Couple Threatened by Delta Employee?

jimntx

Veteran
Jun 28, 2003
11,218
3,302
Dallas, TX
www.usaviation.com
I was just watching the morning news on TV. The program had one of those scrolling trailers (called a chiron for you trivia buffs) along the bottom of the screen that mentioned various news highlights in general--i.e., "AMA makes official statement in opposition to the health care plan" sort of thing.

Now, to the point. One of the trailers said "Delta employee tells couple they would be arrested and their children put in foster care unless they gave up their toddler's paid for seat to another customer"!!! Another trailer said "Delta attempting to contact couple to make compensation."

Anyone else hear anything about this? Are we all in a competition to eliminate cordial customer service? At least they didn't drag the toddler down the aisle, or hit it with the car seat.

No, I don't know where or when it happened. But it was an NBC news program; so, I would think the basic story is true since Delta is attempting to make compensation.
 
Last edited:
UPDATE!

Found this link. (Ain't Google wonderful?)

http://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news...threatened-jail-refusing-give-toddler-n755141

Happened on an Maui-LAX flight. The family had sent their teenage son home on an earlier flight so that the 2 year old would have a seat for his car seat. Because the ticket for that seat was in the name of the teenager, the Delta employee threatened the couple with arrest and foster care for the children (they also had a 1-year old) to get them to give up that seat to another passenger saying that the FAA requires children under a certain age to be held in an adult's lap. (Not true. The FAA website says that the FAA recommends that all children under a certain age be in an approved car seat with proper restraints which the 2-year old had.) And, the couple says that they checked with a Delta employee before doing what they did and were told it would be acceptable.

Seems Delta did not reach out to the couple to offer compensation until after the incident became public.
 
Last edited:
As in the words of our Dear Leader, there is a HUGE discussion about this over on other sites.

According to my mother's neighbor best friend, 2 adults, 1 teen and 2 babies flew from the Mainland to Hawaii. They had their hands full during the flight over. They were on a Red Eye on their return and wanted more space on their return and purchased another ticket on another flight for the 18 year to return home alone. They kept the 18 year old's original ticket and intended to put the 2 year old in the seat with a car seat.

Some of the facts are murky, but according to the passenger, he claims to have spoken to a Delta employee who ok'd this? So they board the flight and all of a sudden the flight is full and trying to accommodate as many folks as possible a Gate Agent discovers that the 18 year was on a earlier flight and now according to the computer boarded the current flight. The Gate Agent wants the seat and the passenger says no. There's a video and it boils down to the Gate Agent threatening to arrest the parents and put the children in foster care. The agent also incorrectly states that the FAA requires parents to hold children on flights and doesn't allow car seats.

No yelling, no dragging and the passenger may very be in the wrong, but when the Gate Agent threatens jail the parents and put the kids in foster care, it puts Delta in a bad situation. Delta has since said they are sorry, refunded their tickets and given other compensation.
 
In any case the airline industry has once again failed to cover itself in glory. I'm guessing that someone at Delta knew that they would never win a court case over a ticket name technicality. Good on that someone. Yes, I know the TSA requires that the Passenger Information List match the actual people on the plane, but in this or a similar case involving small children, the airline would have a hard time proving their case. Particularly since everyone (including judges) these days are mad at us.:eek:
 
This couple wanted to use the empty seat (belonging to the 18 year old who took an earlier flight) for their one year old, not the two year old. The two year old could not legally be a lap child, and had its own seat.

In an ideal world, the parents should have been able to ask the ticket agents to switch the name on the 18 year old's ticket to their one year old to convert the lap child into a (safer) ticketed passenger. Problem with that easy solution is that the "gotcha" ticketing rules prevent such an easy fix. Tickets are non-transferable, even between siblings. A last minute ticket for their lap child would have likely been many, many $$$.

I can see the father's point. He's not expert with airline ticketing rules. He paid for all the tickets for his family, one of them took an earlier flight, and so he had an alternate use for the ticket he bought.

The airline, of course, correctly saw that seat as vacant and could resell it to another unrelated passenger.
One odd thing about this case is that the employee threatened the family with jail for "stealing" a seat they paid for. The father was wrong, but his argument has some populist appeal.

To Delta's credit, it learned from the UA and AA incidents and didn't issue a "the employees were right and the customer was wrong" memo like Oscar initially did. I give Delta an A for its corporate response. The employee who threatened jail and foster care needs some retraining to learn how to effectively communicate with passengers.
 
I have a feeling that more stories will come forward about passengers getting bumped. The more they keep this kind of stuff in the media the more they will get support for the passengers to get more power put back into their control. So now everyone is firing up the cell phones hoping to capture more passengers getting bumped from paid for seats just to seat other customers. This is just my opinion but it seems to fit. In this Delta case I would think the passenger is in the wrong as their son took an earlier flight, therefore I would think his ticket was used on another flight and that does make his seat on his original flight available and I think the couple just didn't want to have to deal with a lap child for the long flight back to home.
 
I In this Delta case I would think the passenger is in the wrong as their son took an earlier flight, therefore I would think his ticket was used on another flight and that does make his seat on his original flight available and I think the couple just didn't want to have to deal with a lap child for the long flight back to home.
Actually, they purchased a ticket for the teenager on the other flight. They then attempted to use his original ticket for the toddler's car seat. According to them, a Delta employee told them that was acceptable. As FWAAA pointed out, the ticketing rules do no allow this action, but have you ever tried to read the Contract for Carriage printed on the back of a ticket? The print size is too small for me to read it.

Delta took the right course of action. Good on them. If this had ended up in court, the couple would have asked for a jury trial, and the final score would be couple 12, Delta 0 before the trial even got started. We airlines are not the most popular groups of people these days. Or, hadn't you noticed?:eek:
 
I agree. Yea I even hate to mention that I work with an airline. Although in our area both AA and SWA has good reps, you still get the public passengers that somehow had a nightmare with a local airline. Pretty hard not to run into those where we live and work. I do see where this passenger completely thought he was in the right, after hearing your explanation, I too think Delta did the right thing, it was just a mix up between Delta employee telling them that it would be ok.