Hmm, another late one to the party :) *waves*

Deaf, implant in one ear, and HA in the other. Fly mostly on British Airways.

Welcome!

I am deaf in my right ear, so I suppose I half count!
I am just starting out a course on ASL, I think it may be helpful to me in some situations. Of course unlike H.S Spanish, ASL will take YEARS to master!

You can sign ASL using one hand then. :D

Thanks for the laugh! I originally started learning some basic signs because my stepson is severely autistic and he was taught signs ( what great parents to do this!) but I was confused what he was asking me,so I started googling sign language and found he was asking where his dad was (he was at work) and was asking for candy.
Then I got to thinking, eventually I will lose more of my hearing to age, being half deaf now I don't want it to leave me with minimal communications options. I decided to start at least learning the basics.

For now, I can tell you where to get candy...lol. Otherwise I am ASL illiterate, but learning.

I started losing my hearing at age 11. I didn't start learning ASL until 18. It took me about 6 years to really master it, although I did well enough with signed English much quicker than that.

I am not deaf myself, but I do actually have AA in ASL.
I often travel with my Deaf friends, whether it is via car, Train, or plane!!!

Newly Hearing Impaired
 

This year I have lost 90% of the hearing in my left ear (no specific diagnosis), the 10% that is left results in sound distortion.

If I am talking one on one with someone in a quiet place I have no problem. Noisy places mean my brain becomes overwhelmed with the mix of normal and abnormal sounds and the result is a muffled mess. Not knowing where sound is coming from has required some adjustment, like standing in front of a bank of elevators, I hear the ping, but have no idea if the arriving elevator is to my left or right.

I am a solo leisure traveler, usually fly Europe once or twice a year and somewhere in the US 2 or 3 times per year. Thanks to points and miles mostly in business class.

Some of the airlines I use allow free seat selection at ticket purchase time (United) and some do not (British Airways). I prefer to sit in an aisle seat with the good ear facing the crew. On a plane or in the airport I can no longer understand the announcements. But that probably only matters in an emergency.

On the disability scale I know I am way at the bottom but do people like me put this in their frequent flyer information? I hestitate to identify myself as deaf as I have some hearing. I have concerns that my name may be called out when travelling and I won't know.

Looking forward to the future it is possible that the right ear will suffer the same problem and I hope hearing aids will work for me. I also suffer from arthritis in my hands and would not be able to sign but I hope to take lip reading classes next year.

Since my hearing loss I have flown and all has gone smoothly.

Interested to hear about other peoples coping mechanisms.

I think you've answered your own question here. If you're concerned that you will not hear announcements, you should take advantage of whatever accommodations are available!

Welcome to FlyerTalk.

There's no disability scale. I would say something to the airline when booking, or when checking in, and in a profile if I had one, if I were you. If there is a need to know what's being announced then, if they know about you, they might come and tell you. They do not always do so, but it/s nice when they do.

It is in my profile with Air Canada and I add it to every itinerary (they have a field for "special needs" which uses a wheelchair pictogram, but when you select it, there are options to clarify if the disability is visual, auditory, mobility etc.)
Most of the time, the cabin crew check in to various degrees, ranging from "can you lipread?" (to which I say "if you thought there was a chance I could not, why would you not have come with that question in writing??") to a full-on personal seat-side performance of the flight safety briefing. And then there are flights like the last two, where nobody acknowledged it at all.
If they acknowledge it, I tell them I don't need to have them tell me announcements like the captain's name and the weather at the destination, but if there is anything important, come and give me a written note. The only time where that was relevant, they didn't, and I ended up with a 25% credit for compensation :o
I don't need to be treated like I am stupid and inexperienced about flying. How can you go up to a 50,000 mile/year passenger and ask "have you flown before?" And really, was there a need for the flight attendant to make me demonstrate the fastening and releasing of the seatbelt to prove to her that I knew how it worked? It was ON at the time!
As a deafened person, I understand the self-questioning about "am I deaf enough to label myself deaf?" and I agree with DeafFlyer and Katja: there's no entrance exam. Claim it and move on with it. State your needs as though it was your worst day, because you never know what conditions will be at the time they use the information. I have "normal" speech, and routinely, when I talk to airline personnel, I use a "deaf voice" otherwise they will not believe that I cannot hear as well as I speak. I need them to believe it is real, and I will put on whatever kind of show I need to convince them.
(By the way, I know lots of older deaf people with arthritis in their hands who sign, and have done all their lives, so just for what it's worth...)
Welcome to FT!

