chessman

Interesting decision from a federal appeals court today, allowing a passenger to sue US Airways (the case is years old) for refund of her bag fee on the theory that the airline breached its contract to deliver her bag on time. (Short summary is that she alleged that US COC agreed to deliver her bag on time in exchange for the $15 bag fee and the court held that the claim was not preempted.)

The decision is here:http://cdn.ca9.uscourts.gov/datastor...3/11-16305.pdf if anyone wants further reading.

FWAAA

Cue the internet know-it-alls who will mistakenly claim that the Ginsberg holding preempts claims like these.

Seems to me if you pay money for bags, the airline certainly should have to refund part or all of the fee when it fails to perform reasonably.

3Cforme

There was a proposed DOT rule that would have mandated refund of fees if baggage was delayed. Did it not get finalized before Obama left office?

pinniped

General question: do any airports or airlines measure (and publish) the time from the aircraft arrival to baggage delivery on the carousel? I wonder if there's any statistical difference between Southwest and the legacies.

Last week, we waited 25 minutes for Southwest bags at MCI. Of course, the bag fees are simply bundled into the fare: no refund is ever offered. I would think the legacies would perform better since many passengers only have 1 or 0 free checked bags.

I love the idea of a DOT rule here, but I'm guessing the airlines would say it'll cost them gazillions of dollars to collect the data.

JonNYC

HA!

I've been dutifully trying to correct that mistaken assertion by some here for many months/years.

GNRMatt

I'm not sure if there is public data, but Alaska and Delta both have 20 minute guarantees and will provide compensation if the bag is not on the carousel at that time.

imapilotaz

AA would need to do a 60 minute guarantee to avoid paying out on every single flight...

dickinson

So she gets $15 and the lawyers get $1.5 million??

Phasers

I prefer to think of it as 'She gets $15, the lawyers get millions, and the airlines get a much deserved comeuppance'.

lobo411

She was the lead plaintiff of a class action, so I bet she'll get a bit more than $15.

anc305

You must be a lawyer to think that would be a fair split.

TSparky

How about 30 WN drink coupons? Just received that in the mail for a class action lawsuit.

MSPeconomist

AFAIK DL doesn't publish stats, but they give out 2500 redeemable miles every time a bag is delivered to the belt more than twenty minutes after the flight arrives (apparently using arrival time from the flight status information on their website and using the DL app's "track my bag" record of when the bag was delivered). There are a few airports that routinely fail the test, but most do an amazing job of getting the bags out fast now.

IIRC this started as a promo to compete with Alaska's generally efficient service for checked bags. It was first offered for a limited period, apparently to challenge the baggage handling employees. However, it was popular and so it continues a couple years later. I think it's only for domestic flights, although it should apply if you recheck the bag after customs on an international arrival followed by a domestic connecting flight.

Disclosure: My bag only earned the 2500 miles for me one time! So it works, or doesn't work, depending on your perspective.

The smallest state

Alaska airlines does this now. It is on the honor system. If your bag isn't there in 20 minutes you get something like 1000 miles. I've never needed to use it as its never been over 20 minutes. Although I did stand beside some hipsters who were actively hoping it would be late and making jokes about letting the bag go around in circles until 20 minutes came up.

ords

Of course they (airlines) track baggage delivery times as some are written into handling contracts. Will it ever be published, nope.