More than half of all U.S. airline travelers don’t trust their carriers to handle fairly their claims for compensation resulting from late or cancelled flights or other operational failures that are within the control of the airlines themselves.
That high level of consumer distrust of airlines is the most notable – but perhaps not all that shocking – result of a new survey released today by AirHelp, a travel consumer’s rights organization based in Berlin, Germany. Airhelp, which assists consumers in pursuing claims against airlines, interviewed almost 10,500 travelers around the world in June and July of this year to learn what travel consumers actually understand and don’t understand about their rights as airline passengers in the event airlines fail to live up to their obligations or, in some cases, fail to meet performance standards written into some nations’ laws.
Delayed and stressed passengers wait for their flight at Orly Airport in Paris during July 2011 … [+]
Among the survey’s most notable results:
- 55% of U.S. air travelers don’t trust airlines to handle fairly their compensation claims
- One quarter of those air travelers surveyed globally said the reason they’ve not even tried to file claims for compensation when flight operations have gone way wrong is that they don’t think the airlines would listen
- Nearly three-quarters of those surveyed – 73% to be exact – say that in their initial claims for compensation were rejected by the airline involved (even when those rejections were baseless, in obvious error or at least debatable)
- Only a third of U.S. travelers are even aware of their right under E.U. regulations to file claims for up to 600 Euros in compensation for certain kinds of flight disruptions involving travel on carriers based in the European Union or U.S. carriers’ flights departing from the E.U.
- 81% of U.S. passengers are unaware of their consumer rights as travelers both on E.U.- and U.S.-based airlines
An E.U. regulation known as EC261 entitles passengers on E.U.-based carriers operating anywhere in the world, and those departing Europe aboard non-E.U. airlines to receive up to 600 Euros (around $660 at current exchange rates) if their flight is cancelled or delayed more than three hours, or if they are denied boarding even though the airline sold them a ticket for that flight.
No similar blanket law or regulation exists in the United States or most other non-E.U. nations. But passengers on U.S.-based airlines can file complaints regarding various kinds of operational disruptions directly with their airline and with the U.S. Department of Transportation. If their flight was aboard a U.S. airline departing from an airport within one of the 28 member nations of the E.U. they can file a complaint directly to the E.U. if they’re not satisfied with the airline’s response.
Monetary compensation is not mandated by law or regulations in most cases involving U.S. carriers operating domestically or outside of the E.U. But consumers are free to demand compensation and to make arguments as to why they deserve such compensation or, at the very least, why they deserve more than the vouchers for food, hotel nights or discounted future travel that they might have been given initially by airline staff.
AirHelp noted that so far this year about 169 million U.S. air travelers have been affected by flight disruptions. And some significant percentage of those, AirHelp added, are eligible for compensation under EC261 but are having to do battle with airlines – European and American airlines alike – to be awarded the compensation that AirHelp says is rightfully theirs under EC261.
Christian Nielsen, Chief Legal Officer at AirHelp, said “Passengers are losing out on money that is rightfully theirs because airlines are dishonest about their own passengers’ rights. The compensation claims process has become so disheartening that many passengers give up after their initial claim (is) rejected, highlighting the fact that many consumers feel powerless against airlines.
Nielsen added that U.S. passengers lack of faith in airlines is unsurprising because there’s less consumer protection in place for them than for passengers of European carriers. But he criticized mostly European airlines for using “smoke and mirrors” to “shirk their legal responsibility” to compensate passengers whose flights were disrupted in ways that meet the compensation conditions included in EC261
AirHelp’s survey showed that in addition to the broad lack of awareness by U.S. air travel consumers of their rights when flights get disrupted, those who do file claims or complaints to U.S. airlines often are given the brushoff by those carriers. AirHelp found that U.S. airlines use “wrongful grounds” to reject an average of 25% of customers’ claims filed with them.
Additionally, the survey showed that 24% of U.S. passengers who experienced flight disruptions bad enough to qualify for some sort of compensation have accepted an airline’s offer of vouchers for food, hotel stays and/or discounted future travel instead of claiming for financial compensation. Often times restrictions on how those vouchers can be used and/or short expiration dates that travelers typically aren’t aware of when first offered those forms of compensation can make that compensation worth much less than consumers initially assume they’re worth.
Accepting such offers of compensation typically does not make the disrupted traveler ineligible for further cash compensation. But many travelers who do accept vouchers or other forms of compensation either don’t know that they still can pursue cash compensation or simply drop the matter without pursuing additional compensation in cash.
