I’m sorry Sec. Buttigieg. You have done almost nothing for passengers so far.
Few have been traveling for the past two years. But, that is no reason for the Secretary of Transportation (DOT) to forget about passengers. President Trump’s Secretary of Transportation was pilloried for doing nothing during her four years in power. However, Sec. Buttigieg has given passengers little more than lip service during the first year of the Biden administration.
I first met DOT Sec. Elaine Chao at the White House in June of 2017. I was scheduled to give a presentation from the consumer point of view about the need for a new air traffic control system from a passenger’s perspective. But the presentations by both the talk of the National Air Traffic Controllers Association and me were canceled at the last minute by the Trump Administration.
The word from the Department of Transportation (DOT) during the Trump Administration was always “no new regulations.” During my one encounter with Sec. Chao, she told me not to expect any new DOT rules. I didn’t like what I heard, but it was from the horse’s mouth. So far, during the time that Secretary of DOT Buttigieg has been heading the department, I have only heard directly from him one time. Nothing that he spoke about has taken place.
Airline passengers have seen few changes from Sec. Buttigieg
He has appeared on many late-night TV and morning talk shows for a DOT head. One would think that Sec. Buttigieg would acknowledge that he is responsible to passengers, the aviation industry, and transportation in the larger sense. Congress in the previous year had passed an FAA funding bill that called for the appointment of a passenger ombudsman. The rationale was to clarify that DOT was responsible for consumers and the aviation industry.
Unfortunately, the creation of the consumer ombudsman has done nothing to change the actions (or inactions) of the Sec. DOT from the Trump administration to the Biden administration. In 2020 and 2021, no new rules were established for consumers. At least the Secretary could use his power of the bully pulpit during a few TV show appearances to mention passengers. However, that has not happened.
DOT Sec, Buttigieg has masterfully used the DOT Refund/Cancellation Dashboard as a fantastic PR tool. Very little changed. The airlines made minor changes to meal vouchers and hotel vouchers being handed to passengers who were delayed more than three hours and overnight if the passengers asked for food or lodging. But, their commitments to these vouchers are suspect because they have been added to the Customer Service Plan with no legal teeth.
Passengers have been fined more than $1,500,000 since the start of the pandemic for unruly behavior.
The only time I have heard any mention of airline passengers has been when a passenger was charged with unruly conduct resulting in the flight attendant losing two teeth. Otherwise, passengers, according to the lack of any action otherwise, are expected to accept mistreatment from airlines, airports, TSA, and their employees. Passengers have been fined more than $1.5 million since the start of the pandemic. During the latest month of November 2021, the FAA has levied almost another $400,000 against unruly passengers.
US airlines have not been fined for pandemic-related violations that have resulted in more than 100,000 official DOT complaints.
These DOT complaints have been about the lack of airfare refunds for flight cancellations by airlines, Plus, the airlines were caught lying to passengers about regulations that required them to refund airfares in cash rather than in airline scrip. These transgressions against airlines are apparent. However, DOT’s position is that getting money back into passengers’ hands is better than fining airlines.
Regulations that Secretary Buttigieg can act on now.
Travelers United has repeatedly asked for action on the following issues. A few words of support from the Secretary of Transportation while on TV would help dramatically. However, it appears that the Secretary has forgotten consumers.
Seat size regulation will show concern for passenger comfort and safety.
Seat size regulation will show concern for passenger comfort and safety.In the 2018 FAA Bill, Congress directed the FAA to do a study on lower airline seat pitches. Did the new configurations of aircraft seating, packing more and more passengers into planes, affect plane evacuations? Can plane evacuations occur in 90 seconds with half of the doors blocked? And, does tight seating make fainting the most common inflight medical emergency?
American travelers now await the results of the study. As I understand it, the FAA completed a portion of the study. But the results after four years have not been released.
A few months ago, passenger advocates had a chance to speak to the new DOT Secretary for the first time and they, as a group, brought up the issue of seat sizes and emergency evacuation. Of course, Secretary Buttigieg did not answer. No one knows, because the testing with a plane filled with average passengers has not been completed. The only testing focuses on seat size.