Thank you Katja, DeafFlyer, and flyquiet for your thoughtful responses. Especially
"Claim it and move on with it." . I will add a disability notification in my frequent flyer accounts and from now on I will tell the gate agent and crew that I will not hear any special announcements.
And I am looking into sign language classes..............
Many thanks

Good luck voyages99.
Off topic: I answered you while I was at ALDAcon, conference of the association of late-deafened adults. You might check into that association alda.org and see if there is any comfort to be gained from that network.

Everyone's different, with variable hearing loss, and how the brain/personality can deal with that.

I fly roughly once a month, mostly between UK/Australia and I rarely tell the airline at the booking stage that I'm deaf.

Occasionally, depending on my observations of the activities at the gate, I will let the gate agent know that I can't hear any special/important announcements or if I'm unfamiliar with an airline's procedures.

On board, I usually let the cabin crew know I'm deaf and would like to know the meal choices before we're airborne as it's a bit difficult hear once we're up in the air.

All in all, the less fuss, the better for me personally.

Wow that's very interesting...

Let the airlines know that you're deaf, they will give u priority tag, short-cut queue at x-ray check and immigration, preboarding - so that you can have lots of time to take photos of empty seats, have a chat with flight attendant - let them know who you are and will talk to ya about safety brief one to one, press button for helps and so on. After landing, short cut queue, ride a mobile car around the terminal and pick baggages quickly then off.

Most of time, airlines have forgotten to call airport staff to help deaf people.

Top airlines that help disabled people
1) Thai Airways/Singapore Airlines (both are tied - very attentive to the disabled passenger and helpful)
2) Emirates (Friendly cabin crews were very eager to help them but not ground staff at the airport -due to third parties)
3) Air New Zealand (know how to communicate with deaf pax - international only)
4) Air Canada/United (have done very good job to help them in domestic only but not international)
5) Qantas/Virgin Australia

I'm deaf here! Just joined the forum. This thread I will stay subscribed.

Welcome to Flyertalk!

Thank You!

Looking forward to all the help when I need it in the future.

Just wanted to check in as another Deaf FTer :)

I have no qualms about asking for accommodations to make the overall experience less stressful for me. I always ask for announcements to be written down at the gate and preboarding. I request preboarding because if they use a group boarding system, I have no idea when it's my turn and it can be stressful so it's easier for me just to go board when I see people entering (typically with first class or when the FA calls me over). I've tried to cut the line at security but I'm not often successful so I've stopped trying for most part. It's not something that I really need though.

When there's an option for deaf/hearing impaired when purchasing the ticket or in my FF profile, I select it. If there's just a general disabled/special assistance option, I don't check it because that typically means someone meeting me with a wheelchair.

I agree on United about being very accommodating and I recently flew ANA which was really nice to me and even gave me cute handwritten cards with relevant information about the flight and destination :)

Dear fellow Deaf FTers,

I'm embroiled in a squabble with an airline currently in which I identified as DEAF on my profile and also on my boarding pass, but they did not ensure I had information about a gate change because I did not ALSO go up to the desk and identify myself in person at the gate.

I'm intentionally not identifying the airline, because I am interested in this issue across airlines.

My airline does have a specific "special assistance" check box on the online ticket purchase dialogue that has a wheelchair icon but when you check it, additional options appear and one of those is deaf and hard-of-hearing. I always do this, and verify that my boarding pass has the word "deaf" printed on it.

To the best of my knowledge, based on a lot of flying with this airline, there is nothing that stipulates any additional responsibility for me to self-identify in any other manner.

Further, when I approach the gate agents, intending to self-identify, they invariably look annoyed because I am interrupting their Very Important Work, and greet (i.e., try to ignore) me like I am gate lice, the people who smother the staff looking for free upgrades and pre boarding.

