Originally Posted by
jsloan
There's always a penalty, but everything's negotiable.
I don't know the financials in detail. All I know is that you don't continually defer a purchase the way that UA has if you are actually attempting to acquire the goods in question.
It's often better to take one short-term hit than to acquire an asset that you're expecting to be a money-loser.
Back in the day, IIRC, NW was among first to order the DreamLiner (ANA launch customer, CO launch N. American customer). pmUA came along a little later IIRC, splitting the order between 787 and 350.
Now to the point - post merger DL did not want 787s, deferred at first, but actually cancelled relatively quick - of course they had the luxury of Boeing's delays (those by many accounts really hurt CO who bet big time on DreamLiner).
Who knows what the penalty was, but DL did not want this plane for some reason, and IIRC just a few years ago again rejected it in favor of A330 NEO.