Originally Posted by
jazzmie08
With discount travel sites, trying to use a $100 Hawaiian Airlines voucher would probably cost me more than it would save if I had to book through them.
It'd be nice to know what is actually required of the airline. It seems like airlines are always trying to get away with whatever they can and I don't want to be the one taken advantage of.
I am an engineer, not a lawyer, so I am hoping that others will add to my findings. I did a little bit of research and it looks like there are no clear guidelines for incidents like yours. Usually, the so called "Warsaw Convention" regulates airline liability in incidents like yours. However, the US court system seems to allow the collection of damages under Warszaw typically only when bodily injury is involved, which is not the case here. See
http://scholarship.law.marquette.edu...4&context=mulr , especially the Eastern Airlines incident described on page 235. I hate to say, but I don't think that Hawaiian is obliged to pay.
If you still try to pursue this. Hawaiian has a consumer affairs office and I would contact them with your request:
http://hawaiianair.custhelp.com/app/ask/c/372 . If that doesn't work, consider taking your story to the press, both in New Zealand and international travel journals. Conde Nast Traveler have an "Ombutsman" website where they help one customer a month and they have helped Hawaiian Air customers recover lost baggage and other things before.