{"id":767,"date":"2017-06-30T17:00:16","date_gmt":"2017-06-30T15:00:16","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.aviationadvocacy.aero\/blog\/?p=767"},"modified":"2018-02-02T12:31:17","modified_gmt":"2018-02-02T10:31:17","slug":"deplaning-airlines-reputations","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.aviationadvocacy.aero\/blog\/?p=767","title":{"rendered":"Deplaning Airlines’ Reputations"},"content":{"rendered":"We have all seen the footage of Dr David Dao, bloodied by United\u2019s out-sourced thugs, forcibly removed from a flight.\u00a0 In one of their many attempts to divert blame, United made clear that the thugs were not their thugs they were airport security thugs, so that is OK.\u00a0 Think about that.\u00a0 United Airlines did not vet the men it let on-board to forcibly remove a passenger.\u00a0 United\u2019s CEO Oscar Munoz made his apologies \u2013 four of them, over 48 hours \u2013 until he eventually got it right.\u00a0 Practice makes perfect, which is just as well, as United seems to be a customer-service-apology-generating machine.\u00a0 Off-loaded children; dead rabbits: the hits keep coming.\r\n\r\nOne might think that other airlines could go to school on United\u2019s travails, but instead, they adopted a \u2018but-for-the-grace-of-God\u2019 position.\u00a0 In retrospect, that was very wise.\u00a0 Delta got in on the let\u2019s-make-passengers-hate-the-industry game by deplaning a 2-year old child<\/a>.\u00a0 The parents were threatened with federal offences and gaol time by a Delta agent if they didn\u2019t remove a child seat and place the child on their laps.\u00a0 The father, having paid for the seat, refused.\u00a0 FAA policy recommends the use of a child seat as a safer way to transport children.\r\n\r\nAirlines are complex businesses.\u00a0 We know this because the airlines tell us, all the time.\u00a0 Both capital and labour intensive, high cost, at the mercy of the oil price, narrow margins and do not start on the regulatory problems.\u00a0 Taxes!\u00a0 Enough said.\u00a0 Booking aggregators and low cost carriers have commoditised the seat.\u00a0 Safety and security require special attention, which is largely unfunded by unappreciative regulators, for an industry that also serves as essential transport infrastructure.\r\n\r\nPassengers buy every bit of it.\u00a0 They are willing to show up two hours early for a one hour flight.\u00a0 They endure long queues just to have their bags searched and bodies scanned \u2013 a presumption of criminal behaviour without reasonable suspicion, or demonstrable effect.\u00a0 Every now and then a smooth talking pilot pops up in the press<\/a> to tell them that there was no such thing as the good old days, so suck it up.\u00a0 A message delivered in those reassuring tones pilots use, to help make the medicine go down.\r\n\r\nIn short, the airlines have won.\u00a0 Passengers accept that aviation is a complex industry.\u00a0 Airlines deliver safety.\u00a0 As to comfort, they have cut all corners, immiserating the experience in the name of profit.\u00a0 All other passengers have knowingly exchanged comfort for a cheap seat.\u00a0 Dr Dao knew that too, but nevertheless he still did not get what he paid for.\r\n\r\nThe end of May saw two fascinating examples of the decisions the airlines have made to increase their profit.\u00a0 BA determined to cut costs, suffered three days of chaos and demotivated staff at non-functioning airports. \u00a0Against the flow, Ryanair, a very profitable airline, on the other hand announced increased profits at the end of May on the back of what its CEO Michael O\u2019Leary noted was \u2018improving our customer experience\u2019.\r\n\r\nThe airlines, remarkably, do not seem to appreciate that liberties taken by their staff, deplaning by force, shockingly rude passenger interactions and so on are now recorded on smartphones and broadcast over the internet.\u00a0 They are viewed over and over, like a slow-motion train crash; industry self-destruction porn. \u00a0Politicians too cannot look away.\r\n\r\nIn the US House of Representatives, a body of regulators never slow to seize upon potential vote winners, at least four bills have been introduced to address the involuntary deplaning of passengers.\u00a0 Gratifyingly, these proposals tick both the boxes for perfect pieces of grandstanding legislation: over-lengthy names and silly acronyms.\r\n\r\nThe BOARD Fairly Act<\/a> \u2013 \u2018Bumping on Overbooked Airplanes Requires Dealing Fairly Act\u2019 \u2013 aims to prohibit airlines from refusing to carry passengers who hold confirmed reservations \u2013 not merely passengers who have been issued a boarding pass.\u00a0 Similarly, the Hands Off Passengers Act<\/a> aims to prohibit the involuntary deplaning or denial of boarding of any passenger holding a confirmed, reserved seat on an oversold flight, if the purpose of the deplaning or denied boarding is to accommodate a member of the air carrier\u2019s flight crew or staff.