Delter debacle

ahsmatt7 said:
I wasn't necessarily talking about that specific issue. However, it would still be much easier to show the logic behind what a customer pays for.

Example...

Gate agent: "Sir you can't use this seat for your child. Your child is a lap child.

Passenger: "But I paid for 4 seats and I want to put my child in this seat now because my other son is not on this flight."

Gate agent: "No sir, you didn't, you originally paid for 4 spots on this flight and one of those spots is now on another flight, therefore you gave up your other spot in THIS flight. Also, one spot That you reserved on THIS flight is considered a lap child and they won't be using a physical seat on the airplane. That being said, you don't have rights to this particular seat."

Passenger: " but I paid for 4 tickets, therefore I get 4 seats!!!!!"

Gate agent: " Sir, I am so sorry but you aren't understanding what you actually paid for. See, you only pay for a spot on the aircraft manifest, as well as a specific right to use our service to take you between two specific cities. We fulfilled our service to your son by getting him to the city you asked us to get him to. Once this happened, there is now no longer 4 spots available for you to use on THIS fight's manifest. Just 3. Because you only have 3 spots left to use on THIS flight and because your youngest child is considered a lap child, you are actually only entitled to use 2 seats on this airplane because there are truly only 2 spots on the manifest requiring a seat under your itenirary."

Passenger: " I'm never flying Delta again because they don't let me get what I want even though I have no ground to what I actually want!!!!!"

I think it's much easier to explain because now a days, people are so emotionally tied to a specific seat because it's "their" seat assignment. If the label of a seat assignment was taken off, then they would hopefully be able to see that that they literally didn't purchase a right to reserve "that" particualr seat on "that" airplane and use kt how they wish.



Sent from my SM-G955U using Tapatalk
Click to expand...

Just asking, because I've never dealt with booking a small child - if the passenger paid money for a seat for the child who turned out to be a lap child and by rules can't use the seat, does the passenger get a refund? Or does our industry always charge by "name on manifest" even though not all would get a seat? Seems odd to me. I thought tiny lap children were free if you actually kept them on your lap.
 
Beefy McGee said:
Just asking, because I've never dealt with booking a small child - if the passenger paid money for a seat for the child who turned out to be a lap child and by rules can't use the seat, does the passenger get a refund? Or does our industry always charge by "name on manifest" even though not all would get a seat? Seems odd to me. I thought tiny lap children were free if you actually kept them on your lap.
Click to expand...

Kind of what I was wondering; if one pays for a seat that's later determined they can't use, is that portion of the ticket cost refunded and then the seat taken back by the airline for its use?
 
MikeD said:
Kind of what I was wondering; if one pays for a seat that's later determined they can't use, is that portion of the ticket cost refunded and then the seat taken back by the airline for its use?
Click to expand...

Probably not refunded because clearly you didn't read the contract of carriage.
 
NovemberEcho said:
Probably not refunded because clearly you didn't read the contract of carriage.
Click to expand...
Um...this isn't contract of carriage stuff. Every time I've ever bought a ticket they're pretty clear about their policy of what happens if you don't use it, and unless you pay extra for the full flex or whatever that doesn't include a refund for you.
 
Roger Roger said:
Um...this isn't contract of carriage stuff. Every time I've ever bought a ticket they're pretty clear about their policy of what happens if you don't use it, and unless you pay extra for the full flex or whatever that doesn't include a refund for you.
Click to expand...

So it would apply to the type of ticket one purchased? In these cases cited, do we know what type of ticket the passengers had purchased, in order to really know what terms they were eligible for with regards to transfer, refund, etc?
 
Beefy McGee said:
Just asking, because I've never dealt with booking a small child - if the passenger paid money for a seat for the child who turned out to be a lap child and by rules can't use the seat, does the passenger get a refund?
Click to expand...

There's no rule that a child under the age of 2 be required to be a lap infant. Not all two year olds can safely sit in a seat with just a lap belt, which is why parents are allowed to bring an approved car seat onboard if they purchased a seat for thr child. In the few instances I dealt with in my nearly 15 years as a gate agent where the parent purchased a seat for a little one but didnt have a car seat, they were required to hold them for takeoff and landing but were allowed to keep the seat and use it inflight for the kid.

Or does our industry always charge by "name on manifest" even though not all would get a seat? Seems odd to me. I thought tiny lap children were free if you actually kept them on your lap.
Click to expand...

Domestically there's no charge, no ticket, and no seat for lap infants. They are simply appended to a parent's reservation usually in the form of an SSR or in an OSI field. Internationally is different obviously. The reservation is edited in the same way but some form of an add-collect is required and can vary from taxes/fees only (like US to Canada r/t, Canada charges nothing but the US charges lap infants the customs and immigration fee which is $7 and the agriculture inspection fee which is $5) to a small charge or percent of parent's ticket price plus taxes. This is in part due to infant in arms services some airlines provide (bassinets, etc) and also some taxes are based on fare paid and are cheaper with a small paid fare than say a zero value ticket where the tax is charged based on the full Y/C/F fare value (hence why some international mileage award tickets are so expensive). In both cases, the infant in arms was considered an unticketed passenger and the actual ticket purchased was simply a means to collecting taxes and not an actual ticket for travel as defined by the Warsaw Convention.
 
MikeD said:
Kind of what I was wondering; if one pays for a seat that's later determined they can't use, is that portion of the ticket cost refunded and then the seat taken back by the airline for its use?
Click to expand...

Depends on why they couldn't use it. Alaska used to have a policy (no idea if they still do anymore) where if a member of your party wasn't traveling, for a flat $50 you could change the name of the missing person's ticket to EXST (the SSR code for a passenger with an extra seat, usually used when one person such as a passenger of size purchases two seats). This allowed the remaining traveler's to keep the extra space. The key here was that once changed, it could not be changed back so if say on leg one or two the seat was converted to EXST all subsequent legs would remain a paid empty seat. If the ticket was origially an EXST purchased under passenger of size rules, as long as the flight was otherwise not full, the EXST was refundable for whichever segments went out not completely full.

For people physically not able to be accomidated in their seat, it depended on if accomodations could be made (different seat, later flight, different plane type, etc) or not. If not, usually it was refunded, though often not immediately at the airport and passengers had to contact reservations.

In the case of tickets that are purchased and the passenger either doesn't check-in for or does check-in but doesn't board, the seat is released and given to someone else (if necessary) and any rebooking or refunding is subject to the fare rules as purchased.
 
MikeD said:
22 months and younger, they generally fit pretty well under the seat in front of you, so you don't have to hold them all the time. Assuming of course that there isn't available overhead bin space that you can wrap them comfortably in their blankie in and place them in.













)
Click to expand...
 
BobDDuck said:
Last time I checked (which was about 20 hours ago), you were required to put your laptop away during takeoff and landing.

The issue isn't the baby's safety. If you want to kill your kid (even at low probabilities) go for it. It's about the nailing the passenger in the 6 rows ahead of you in the back of the head as your kid goes flying forward.
Click to expand...
Yes that's my point...laptop bad, baby ok...maybe because it's softer than a hard laptop it's ok if it smacks someone...
 
wheelsup said:
Yes that's my point...laptop bad, baby ok...maybe because it's softer than a hard laptop it's ok if it smacks someone...
Click to expand...

I misunderstood what you were saying. I thought you were advocating that if a parent wants to keep their kid in their lap.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top