Pete Buttigieg travel tips

The Transportation Department announced on Thursday that it was investigating the rewards programs of the country’s four biggest airlines, part of the agency’s continuing efforts to bolster protections for air travelers.

One of the nation’s biggest airports is about to get a boost from the United States government.

Good morning from Skift. It’s Friday, September 6, 2024, and here’s what you need to know about the business of travel today.

The Department of Transportation officially launched an inquiry Thursday into whether the loyalty programs of the four largest U.S. airlines have engaged in unfair, deceptive or noncompetitive practices.

Of all the cabinet positions in a presidential administration, Transportation Secretary has never been seen as the sexiest. But Pete Buttigieg, also known as Mayor Pete, has made an often-overlooked department relevantHe’s probably the most high-profile Transportation Secretary in recent times. 

United Airlines flight attendants voted overwhelmingly to authorize a strike as tensions with management rise. 

I do not know anyone who heads to the airport and thinks to themselves, "Oh man, I bet this is going to be an awesome experience." Just booking a flight means contemplating a sliding scale of unfortunate scenarios. What if my bag is lost? What if the flight is overbooked? What do I do if it's delayed or canceled? Once you get to the airport, things only get worse: the headache that is maneuvering through long security lines, swallowing eye-popping airport prices, or wondering just how scared you should be if you wind up on a Boeing. At this point, it's more of a pleasant surprise if a flight actually goes as planned.

United States Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg issued a letter to the chief executive officers of the nation’s 10 largest airlines to reinforce the need to provide customers with cash refunds when appropriate.

Flight cancellations are mounting Monday after Hurricane Debby made landfall on Florida's Gulf Coast — disruptions that come in the wake of a messy weekend for air travel amid severe storms up and down the East Coast.

Some have called it the parenting tax: when caregivers are forced to pay for the privilege of sitting next to their children on a flight.

Traveling with children already comes with inherent challenges, but in recent years, airlines’ seat selection policies have made it more difficult for parents and guardians to book adjacent seats with their young children—and are charging for the privilege. This morning, the Department of Transportation (DOT) formally proposed a ban on family seating junk fees.

The Biden administration is proposing a new rule that would prohibit airlines from charging families fees to sit together.

The Department of Transportation is proposing a rule that would prohibit airlines from charging “junk fees” to seat families together on flights. 

Right now, domestic airlines treat traveling families differently. A handful, such as JetBlue Airways, American Airlines and Alaska Airlines, guarantee that parents can sit next to their children. But on the others, parents are left to pay for more expensive assigned seats or to bank on the good will of strangers.

A U.S. Department of Transportation regulation requiring airlines to more transparently disclose add-on fees appears to be in peril.

A U.S. appeals court struck down the Department of Transportation’s rule that would require airlines to disclose all fees upfront, pending a full review of the rule. 

While commercial air service was slowly recovering on Friday after a technology outage caused thousands of flights worldwide to be canceled or delayed, the ripple effect from the disruption left airports crowded with passengers and airlines working to get planes and crews back in position.

The Biden administration is opening up an investigation into Delta Air Lines as the carrier's operational meltdown stretched to a fifth day of mass cancellations in the wake of an IT outage affecting industries worldwide on Friday.

Scott Darling and his wife drove their 17-year-old son, Asher, to the San Jose airport on Sunday morning and saw him off at the check-in counter. They were back in their car and pulling out of the airport when they got a frantic call: Delta Air Lines wouldn’t let Asher check in because he didn’t have a parent accompanying him on the flight.

Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg said on Tuesday that his department had opened an investigation into Delta Air Lines after the tech outage last week disrupted flights worldwide, and the agency wanted to hear from travelers who said that the airline had not complied with passenger protection requirements.

The Department of Transportation announced Tuesday that it is launching an investigation into Delta Air Lines as the carrier struggles to recover from a meltdown that has led it to cancel thousands of flights.