitled to compensation for direct and incidental damages arising from the delay. This means that you can buy new clothes for a business meeting or a vacation, new toiletries, and other items that you need until your bag and original items are returned to you. These purchases must be reasonable in price and amount relative to the length of the delay, and they should be reasonably similar to what you normally purchase. Passengers should not abuse the system by purchasing very expensive items, but passengers should not hesitate to purchase needed items and to seek reimbursement.
When your bag is lost, typically after 5-14 days of being missing, you are entitled to compensation for the bag and items in the bag up to a maximum of $3800 domestically and $1700 for international flights. Again, the goal is to be reasonable with the airline when itemizing the items and their values. The airline may say they need receipts for every item, but that is impractical and unreasonable. But you should be able to provide receipts or credit card statements for most of the items.
Tips:
- Book early morning flights to avoid delays.
- Book direct flights whenever feasible.
- Make sure to leave enough time for connections, especially when booking connecting flights on different airlines.
- Research on-time statistics for your flight. FlightAware and Flightera are great resources.
With the Southwest Christmas Meltdown of 2022 and many other widespread delays throughout the holiday season, keep backup plans in mind. Book an earlier flight when possible, or book backup refundable tickets.
And most importantly, know your rights when you fly.
