Air Passenger Complaints Regarding Refunds Soar

The US Depart of Transportation recorded 90,000 air passenger complaints since March 2020. Based on their data, that’s 57 times more complaints from 1500 complaints recorded in 2019. One of the main concerns of air passengers is their refund. When the pandemic started, air travel dropped by 96%. As travel restrictions forced airlines to cancel flights, it’s only logical for customers to expect a refund. Unfortunately, this isn’t the case with a lot of airline customers.

As a general rule of thumb, if the airline cancels the flight, they are enforced by federal authorities to refund your airfare. However, if you cancel, then there is a chance then you wouldn’t be able to get a refund.

Additional Flexibility

According to a spokesperson from American airlines, customers have additional flexibility to make sure that they can change plans ahead of time. American allowed customers to use flight credits until the end of March 2022. Plus, the airline even slashed change fees for both domestic and international flights.

Bill McGee who works as aviation adviser for Consumer Reports says that “I have never seen a single issue generate so much consumer anger”. He added that “it’s off the charts and this has been going on now for 14 months”.

According to McGee’s estimates, airlines roughly need to refund $10 billion to $15 billion to their customers. And to add insult to injury, airlines received federal funding to keep the industry afloat.

However, Airlines for America says that their member airlines already refunded $13 billion to customers, despite losing $100 million a day when the pandemic started. But does this answer all the air passenger complaints since the pandemic began? It only makes it complicated.

What most consumers don’t check when it comes to their credits is the expiration dates. Can you get an extension in case you don’t plan to travel any time soon like the others? Each airline’s policy is different. However, each policy will also have to comply with federal regulations.

Senators Richard Blumenthal and Edward Markey want airlines to offer cash refunds instead of credits for flights that have been canceled during the pandemic. According to Markey and Blumenthal, “Americans need cash in their pockets to pay for food, housing, and prescriptions during this emergency”.