When I manage to express the reason I am presenting myself, the gate agents have variously hissed at me that they will get to me when they get to me, looked at me like "what do you want me to do about it?", and told me to "sit down over there". Indeed, on one previous occasion, I did "sit down over there" after being barked at three times to do it as three other flights departed from a gate labelled with my destination and flight number. "We. Will. Get. You. Sit. Down!" They never did. I waited until the door was about to close, and boarded myself.

Often, particularly with delays, the gate personnel change, so the people that know I am deaf are long gone before boarding. Suppose I identify myself and that agent knows, do I have to repeat it every time there are staff changes? How do they communicate who I am and what I look like when handing off to another agent? In my opinion, I do not "look deaf", i.e., there is no distinctiveness to my appearance they can describe. To me, it defies logic that self-identifying at the gate helps anything. There is a deaf person on the manifest. You know what seat he or she will board into. If the plane begins to board and that passenger/seat is not boarding, it seems like it would be a simple task to look for an oblivious person who did not hear the announcement. Maybe write the surname on a sheet of paper and hold it up (like the limousine drivers do). It would even make sense to have a card to hold up that says "Preboarding passengers with disabilities" when there is a deaf passenger on the manifest.

I tend to approach the agents at the point where they begin to make announcements, and what I say is "this is me [point at word DEAF on BP]. You seem to be making announcements but I cannot hear you. I am on this flight and YOU need to make sure (a) I get on this flight, and (b) I do not get on any other flight."

On this occasion, the agents were working through various papers at the gate, talking to each other, and passengers were pestering them because there was a delay. Because of the past experiences, I figured I would identify once we had a revised departure time and prior to the need to pre board. I knew the aircraft was not there yet, because I was watching the inbound flight on Flightstats. I had no need for any special attention at that time. I have taken this flight maybe 5 times a year for several years and it was always the same gate. Well, I went to the washroom, and they were GONE. The gate was not shown on the app, and I received no notification from the airline of the gate change despite registering for updates. After a stomach-dropping few moments, I collected myself and figured out how to locate them and arrived home without further ado, but I thought they should apologize and commit to changes to their procedures, so I complained.

Airline is denying any wrongdoing because I failed to self-identify at the gate. They're going scorched earth to blame it on me to get out of agreeing they failed and need to fix the process. (They have already awarded me miles in compensation but have not agreed that their process was inadequate.) Their extreme effort to blame me seems nonsensical to me.

The airline conceded that it says "deaf passenger" on the manifest. Is it not reasonable they would err on the side of access and at least leave a post-it note saying "dear deaf passenger: we moved flight 123 to gate ABC" rather than assuming that on this occasion, I was travelling with my butler, or something?

I contend that I cannot "fail" to perform any action that I had no duty to perform, and they did not explicitly assign me any such duty.

As a deaf flyer, have you ever been told by the airline anything in writing at any material time that says "oh, in addition to all of that, also identify yourself at the gate"? If so, does it identify how, when, and to whom that self-identification is to be done?

I am directing this question to those who are deaf, not hard of hearing or who can hear overhead paging in the airport. I'm also not asking hearing people what you think we should do.

I am not asking for opinions on whether self-identifying would have helped or not. Possibly it would have helped, but I do suspect that if I had self-identified on arriving at the gate 90 minutes before the flight, and then they changed staff or forgot, they would still blame me for not re-self-identifying. I think they would just keep making up undisclosed things I "failed" to do, up to the point where I am supposed to read their mind and invent the idea of wearing a top hat with a neon sign blinking "deaf-deaf-deaf" and sitting on the floor beside their desk like a dog. (BTW all the "special services" seats near the desk were taken by people with no disabilities and they were permitting that to happen. I couldn't have sat in the designated "special services" chairs if I wanted to.)

I think in accusing me of "failing" to self-identify at the gate, they are relying on "common sense" and not an explicit duty, so I am asking whether you have ever been aware that an airline has explicitly given you the duty to self-identify in any manner other than in the passenger profile and ticket purchase.

