BOSTransplant

My point was less about flight picking than making blanket statements like "DL is bad at IRROPS." It's easy to objectively see which airlines are good or bad operationally using data that's available on the web, so anecdotal experience isn't necessary or even particularly helpful when it comes to discussing and comparing the operational abilities of various airlines.

MSPeconomist

It depends. For example, KLM handles DL at AMS, DL has their own staff at NRT, and many smaller outstations use contract staff, especially if it isn't a big station for one of DL's (closer) partners.

MSPeconomist

This is very different from what your earlier post said about elites waiting one day and kettles two days to get out.

RealHJ

I don't base my opinions based on hearsay, but on close to a million miles flown on DL and actual facts, not what some fanboys say without anything to back it up (other than yelling and screaming, and thinking that than louder they do so, that by drowning out all else and good reason, others will believe them). Each year I have close a 100 flights flown, with a good and fairly balanced mixed across the three alliances, so I base it on the trends and experiences - never a single one. (Something that you, your "mother" I mean, should try. Base things on actual repeat experiences and trends, vs. just what you overheard. That is, base things on facts, vs. just pick what "evidence" you want to back up your preconceived notions.)

DL res (US DM # and the local reservations offices also usually) are happy to get the seats from other airlines. That is rarely the problem: the seats are there and wide open (I've even went over to the adjacent KLM gate and had KLM confirm that the flight is "only half full" and there are a lot of seats available on it). It's just that then DL ticketing will not issue it and come back and tell the agent that pax must fly on the next DL flight, even if the next scheduled be be as much as 2 or 3 days later, vs., for example, a KL flight that is departing in a few hours.

Countless times, res phone staff happily grab and confirm seats on other ST airlines, but each time at ticketing it is denied: pax must fly on DL, no matter how many days later that is. It's just that DL ticketing seems to be under clear direction to keep pax on DL and not accommodate on other airlines at all costs, with some, but rare, exceptions to that. This recent 5:1 disparity of AA sending pax to DL vs. vice versa further proves that.

Huh? That is exactly what I said. May be try to re-read.

So to use this same example and recap again: DL flight goes mechanical. Higher status pax get booked on DL flight next day. Lower status pax get booked on DL flight two (and some possibly three) days later. Neither pax get accommodated on other airlines to fly out sooner (same day, or in case of lower status pax at least next day vs. two days later). DL doesn't fly in another plane either.

That is pretty typical, speaking from multiple DL experiences.

Sometimes DL will arrange ground transportation and hotel and meal vouchers, other times it won't and just will dump pax out and all DL/contract staff will go home to avoid dealing with stranded pax, and phone agents are helpless and direct pax to airport, where DL ops are only open a few hours a day.

MSPeconomist

If you're talking about re-routing through Europe to get to Asia, DL unfortunately no longer allows this in IROPs. I know because I asked about it recently.

HDQDD

Yeah, it's much more accurate to base your opinion on 100/flights per year than on DOT statistics of a carrier that operates over 5,400 flights per day.

Perhaps you should take your own advice:

RealHJ

Yes, that is a part of it, that DL insists for pax to stay on original routing (or close to it), which in some cases severely limits the alternate flight options. That combined with a strong preference for DL ticketing to keep pax on all DL flights (if that is how it was originally) makes irrop handling more difficult and inconvenient with DL than with other airlines for the pax. Combine that with amateurish and ill-prepared int'l outstation irrop handling, and the end result truly is horrendous (relatively speaking, of course).

Hopefully now you see my point. May be I've been lucky, but with UA I've had very good irrop experiences, and with AA both good and not-so-good-but-still-OK. With DL, more of really bad handling, which may be because I fly more int'l. For domestic fliers the experience is likely to be different and markedly better (and some then think of that as the way it always is everywhere and all the time, not realizing how very myopic and limited their perspective is).

sethb

Isn't "ticketing" a department in the partner? If they won't provide the ticket, what do you expect DL to do?

