"Significant Benefits For All Stakeholders" According To
Business Travel Coalition
The Business Travel Coalition (BTC) has joined with
FlyersRights.org in advocating passenger rights legislation. BTC
Monday released survey results and analysis that underscore a sea
change in thinking among participants in the business travel
industry.
The survey shows an overwhelming 82% of travel industry
professionals and business travelers support legislative language
championed by Senators Barbara Boxer (D-CA) and Olympia Snowe
(R-ME) that includes an option for passengers to disembark after 3
hours of onboard delay for domestic U.S. flights, should a captain
decide it is reasonable and safe to do so.
After 10 years of Congressional pressure on airlines as well as
highly unfavorable press reports of nightmarish delays and
conditions for passengers, the response by the airline industry has
been uneven, as confirmed in U.S. DOT Inspector General reports to
Congress.
In a news release, BTC chairman Kevin Mitchell said "BTC
testified 4 times since 1999 in opposition to Congressional
intervention, and opposed the New York State Passenger Bill of
Rights that would have led to disparate passenger rights standards
in every state. So-called federal preemption was emplaced long ago
to prevent a patchwork of oversight regulations. However, airlines
can no longer have it both ways; consumers continue to be harmed
and are without protections at the state level. As such, the only
remaining remedy is a single passenger-rights standard emplaced by
a Congress that needs to do for passengers what the airlines have
refused to do."
There are always benefits and drawbacks from any public policy
decision, some anticipated, and some not. BTC and FlyersRights.org
say the central question is whether the problem is worth solving at
a governmental level, and on balance, if the solution would likely
generate public policy benefits sufficient to effectively solve the
problem. Currently, the airline industry policy of denying there is
problem is generating its own set of serious unintended
consequences, including negative impacts on the health and welfare
of passengers, lost productivity for business travelers and
diminished airline brand quality.
"FlyersRights.org and BTC have been jointly analyzing the
implications of a 3-hour standard. Our organizations are not trying
to solve, for example, for all 613 of reported 3 plus-hour extended
tarmac delay problems from January through June 2009, just the 80%
represented by the recent Rochester, MN event," said
FlyersRights.org executive director Kate Hanni. "We have identified
significant benefits for all stakeholders that will likely flow
from a single 3-hour standard that encourages a reengineering of
current airline and airport systems and processes. Benefits include
helping solve the NYC-area airport congestion conundrum."