aa csm

in my opinion, DL did what they were required to do. I personally don't feel that DL had any other legal responsabilty the the children thatn to put them up for the night and book them on the next flight. Yes, the DL agent should have noticed that they were minors, but by refusing to pay the fee for the UM service, the father effectively told all DL agents looking in the record that his son was old enough to look after himself and his sister. Should DL have started treating the boy and his sister as UM's in SLC, it could never hurt to have some extra supervision for children traveling alone, but if a DL employee had forced the children in the airport under direct supervision of an employee someone wolud probaly be claiming that DL kidnapped their kids.

Traveller

Agree 100%.




What is wrong with this stepfather? Has he never flown? He has no common sense. Even in a perfect world, I would not send 2 children from Alabama to Alaska on such a late evening flight with a 28 minute connection. Stupid father and TA.




OT, but the original article said the flight was late due to weather (high winds). Why did DL give hotel rooms to the passengers? I'm glad they did, but why in this situation? Because of the aborted takeoff?

N830MH

That is not enough short connecting flight in SLC. I think they need arrived in SLC least 1 hour before next flight to FAI. It was DL fault what they did for unaccompanied minors was leftover in SLC. It was misconnect flight from SLC. It would be no more layover short for least 30 minutes before he & she next connecting flight to FAI. Do you think DL will gave his entire parents apology for what they did took onto entire flight from ATL was delayed due to headwinds. It was incredible what they did took onto tour around the cities. They took these 2 kids to the SLC airport next flight to FAI. I'm sure DL will understanding need give them chance more earlier flights from ATL whose came from Alabama.

oldtirednbusy

Huh? Delta should apoligize for the TRAVEL AGENT making the reservations and the TRAVEL AGENT and FATHER lying about the boy's age?
WHY?

N830MH

Yeah, because kid's father wasn't doing very well. HE wasn't give a reservations for his kids trip to FAI. He doesn't know what is kid's age. He doesn't understand at all. I don't concerned with his father wasn't lying to DL or Travel Agent.

AdamS

Wow! This must happen very rarely. What position with DL would the employees be (FA, TA, etc). Are employees on call to handle this situation?

J-M

I would certainly hope he knows his kid's ages. It was HIS fault because HE chose to lie to the airline. How do you expect a GA or a hotel clerk to know the difference between 15 and 18 when the guy shows up with a credit card?

N830MH

Because DL was brought hotel voucher for their kids are stay there for 1 night. I don't know what is situations about credit cards either.

grahampros

I have to agree with those who put this on the parents. What adult in their right mind would put uc minors on this itn, regardless of the what TA said? ( and I'm not letting the TA off the hook here either). To save a few bucks? Though I'm not sure this was this case if the report of $2000 in airfare was true.

Given the state of the airtravel in the US this days, I don't think I'd put a UC on any connecting itn, unless I had relatives or friends in the connecting city that were advised well in advance the children were comming through and were on stand by should something happen.

And the parents should have been in close contact with DL (either watching the flight progress on the internet or checking in with the call center) to moinitor what was going on and make back up plans accordingly. There are too many tools to monitor flights these days for either parent to claim cluelessness of the situation here. They weren't paying attention, under the asumption all was well.

It's also unclear from the story if the boy had a cell phone (some parts of the story suggest yes, other dont'). What prevted the boy or the parents from staying in conntact during the ordeal?

sushibear

What a mess! Thankfully the kids are fine.

I had to chuckle a little at this part of your post. It wouldn't have phased me in the least either at fifteen, but when I look back now at some of the things I did at that age, I scare myself half to death. I can remember thinking I had the meanest dad in the world because he wouldn't allow me to make a train trip that would have involved a connection with a three hour layover at the New Orleans train station. I was probably fifteen at the time and considered myself quite sophisticated.

icydog

Although the parents and the TA are very good targets in this situatation, I believe DL should take a lot of the blame. Maybe this will be sound a wake up call for them, and for other airlines as well, that while at work they must turn on their thought machines, aka brains. Doing work like this by rote can come back to haunt you, as in this case of two minors sent to a hotel by themselves. While at the hotel they seemingly were left to fend for themselves for close to 24 hours. Sometime during the night, after Delta notified the hotel of their error, Delta shifted their responsibiltiy to the hotel's management, rather than assume the care of those children themselves. The hotel's answer was to lock the kids in their room until flight time, but they were still left completely unattended. What would have happened if one of them was sick? Whose problem would that be? Could the hotel or DL assume a 15 year old was responsible enough to care for himself and his little sister. It was not their call, DL's and the hotel's, to shift responsibility to each other. Thank goodness someone had the sense to ask for help from the police.

GeorgeBurdell

I disagree with eyeing the kids. My son is 14. He could easily pass for 18 or older. We recently had an incident where a waitress offered to bring my son a wine glass when my wife and I ordered a bottle at dinner. The waitress was very embarassed when I told her to card my son. My son also is very well traveled and could easily make decisions about hotel vouchers, etc. He has been through that process with me and knows how it works.

I do agree that, at a minimum, Delta should have sent someone to the hotel to check on the kids. The airport is only about 15 minutes away from the Radisson in SLC. They should also have arranged for an escort or security person to stay in the hotel to keep an eye on the children.

The travel agent is really the at fault party in this case. They should have advised the father to pay the unaccompanied minor charge for the daughter, just to be safe.

oldtirednbusy

The son wasn't even 15 he was 12, but from his pic he could pass for at least 15 possibly 18.
Parents are mainly to blame along with an unethical travel agent who apparently encouraged the father to lie about the son's age.
The hotel vouchers weren't even owed on a weather delayed flight.
The boy must have had a cell phone as the article indicates he talked to his mom from Atlanta and told her the flight was very late.
Why didn't she get on the phone to Delta and STAY on the phone until she was sure her children would have been taken care of?

cup.of.jo

I'm amazed that when the son called his mother from the plane & told her, "We are OK, but we'll be late" that she didn't realize their connection was at risk (& with that, the potential of spending night in SLC) when she had prior knowledge that there was only a 28-minute window!

It isn't mentioned in the article, but I wonder if the parents were tracking the flight progress. Regardless of whether they have internet access, even Flight-Line does a decent job of helping you track the status of a flight -- even calling Delta CS directly when Flight-Line doesn't cooperate (may be ATL based, but it doesn't understand my good-ole Southern drawl ). Plenty of times I've checked delta.com/Flight-line while in the airport or on the plane to verify the status of current or connecting flights for myself or loved ones and plan accordingly.

I've given up judging ages. Recently, I couldn't guess if the "younger generation" staying at my hotel (with their parents) during a college orientation weekend were high school sophomores-seniors checking out the area colleges or soon to be college freshmen.

tkey75

But that is a service you pay for - in advance - in case of such an event. I'm not saying Delta shouldn't have done it, but do they then hold the children at their final destination for the parents to pick up and present them with a bill at the same time? It seems to me they'd be well within their right to do so.