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Tuesday, January 24th 2012
4:22 AM
Airline Consumer Protection Rules Finally Start This Week
- Requested Travel Info
The U.S. Department of Transportation (DOT) said starting this week airlines and anyone who sells airline tickets, including travel agents, must now include all mandatory taxes and fees in published airfares and disclose baggage fees to consumers buying tickets.
In addition, all airline tickets are now essentially refundable for 24 hours after consumer book them, unless the flight is departing in less than a week. Passengers can either hold a reservation without payment or cancel a booking without penalty for 24 hours after the reservation is made if they make the reservation one week or more prior to a flight’s departure date.
Other new rules taking effect this week include:
Airlines must notify passengers of flight delays of over 30 minutes, as well as flight cancellations and diversions.
Airlines will also be prohibited from increasing the price of passengers’ ticket after it is bought.
The new rules are also supposed to make it easier for passengers to determine the full price they will have to pay for air transportation prior to travel. Currently, airlines and ticket agents are allowed to publish ads that list government-imposed taxes and fees separately from the advertised fare, as long as these taxes and fees are assessed on a per-passenger basis. However, sometimes the notice of these taxes and fees is not obvious to consumers. This means airlines and travel agencies have to post fares as - for example, $250 including $50 of taxes and fees as opposed to $250 plus $50 in taxes and fees. This starts Thursday - all others start today.
In addition, airlines and ticket agents will be required to disclose baggage fees to consumers when they book a flight online. The first screen containing a fare quotation for a specific itinerary must show if there will be additional baggage fees, and inform consumers where they can go to see these fees.
Information on baggage fees also must be included on all e-ticket confirmations, and for most trips the same baggage allowances and fees must apply throughout a passenger’s journey.
Source: TravelPulse