Well, if you don't inform the GAs that you're deaf, how are they supposed to know who to tell about delays or any changes? Email or text isn't the best way to contact passengers because not everybody will be able to access their email or texts at the airport. Standing in the line at the gate can be a pain when the line is a mile long but I still do it anyway. I'd rather stand in line than wear some ridiculous name tag to identify me as deaf or god forbid, have airline staff escort me to the gate to tell the GA that I'm deaf.

And think about this - honey gets more flies than vinegar. When I approach the GA, I have a smile on my face and write out a really polite message like below. I do it early when I arrive at the gate before they're making any announcements if possible because by then, they'll be busy and more liable to forget about you in the chaos.

I still do this even if I've had a .... day and exhausted from flying because taking out your anger on the staff does you no good but if you're really nice to them, they'll make it easier for you. I always try to sit close to the gate so I can make eye contact when I see them making an announcement to go "what's going on?"

Just remember that putting DEAF on your boarding pass only really makes a difference once you're on the plane because they will know who you are by where you're sitting. They have no way of identifying you at the gate. I've only had a written message left for me at the gate once ever and it was about a seating thing

And, HoH people do have this problem too. From what I've heard from my friends, it's very hard for them to understand announcements at airports because there are multiple ones at the same time and they're not quite sure which ones belong to their flight. In a way, I think they have it worse than profoundly deaf people because I don't have anybody assuming that I'll be able to hear the announcements so they don't need to tell me what's going on.

emika, I understand that telling them makes it easier (certainly for them) and this is why I generally do the same. (Please don't assume that I am anything other than gracious to the airline crew.)

I am asking whether anyone is aware of the airline informing deaf passengers of the duty to do this. To me, the bottom line is that my "failure" to do it is only a failure if I had been given this duty prior to being expected to perform it.

At the gate, agreed that they may not know what I look like. (In this particular case, this is a regular flight I take and they always act like they recognize me. They have found me in the crowd on other occasions and even signed thank you, and that kind of thing. But let's say they don't know who I am.) Does the airline NEED to know what the deaf passenger looks like to fulfill the one thing they need to do, which is to ensure the deaf passenger boards the aircraft?

First, they don't know which person it is, but they know there is A deaf person awaiting this flight. Maybe the person is still in the lounge. Maybe the person is at the duty free. Maybe the person is held up in security queues. As a deaf person, MUST I "sit right over there" or am I not permitted to browse the shops and snack bars like anyone else? The flight has been delayed and no new time has been announced. I can't go for a walk to stretch my legs? In fact, as I mentioned, I was in the bathroom when they moved, and therefore they would not have been able to notify me based on recognizing me in the gate lounge. (That also gives you an idea how quickly they moved.) As they collect the passengers in a herd to move to the new gate, they could glance at the facial expressions for someone who looks possibly confused by what is going on, and ask to see the Boarding Pass to confirm who it is.

Even if they do not know what the deaf passenger looks like, I think they can keep in mind a deaf person is expected and take one last glance around before they close the flight, particularly if that is the name that has not checked in. And if they move gates, they can ensure that there is some type of visual informational message left at the gate.

The gate had a video monitor, but it was not used to display the new gate location. There was no new flight number posted. It was just a generic "welcome to City X" message. The new gate was only displayed on a Departures board that would not normally be passed again after arriving at the gate.
The airline has an app, but did not put the gate in the app.
The airline has my text number, but did not text me.
The airline has the text number of my Next of Kin at home and has used it previously for other cancellations and rebookings, but did not contact it.
The airport has free wifi and charging stations near the gate, so it has provided the telecommunication support to ensure passengers are able to use this technology.

Everyone may not have access to their email and texts, but my argument is that the airline has a duty to use ALL of the technologies available to them, and not to rely on ONE SINGLE method, consisting of "the passenger shall self-identify at the gate", and then NOT TELL THE PASSENGER of this expectation.

I agree with you that if I self-identify once I do arrive at the gate, I have the means to increase their ability to recognize me, but remember, I have no guarantee they will remember my appearance or pass that information along to the next agent when they swap positions.

