Flight cancellation tips

Things are getting back to normal for Delta, but the damage, as they say, is done. The airline is reeling from a crippling systems outage that affected flights across the globe and led to thousands of cancellations and delays. Now begins the process of fixing what went wrong and, just as importantly, making good with customers.

Airline delays and cancelations are frustrating enough, but having to spend time fighting with the airline to get compensation or getting stuck with an airline voucher you’ll never use makes the situation even worse. Fortunately, that’s all about to change—the U.S. Department of Transportation (DOT) just announced a new policy that requires airlines to automatically issue cash refunds to passengers when flights are canceled or significantly delayed.

Southwest is getting out of the overbooking game. Following the recent “incident” involving United Airlines, Southwest will heretofore only sell as many tickets as it has seats.

Beginning on June 1, Spirit will become the third airline to pull out of the Cuba market altogether, joining Frontier and Silver Airways. Two other airlines, American and JetBlue, have cut capacity on their Cuba flights, either by reducing frequency or downgrading to smaller planes.

The 26-country no-border-control Schengen area is in danger of collapsing under the migration threat. Presumably, the new border controls will be for no more than two years. But for now, you have to figure on reverting to the bad old days of mind-numbing border hassles within the area.

New airline passenger protections have passed for our neighbor to the north, offering increased Canadian air rights for travelers impacted by delays and other air travel inconveniences. But advocates on both sides—the airlines and some consumer groups—are not happy with the new rules.

OAG, which dubs itself an “air travel intelligence company,” has released its top-10 rankings of the most and least punctual airlines in 2016. The group analyzed 54 million flight records using full-year data from 2016 to compile the list, and for the purposes of the study defined “on-time” as “a flight that arrives or departs within 14 minutes and 59 seconds (under 15 minutes) of its scheduled arrival/departure time.”

Lufthansa pilots are striking for the 14th time since 2014 in their attempt to extract better wages from the carrier.

In just the past month, there have been two major airline service disruptions, inconveniencing hundreds of thousands of travelers.

If American Airlines’ recent scheduling glitch left you wondering whether your holiday flight would be cancelled for lack of available pilots, you can now rest easy.

USA Today reports that American has been fined $1.6 million for tarmac delays that occurred during 2013-2015.

Google “La Compagnie” and the top non-sponsored result describes the airline thusly: “Discover Paris and London with La Compagnie, the unique French all-business-class airline, at an affordable price.”

In a stunning and comprehensive report, the Tampa Bay Times has uncovered systemic mechanical problems on Allegiant Air’s planes.

From deceptive pricing to excessive fees to too-tight seating, here’s how to deal with the biggest concerns.

Spirit Airlines is known for a lot of things, namely fees and quirky advertising, but one thing it isn’t known for is punctuality or service. According to the Department of Transportation, this past April, the most recent month for which data is available, only 73.4 percent of Spirit’s flights arrived on time—dead last among the airlines that report to the DOT. The average on-time rate for April was 84.5 percent. For 2015, the airline averaged a 69 percent on-time arrival rate. That’s bad.

Adding to the already-high levels of stress associated with air travel, systemwide computer outages have become an increasingly common occurrence, raising the prospect of not only a cramped, uncomfortable flight, but a cramped, uncomfortable flight that is delayed or cancelled.

The newest FAA reauthorization bills in the House and the Senate include several proposals that could improve air travel for consumers, as well as two terrible ideas and one that could be a blockbuster for travelers fed up with unreasonable airline fees.

In a blow to smartphone giant Samsung, and a scare for a plane full of passengers, Southwest flight 994 last night was evacuated when a Galaxy Note 7 overheated and began smoking. According to USA Today’s report, the phone in question was a replacement for the owner’s original phone, which was among 1 million Note 7s recalled and replaced because of overheating batteries. The replacement phone was supposed to be the fix. Apparently it wasn’t.

Travel over the Thanksgiving holiday period was robust, and predictions are for similarly strong demand for air travel during the period between Christmas and New Year’s. For most airlines, that’s good news. For American, however, it’s a potential nightmare.

Airline fees remain a “pain point” for many travelers, and the pain is getting worse. Despite all the focus, however, you still see some public confusion. The latest exhaustive report (104 pages!) from IdeaWorks presents a good starting point for a dispassionate assessment of the realities and myths of airline fees.

It wasn’t that long ago that Southwest’s self-proclaimed identity as the Love Airline was a credible bit of branding, reflecting a virtuous circle of contentment among the airline’s customers, employees, and shareholders. For now, however, the love fest appears to be over.