Democrats can’t control ‘messy’ holiday travel, but this big change helps
Holiday traveling is not for the faint of heart: It’s hectic, it’s crowded, it’s stressful, and it’s unpredictable. At least now you’ll be compensated for the headache airlines cause you when your flight gets canceled or significantly delayed.
This Thanksgiving, when Americans get cash in hand from the airlines after their flight is unexpectedly changed, they have these Democrats to thank.
“Our department has issued new regulations for passengers around airline refunds,” said Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg in a video on X. “Passengers are owed a refund when your flight is canceled, and you’re not rebooked on a new flight, if your flight is canceled and you don’t want to be rebooked on an alternative flight, or if your flight is significantly delayed and you don’t want to continue with that ticket or be rebooked on a different flight.”
This comes as the National Weather Service tracks a “messy Thanksgiving travel” week, from California’s Sierra Nevada mountain range to the Midwest to the entire eastern side of the country. It’s predicted to be a holiday week filled with rain, sleet, and snow, with very difficult or impossible travel due to wintery storms threatening to cancel or delay flights.
In April, Buttigieg, along with President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris, implemented a new rule requiring airlines that cancel or significantly delay flights to give passengers a prompt cash refund as long as the passenger doesn’t accept alternative transportation or travel credits.
The Department of Transportation stated that it has received “complaints of some airlines revising and applying less consumer-friendly refund policies during spikes in flight cancellations.”
“Your holiday travel reminder: The Biden-Harris administration has required airlines to provide automatic cash refunds when your flight is delayed or canceled,” the Democratic Party posted on X on Monday.
Prior to this rule, airlines were allowed to set their standards for what kind of flight changes warranted a refund. “As a result, refund policies differed from airline to airline, which made it difficult for passengers to know or assert their refund rights.”
“For the first time, the new rule defines a ‘significant change.’ Significant changes to a flight include departure or arrival times that are more than 3 hours domestically and 6 hours internationally; departures or arrivals from a different airport; increases in the number of connections; instances where passengers are downgraded to a lower class of service; or connections at different airports or flights on different planes that are less accessible or accommodating to a person with a disability,” the statement said.
“Passengers deserve to get their money back when an airline owes them—without headaches or haggling,” said Buttigieg in a press release. “Our new rule sets a new standard to require airlines to promptly provide cash refunds to their passengers.”
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