\r\n\r\nThe SEAT Act<\/a> of 2017 \u2013 \u2018Secure Equity in Airline Transportation Act of 2017\u2019 \u2013 unlike its title, is a bit more precise.\u00a0 Normally, priority rules are used for determining which passenger is denied boarding on an over booked flight.\u00a0 The SEAT Act aims to prevent the application of those rules to passengers who have already boarded an aircraft.\u00a0 In the same vein, the SAFE SEAT Act<\/a> \u2013 \u2018Saving All Flyers from Ejection and Securing Everyone\u2019s Access to Travel\u2019 \u2013 seeks to ensure that air carriers \u2018resolve all issues relating to overbooking of a flight prior to beginning boarding for that flight.\u2019\u00a0 It tests the imagination to ponder that air carriers must be told this.\u00a0 But the SAFE SEAT Act goes further.\u00a0 It aims to prohibit the use of force against passengers unless necessary for safety and security reasons.\u00a0 Airlines need to be told that they cannot use force against passengers without good cause?\r\n\r\nThe US Senate has got in on the act too.\u00a0 After all, even US Senators have constituents.\u00a0 The TICKETS Act<\/a> \u2013 \u2018Transparency Improvements and Compensation to Keep Every Ticketholder Safe\u2019 Act of 2017 \u2013 is more comprehensive than its House counterparts.\u00a0 It states that a passenger cannot be deplaned without his or her consent unless there is a security or safety risk.\u00a0 It also suggests a cap on over booking.\r\n\r\nThe Canadian government too, is getting in on the legislative action.\u00a0 In May, the Federal Ministry of Transportation introduced a Passenger Bill of Rights<\/a> that proposes, amongst other things, to prohibit denial of boarding and deplaning.\u00a0 Airlines should feel lucky that it has not gone so far as to prohibit overbooking. \u00a0In the meantime, in Europe, the Commission presses on with their intention to reform Reg 261, whilst the European Court of Justice performs judicial gymnastics to twist the language of the regulation as broadly as humanly possible, if not beyond, to ensure that no passenger claim is excluded by the antediluvian, ossified regulatory framework the industry continues to support as a tenet of faith.\u00a0 Over and above 261 reform MEPs are circling the wagons.\r\n\r\nIt has come to this.\u00a0 This is madness, but it is the madness of the airlines that needs examination.\u00a0 The airlines\u2019 are motivating lawmakers around the world to act to prohibit over booking and other perfectly rational economic behaviour because they see perfectly rational political yardage in doing so.\u00a0 That this is against the interests of the airlines goes without saying, but does beg an explanation as to why the airlines let it get to this point?\u00a0 The proposed rules do not legislate seat pitch, or sandwich thickness, or the ratio of cashews to peanuts in first class, but they do seek some small measure of human dignity. \u00a0Maybe they should chat to Michael O\u2019Leary.","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

We have all seen the footage of Dr David Dao, bloodied by United\u2019s out-sourced thugs, forcibly removed from a flight.\u00a0 In one of their many attempts to divert blame, United made clear that the thugs were not their thugs they were airport security thugs, so that is OK.\u00a0 Think about that.\u00a0 United Airlines did not […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-767","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.aviationadvocacy.aero\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/767","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.aviationadvocacy.aero\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.aviationadvocacy.aero\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.aviationadvocacy.aero\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.aviationadvocacy.aero\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=767"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.aviationadvocacy.aero\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/767\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":768,"href":"https:\/\/www.aviationadvocacy.aero\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/767\/revisions\/768"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.aviationadvocacy.aero\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=767"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.aviationadvocacy.aero\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=767"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.aviationadvocacy.aero\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=767"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}