Clearly, the airline has ASSUMED that we will all do this. I think that is as faulty an assumption as assuming people can hear as well as they speak. Like your HoH friends, I do speak, and aside from this gate-moving disruption, I very frequently have encounters where the airline personnel are cavalier about notifying me even though I have self-identified at the gate.

There are pitfalls to promptly notifying the person at the gate. I may go to a great deal of effort to notify someone who looks "airline-y" but is, in fact, the delivery person from duty free, or the wheelchair porter, or an aircraft groomer or baggage assistant. Because I don't know how they organize their work and deploy their personnel, it is not my duty to second-guess their procedures and improvise additional steps and processes that may or may not be effective.

So, both the passenger and the airline have things they can do to increase the chance of the deaf passenger boarding the correct flight. However, it seems to me the airline has a DUTY under the ADA and more knowledge of the procedures they will use to ensure they board all of the checked-in passengers, whereas the passenger only has the duties the airline gives to the passenger as part of the transaction to buy and sell the ticket. I have performed every duty they have asked, in regards to self-identifying, and my assumption must be, if they have not asked me for more, then they are confident that their systems are adequate in all other respects.

My question, again, is has anyone ever been explicitly told they have the duty to self-identify at the gate?

I seem to remember it, yes. I'm pretty sure the check-in agents have mentioned it to me before. "Just let them know when you get to the gate" if I was asking something about boarding or gates or something.

I've never been told that, but I do it anyway. I have learned to never assume that they know that I, a disabled pax, am coming, and that I need assistance. You take great care to inform everyone, and still they seem to be unaware. I don''t know why it happens, I just assume that they don't know.

As someone who flies 10,000 miles between UK/Australia each month, I have never been told to talk to the gate agents about my hearing.

I rarely self identify at the gate, however I tend to stick with airlines within oneWorld.

I rely on monitors displaying the flight information at the gates. I also usually ask in the lounge if there are any changes as information screens have been known to be incorrect.

However, if I am unfamiliar with an airline, I usually identify myself at the gates, though mainly for the boarding procedures can flummox me due to verbal instructions.

Thanks all. I agree with touching base with the gate and staying tuned in on the monitors as self-defence, particularly the less familiar I am with the location/airline. I object to the airline assuming that if some people do that some time, it's all on each of us every time. Would be informative to continue to share good and not-so-good airline communication achievements here as the experiences come along.

I agree it would be a good idea, but I imagine individual experiences will vary hugely even within the same airline - the old YMMV will apply.

Fortunately in over half a decade years of flying for work, most irrops were dealt with on a one-to-one basis, usually as my flying patterns can be unusual enough to not end up in a crowd of affected passengers waiting for instructions/compensation/accommodation/rebooking/whatever. That said, I'm still waiting for the irrop from hell that some FlyerTalkers talk about.

Unfortunately that means I have nothing much worthwhile to say about any particular airlines that may benefit others in this thread.

American Airlines calls passengers "deaf and dumb"
 

ABC News item at this link:

http://abcnews.go.com/blogs/headline...and-dumb-note/

I'm not d/Deaf, but FWIW I have friends who are, and I have a disorder that causes episodic mutism, so I rely on ASL (or, with the signing impaired, writing) pretty frequently to communicate.

I've also done some ASL music & poetry interpretation videos on YouTube. :)

On the mutism vs airlines & TSA sides of things:
http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/check...sa-vs-ada.html
http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/pract...it-vs-tsa.html
http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/pract...screening.html

No, that's really not it. An employee of AA's contract baggage handler at IAH / Houston Bush International wrote ("“Please text, deaf and dumb”) a note on the couple's baggage, presumably in an attempt to be helpful and assure a text was sent instead of a telephone call made. Unfortunately, the company seems not to provide much in the way of customer service training or customer awareness as relates to disabilities.


(There's a smaller file, but it shows one of the people involved and I'd rather respect their privacy - even though they brought the issue to the media's attention.)

AA wrote back that they would investigate the situation and that they would alert their team at IAH.

Neither Mr. James Moehler nor his mother were satisfied, and said they want more, “To me, it’s not enough. They have not satisfied me, nor have they, to my knowledge, satisfied my son either,” Mrs. Moehle said. “So far their messages have been dismissive. I want to hear something like ‘we take this seriously, we are investigating, and we will get back to you.”

