Time for air travelers to demand a bill of rights

Greg Bean
Coda

My stepfather has some strong opinions, but he's a good Republican and hardly the type you'd accuse of being a rabble-rouser.

Last time I saw him, though, he was ready to lead a national revolution, and his target was the United States airline industry, which he considers the most arrogant, most poorly managed, most consumer-hating business on the planet.

He's a frequent flyer and he's encountered most airline passenger nightmares over the years. But a recent trip - which sounded suspiciously like a visit to the Ninth Circle of Hell described in Dante's "Inferno" - had simply pushed him over the edge.

First, he'd been bumped from a flight he'd reserved months in advance because the airline had oversold the flight, a maddening tactic that threatened the whole chain of complicated connections he'd arranged. Second, when he finally got on a later flight, he sat on the runway for three hours without even being offered a bottle of water. Third, they didn't feed him on the flight (he's not crazy about peanuts). Fourth, the flight was late arriving at its destination. Fifth, because of the change in planes, the airline lost his luggage. Sixth, when he finally found someone to track his luggage, he found it had been sent to another airport clear across the country. Seventh, they didn't return his luggage for almost 10 days, and when it finally arrived, someone had pawed through it and stolen some personal items. Eighth, when he demanded to be compensated for his inconvenience beyond what the airline had offered (a pittance, he said), he was basically told, after about a dozen phone calls, to shut the heck up.

We heard this story in his Phoenix living room, where our family had gathered for a celebration, and as he stood there, breathing fire like an old-time tent preacher, most of us were nodding our heads in agreement.

Several of us, as it happened, had suffered similar helliferocious indignities attempting to reach that very celebration. The airline had tried to bump my wife and me from our flight out of Newark, for example, but finally relented after some histrionics of which I'm not particularly proud (we threw a hissy fit at the check-in desk). Several of our company were waiting for missing luggage, which contained their wedding togs. One couple had arrived an entire day late after having to spend the night at a motel in Utah, a stay the airline did not pay for. One relative was still missing in action.

"It's time for Congress to pass a Passengers' Bill of Rights!" he thundered, to general huzzahs and toasts of various ice-cold beverages made from barley and hops. "And I'm gonna start twisting arms to get it done."

For months afterward, I smiled when I thought about him fanning the flames of revolt among the senior citizens in his retirement community, imagined him at the head of a blue-haired, chino- and sun-dress-wearing rabble waving torches and pitchforks as they descend upon the corporate offices of United and Continental Airlines.

So far that hasn't happened, but after a summer of news reports about impressive profits in the airline industry, at the same time passengers are suffering a record numbers of delays, cancellations, bumpings and other outrages, I have to say that reckoning is overdue. Fact is, we've allowed a situation where airlines are being rewarded for bad behavior to flourish, and if our lawmakers don't do something soon, we might as well just pull down the shades and stay home forever, because it will only get worse.

Thankfully, a number of groups and organizations are attempting to have a Passengers' Bill of Rights introduced and passed even as we speak. You can find them easily online, and several even have petition forms you can sign.

One organization, the Coalition for an Airline Passengers' Bill of Rights, called on Congress last month to stop the rhetoric and get down to business. You can read what this group is all about at http://strandedpassengers.blogspot.com, and there's a link on that site that will take you directly to the group's petition.

On another site, called The Travel Insider, you'll find a draft bill of rights that makes sense and would protect the rights of airline travelers. I'd put the Web address here, but it's too long. You can find it easily by typing The Travel Insider into a search engine. Among the things the bill would ensure are:

• The right to compensation if your flight is delayed for anything except extreme weather.

• The right to compensation if you are denied boarding while holding a confirmed reservation (bumping).

• The right to compensation if your luggage is delayed, lost or damaged.

• The right not to be trapped on a plane. The bill provides compensation to travelers who face lengthy, preventable delays after boarding or landing, according to how long they are trapped.

• The right to assign a ticket to someone else and pay a fee of 10 percent of the published fare or $25, whichever is greater.

• The right to a comfortable temperature.

• The right to clearly understand the cost of a ticket.

• The right to travel in the class you book.

• The right to speedy compensation.

• The right to have disputes heard in the local jurisdiction.

• The right to fly or not fly without incurring extra costs.

• The right to have these rights prominently displayed by the airline and available to all travelers.

If you're a frequent or even occasional traveler, I'd strongly suggest you visit one of these sites and spend some time reading the material. As you read, it's my bet you'll agree the elements of the bill are just common sense. And if you agree, you might want to sign one of the petitions and send it in.

If enough of us do that, it will eventually shame our representatives in Congress into legislating these basic consumer rights, and force the perfidious rogues at the airlines to treat us the way they should have been treating us all along. It might also keep my stepfather from having to lead that trouble-making, blue-haired rabble into the breach.

Gregory Bean is executive editor of Greater Media Newspapers. You can reach him at gbean@gmnews.com.