reidlewis

I live in NYC but was in Pittsburgh for the holiday weekend. My wife and I were supposed to fly a one way itinerary, PIT-JFK-YQB on DL on 7/6.

The evening prior to the trip, Mrs. ReidLewis and I realized we left our passports in NYC. With a 3 hour layover at JFK, we figured that would be more than enough time to have a friend/family member drop off passports during our layover there.

I should also mention our passport info was attached to the reservation because we provided it during online check-in. We called DL to make sure we wouldn't have an issue getting on the PIT-JFK flight. Their response was that since we were successfully checked in for both flights, we were fine from DL's perspective to fly the domestic segment but they recommended checking with TSA to be certain. We called TSA and were given the all clear since all they are looking for is that the boarding pass matches the government issued ID (in this case, we would be using driver's licenses).

The next day, we got through security in PIT with no questions asked. When we arrived at the gate, we decided to notify the gate agent that we were flying the domestic leg of our trip without passports and that we had cleared it with the airline the night before. We simply didn't want any surprises during boarding. Stunningly, the gate agent told us we were on her "passport swipe list" and she could not let us board the plane to JFK without physically swiping our passports. She checked with a supervisor and then came back with the same response - we could not board that plane. This effectively left us stranded in Pittsburgh.

I asked the gate agent if she could separate out the two legs into two separate reservations to isolate the domestic flight from the international one. She said she could not. I asked if she could modify the reservation so that it terminated in New York so we could at least return home, retrieve our passports and then attempt to be re-booked to YQB. Again, the answer was no. The gate agent did not offer any sort of re-accommodation. We were left completely on our own.

We purchased walk up tickets on US Airways to LGA so that we could at least get home. Once home, I called Delta and the agent was dumbfounded about what transpired in PIT. During that call I was able to confirm there was a record on my PNR of my phone call to DL the night before. The agent refunded the tickets but could only offer $100 in travel credit. I accepted the refund but declined the travel credit since, based on her reaction and the money we spent out of pocket to leave PIT, it sounded like perhaps more could be done for us if we write in to DL share this experience.

Obviously someone was wrong here: either the agent we spoke to the evening before or the gate agent and supervisor at PIT. Does anyone know if a passport is required for a domestic flight if that same itinerary includes an international flight as well? If not, is this considered an IDB situation?

Any comments, suggestions or advice would be welcomed and appreciated.