I'm not an airline apologist, and believe they have written their own ticket. But in my longtime experience, AA has (at least in recent decades, once they stopped fighting the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and other more recent Federal laws), been genuinely concerned about people with disabilities and of different groups who have been excluded.

Doesn't mean it has trickled down to every single employee, and we're all subject to stereotypes, but unfortunately some of the contracted baggage handling services have become notorious for surly service, and worse. (Like the recent exposure of Menzies' baggage employees at LAX, where a subset of those baggage handlers were pilfering and stealing whilst processing passengers' baggage behind the scenes).

For my deaf and hearing impaired friends with smartphones, I find some smartphone apps helpful:

FlightBoard (free) displays the flight display board with all flights, gates, displays etc. at nearly any airport you can name, and you can "shake and bake", er, sort, on any order from time to airline, flight number, gate number, etc. How convenient I never have to go search for the display - or if the nearest one has "gone south" and is no longer with us.

TripIt (free) - but I personally pay for and use the TripIt Pro version. It basically aggregates your travel details so you have one file you can look at with your times, flights, hotels, car rentals, everything, with numbers, details, etc.

How do you get all that in there? When your e-ticket, car rental, hotel, restaurant or event booking, etc. arrives in your e-mail, forward it to your TripIt account by e-mail and it seamlessly "assimilates" your information into the trip file for that specific trip. I can manually add stuff like appointments or edit any file. Awesome!

TripIt Pro adds details - including suggestions for which are the best seats, and if your flight cancels, alternate flights on your or all airlines, including detail about how many seats in each class are available. I can't tell you how helpful it is when I can point out to an agent "Flight xyz has three seats available; can you put me on that?"

But wait, there's more. Gate changes, cancellations, etc. get e-mailed to me. My phone is usually set on "vibrate" so I have a non-audible alert to look at and check what's going on - the usual is a cancellation, delay or gate change. I often know before my fellow passengers, and even the gate agent. Awesomer! ;)

FlightStats: this has a free and "upgrade" version as well, and it can interface with your TripIt! I can see the flight stats for my flights, as well as weather and cancellation information for different airports, etc. I can actually see the TripIt flights (or any other I choose to enter) and get some information I can use - including airport weather and delay information.

FlightTracker: It's not necessary, but for the geekier among us, I can also use it to track the incoming flight that will be my departure. Sometimes I've had information far in advance of the gate agent.

WhatsApp is a good one for sharing texts, photos, even audio files, with others who have WhatsApp, without using your phones data plan. You can aggregate contacts - so I have friend and family groupings I can text simultaneously. It costs - $1.00 per year, unlimited text etc. No idea how they can do this, but I love it.

World Clock is indispensable if you travel or have people elsewhere.

xe currency calculator is great if you travel to different countries as well. On the fly currency calculations and the current market rate, you can vary amounts and currencies, even dig down for obscure currencies if you are heading to some little travelled destination. Free.

OK, I like miles, too! So...

Rewards Network operates several dining rewards programs. As an AA flyer, I use AAdvantage Dining. I can register credit cards, look up which restaurants in my vicinity (or where I am going), eat and earn miles seamlessly. If I register, 3 miles per dollar spent (including tip and taxes) and never have to tell anyone anything - ten days later, I've got miles (or hotel points, or whatever).

OpenTable: OK, the bad news is - no miles or points, just money! You can book a restaurant on OpenTable - and earn 100 to 1,000 points for dining. The big flaw here is they want two or more people. :p But, I'm usually with someone, so... when you earn 2,000 points, 5,000 points or 10,000 points, you claim your benefit: a cheque that works exactly as a Traveler's Cheque, worth $20, $50 or $100 shows up ~ten days later, and you spend it at any Open Table restaurant. (I notice the food always tastes a little better when I can use one of those cheques... :D)

If you don't travel frequently, the free apps are probably more than sufficient. If you do - TripIt Pro is my go to app, and FlightBoard, being free, is great for someone who may fly once a year even. If you are a road worrier, er, warrior, you know all about all of these - and may use something better.