I thought dumping pax at a closed airport was a UA trick (or is it only theirs when it also involves a multi-day delay, nonexistent hotel, etc.)?

SJC ORD LDR

Why do you keep flying DL? If your experience is that miserable, I'd be looking for someone else.

Anyway, for me, the A14 numbers match up with my personal experience.

However, on my one trip to Hawaii on DL, my flight home from LIH went MX and I ended up flying me back home on UA.

RealHJ

So DOT handles all worldwide complaints? When did other countries cede their sovereignty to the US? DOT is an American institution and only has limited visibility into flight operations in the US, but hardly gives you a true global perspective, and thus may not be reflective of an airline's int'l flight performance, as there the complaints are more likely to be logged with the DOT equivalent in the country of departure.

No, it's a 006 ticket and ticketing ("international manual reissue" in most of these cases) is at DL (only DL, well and I think also KL/AF, can issue 006 ticket stock). Practically always the ticketing carrier (DL) has to ticket it or reticket it in case of irrops. DL can get the seats from other airlines, just then DL won't want to ticket it (as putting pax on another airline will cost it as per the agreement in place with them).

No other airline can touch or change a 006 ticket. It has to be done by DL (or KL/AF as DL agents, to be exact). Just like with any other airline: any changes are to be done by the ticketing carrier (DL for 006 tickets), as they have to validate the routing, settle any payments to other airlines, etc., etc. Only exception is same day irrops if the operating carrier flight is affected, then the operating carrier will accommodate pax on another flight for their segment, without having to have to go back to the ticketing carrier, the ticket remaining intact as it is (if other connecting flights operated by other airlines are affected, then the ticketing carrier will need to be involved, though).

Why do you think that other airlines can issue a 006 ticket and thus charge to DL for their flights without DL first agreeing to it? That makes no sense whatsoever and has been never so and is not so on any other airline. You must be confusing it with same day irrops on another airline (than the ticketing carrier) ticketed flight, that is the only exception when the ticketing carrier won't be involved for rerouting and the operating carrier will.

Only on the routes where it's the most direct and/or the best fare. I fly DL may be for 20% of my flying. 80% goes to other airlines. Fairly even mix between ST, *A and OW. I am mostly carrier agnostic. That also gives me a far broader and relatively more accurate perspective from others here, as many other posters here fly predominantly or only DL, and thus are not in a very good position to compare DL to others - having little or no first hand experience on that, and thus going only based on assumptions and hearsay.

SJC ORD LDR

That's fair. My experience has been that DL is better than my experience on UA (delays for incompetence, unhappy FAs), AR (not friendly and poorly organized), and my wife's on AA (3 nights in Chicago last year due to IROPS and difficulty getting rebooked due to a MX from AA to US).

Bonehead

This was my exact thought when I heard this news. This is very shortsighted on DL's part in my view.

longing4piedmont

http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/japan...pensation.html

An interesting thread on how well AA handles these types of matters and the quote is even better.......

"It has pretty much destroyed the plan I had to take my six figure miles yearly flying from a good part of it on SkyTeam (DL Diamond each year) to OneWorld (under the AA program here), as if this is how badly they treat their F/J customers, I don't even want to find out how badly they treat their top tier elites (probably even worse than DL, from the looks of it)"

And this is just one among many quotes by the poster......

As Randy used to say.....you are what you post.

MSPeconomist

My last IROPs experience was quite different. I had a DL international ticket, all DL flights, and had used a SWU to upgrade. I was placed on a partner flight in business class, with a domestic FC DL connecting flight. It was a very different routing and probably would have violated MPM constraints and therefore probably would have been an illegal routing. Once it was certain that I couldn't make my original longhaul flight, the new flights--on which I had originally been protected--were quickly ticketed automatically and the excellent SC agent was able to print all of my new boarding passes. Given that bad MX delays sometimes happen to good airlines, I was overall very satisfied by my DL rebooking experience.

sethb

So DL reissues an 006 ticket on AA, and AA cancels it. The passenger doesn't get to fly.

That's what happened often, according to another poster here who was involved.