Advocates have been told that the seat size testing is separate from the plane evacuation tests. So, where are the seat size tests? Advocates asked for observers of the tests and were told that we could not observe. Now, we want to hear the public findings.
As airline seats get tighter, they become thinner and less comfortable. Plus, the width of seats is getting narrower as Americans get, shall we say, broader. Let’s face it, coach passengers are facing a squeeze that they have never experienced before in the history of aviation.
Family Travel Rules.
In 2016, Congress directed the Department of Transportation to “review, and if appropriate, establish a policy” to ensure airlines allow families with children 13 and under to sit together without paying additional fees. After two years of inaction by the DOT, Consumer Reports (CR) filed a Freedom of Information Act request. They asked about the status of this inquiry. One year later, the DOT finally forwarded 136 consumer complaints to CR, while indicating that it was unnecessary to take action “based on the low number of complaints.”
Seating children away from parents causes families anxiety. It also creates a safety risk for all passengers during an emergency. A 2018 FBI report found that inflight sexual assaults are on the rise, with investigations into assaults on children as young as 8 years old.
The CR complaints made it difficult to ignore passenger complaints about toddlers and pre-teens being separated from their parents or chaperones. Next, DOT claimed that the instructions from Congress said, “if appropriate.” Sec. Chao decreed that it was not appropriate. Next, after complaints from Travelers United, DOT decided that a rule was not asked for in the legislation and that they would do nothing. Now, early in the Biden administration, DOT is starting action (only 6 years after the congressional request) of studying the issue of family seating.
Sick Passenger rules.
When the CARES Act was being considered, Travelers United sent emails to the top staffers at the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee and the Senate Commerce Committee asking for a sick passenger rule. It seemed a perfect fit, since the airlines asked for billions of dollars in grants and loans. The airline representatives painted a picture of total desperation. However, when the bill came to be passed by the leadership in the House and Senate, the sick passenger rule fell by the wayside.
Today, the COVID pandemic still rages. The nation now deals with its fourth or fifth wave of infection surges. And with the focus on stopping infection, the airlines are still fighting any new health regulations or sick passenger rules.
Uniform COVID airline cancellation refund rules and standard flight credit rules with few restrictions.
Today, all airline passengers are aware airlines that cancel flights are responsible for refunding any funds for airfare or ancillary fees in cash. However, the requirement that passengers be refunded for “significant” changes to the flight schedules after purchase can also be fully refunded. And this does not consider the thousands of airline tickets canceled by passengers on the advice of the President, the director of the CDC, and other government medical professionals. Or flights canceled by passengers because the country they were flying to would not accept them because of their national COVID protocols.
In addition, passengers who have received airline scrip have had to deal with long telephone waits, expiring flight coupons, and other restrictions to their use. Travelers United has suggested that DOT make an emergency declaration that all flight credits be handled in a common manner. Today, each airline has its own rules and regulations. We have also asked that all refunds issued for pandemic-related reasons be settled with non-expiring flight credits. These flight credits should have no restrictions for how they can be used except they must be used on the issuing airline.
Your help in keeping our work going in DC is appreciated.
All of the above can be started by Sec. Buttigieg being strong. Why is the country left with no action?
Each of the above actions can be handled to demonstrate that the Department of Transportation is engaged. Seat size regulation can be moved forward with a simple comment on TV from the Secretary or the President. It will show concern for passenger comfort and safety. Family travel rules can be dealt with efficiently by announcing a rulemaking request by Congress. Sick passenger rules are more difficult to establish; however, if the preliminary studies and discussions are not started now much of our pandemic lessons will be lost. Finally, uniform flight credit rules are easy to mandate. Sec. Buttigieg need only ask the airline association to come up with a uniform system. Passengers want no expiration dates and no limitations on the ability to use their flight credits as though they were store credits.
By starting with these four issues, the Secretary of Transportation can immediately improve every passenger’s image of our aviation system. It is time that DOT demonstrates there is a new sheriff in town.
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Charlie Leocha is the President of Travelers United. He has been working in Washington, DC, for the past 14 years with Congress, the Department of Transportation, and industry stakeholders on travel issues. He was the first consumer representative to the Advisory Committee for Aviation Consumer Protections appointed by the Secretary of Transportation from 2012 through 2018.