No, I'm not traditionally hearing impaired - I have the opposite problem, hyperacusis. Even at seventy I can hear stuff others can't and sometimes normal sounds are sufficient to physically hurt; when I was younger I could hear "supersonic" dog whistles (always though people were lying when I was a kid) and "supersonic" intrusion alarms, etc. Well, that kind of brings us together, because you may spot me wearing ear plugs or "spuds" of beeswax in my ears whilst I am traveling - meaning I may not hear the garbled announcements, etc. so I use my apps more than most "normal" hearing people might. Some days are better than others, some sounds most people shrug off are literally intolerable. All part of the spectrum, I guess, we are all on.

Safe travels!

From the British Airways forums, this frequent flyer who practically lives on airplanes had this to say about boarding screens in context of Terminal 5 at London Heathrow and the US. Since most of you are in the US (I think), it might be useful information to know about boarding screens.

I have quoted with his permission. slightly edited.

Do other deaf flyers ever get the sense that people think you need help and advice with basic things just because you're deaf? I get offered a lot of "helpful advice" (including here on FT) on account of being deaf that is really, really basic. (Including, literally, a seat-belt fastening tutorial on board the flight where I crossed 50K that year.) I don't fly as much as some of the real road warriors here, but I fly internationally all over the world on business multiple times a year, routinely take public transit in strange places, and a good portion of my work is in connection with tourism. Hearing people are always asking me for travel tips. My problem is not that I can't find a way around. My problem is that the barrier should not be there. I will continue to be resilient and find my way to where I need to be, but I'll be damned if I am going to accept that it's my duty to accommodate the barrier. Unfortunately, some people hear that as a "cry for help" and then we have that awkward moment when I am not as grateful as they would like me to be. Just me?

Yes, I have noticed that on occasion. I don't fly often enough any more, so it's been quite a while. As for Flyertalk, there is the occasional poster who does that, but most treat me just like anyone else.

Not particularly. I tend not to advertise it unless it really becomes an issue. Haven't had an issue on here, I mostly reside in the BA forums where folks seems to be reasonably intelligent.

Most of that awkward moments have been confined to mostly Asian airlines who go way OTT in my early days of travels when I was figuring out out different airlines worked. I may have not looked or acted entirely grateful, perhaps smiling through gritted teeth.

There was a slightly awkward moment a couple days ago when a purser who had recognised me from a flight the previous month, did an awkward hug on realising I am deaf. Not sure what to make of it, I was a bit like that straight-laced lady P L Travers in Saving Mr Banks (which I was watching at the time on the IFE).

Seat-belt fastening tutorial? :rolleyes:

No kidding. And the seat belt was already fastened at the time!

I've also been offered the Braille safety card.

One time I was traveling with a group of other deaf people and the FA decided to mime the safety announcement with some made-up sign language and made us all pay attention. As soon she was done and far away enough to not hear us, we cracked up just because it was so ridiculous.

Most of the time I just smile and nod but one time on ANA, they told me that they had arranged for a person to meet me at the gate to escort me through security and customs at my home airport. I showed them my thick passport with the 48-page inset and loads of stamps but was told that it would hurt the GA's feelings if I didn't use the service and because they were so nice, I obligated. It was just a pretty awkward experience all around and they didn't even get me into the expedited line at customs so I had to wait in the line with an escort following me around pushing a baggage cart with my carry on luggage. Definitely not going to do that again at my home airport and I'll just apologize profusely onboard because I just want to get home ASAP, dammit.

If I end up flying enough in a year to get status lofty enough to be printed on my boarding pass, I'm just going to show that to people who try to "help" me and hope they get the hint and leave me be.

In my experiences, having a top-tier status does not stop those insisting that you need help. In fact, in some cases, it increases the attention given to you because not only you are a 'disabled' traveller, but an important one.

Yeah, the flight where I passed 50,000 miles one year was the time they gave me the personal tutorial about operating the seat belt buckle, complete with mandatory demonstration that I could do it.

Hearing but know ASL
 

I'm hearing but know ASL and have many deaf friends I've hung out with for 10 years. Not a very exciting post to be sure but just sayin.

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