Delta Air Lines is facing a class action lawsuit in a New York court over its controversial overbooking process that means passengers can be involuntarily bumped from their flight even after they’ve checked in and got a boarding pass.
Jalen Empson, a US citizen who moved to the Portuguese capital Lisbon earlier this year, says he was bumped from his flight to Europe by Delta after the airline overbooked the plane and no one volunteered to take a later flight.
Overbooking flights is a fairly standard practice across the airline industry and has been going on for years, although Delta seemingly overbooks more flights than most other airlines. CEO Ed Bastion even told investors earlier this year that the carrier planned to increase the level of overbooking to as much as 105% of capacity.
Airlines overbook flights because not everyone who has bought a ticket for a specific flight will actually show up. By selling more tickets than there are seats they reduce the risk of losing out on potential revenue.
The are many reasons why passengers might show up for a flight, such as misconnecting due to a delayed flight or simply getting stuck in traffic on the way to the airport. Generous pandemic-era rebooking policies also mean passengers can swap onto another flight at the last minute.
Overbooking is, however, a major gamble for airlines. Get it right and they rake in more cash. Get it wrong, and they end up having to pay compensation to passengers who either voluntarily take a later flight or are involuntarily bumped.
Between January and September 2023, Delta has had to offer compensation to more than 123,000 passengers who voluntarily agreed to take a later flight because the flight they were booked on was oversold and everyone turned up as planned.
In one case, last year, Delta reportedly offered eight passengers up to $10,000 each to give up their seats on an oversold domestic flight between Michigan and Minnesota.
In fact, Delta does a pretty good job at getting passengers to voluntarily give up their seats compared to other airlines. According to the Department of Transportation, only three people were involuntarily bumped from Delta flights in the first nine months of the year, and in these cases, there are consumer protection laws that dictate how much compensation airlines are supposed to pay.
But Empson says he showed up for his flight from New York JFK to Lisbon several hours before departure on February 16 and was checked in and ready to board before he was turned away at the gate because Delta failed to find any volunteers to take a later flight because the plane was oversold.
In the end, Delta couldn’t get Empson another flight for two more days, but he says the airline denied his request for ‘denied boarding compensation’.
If you are involuntarily bumped from a flight, an airline doesn’t have to pay any compensation if they can get you to your destination within an hour of your original scheduled arrival time. But they could end up having to pay up to 400% of the one-way ticket price if the delay stretches longer than two hours for domestic flights and four hours for international flights (although this is capped at $1,550).
There are, however, several loopholes that airlines can use to avoid paying any compensation. For example, if they swapped out the aircraft at the last minute and it had fewer seats than originally planned, then no compensation is due.
Overbooked flights departing from a foreign city also aren’t eligible for denied boarding compensation, and there are specific rules for smaller regional jets with fewer than 60 seats.
In Empson’s case, it’s unclear why he had to be involuntarily bumped, but he has filed a class action lawsuit in a New York district court alleging breach of contract for failing to provide a seat on the flight he had booked a ticket for and then failing to pay denied boarding compensation.
What do you think? Should airlines be allowed to oversell flights and run the risk of bumping passengers?
I’m kind of surprised to hear this since I’ve seen Delta gate agents go to pretty extreme voluntary denied boarding amounts- as much as $2000 per passenger plus hotel expenses for a less than 300 mile flight following a late equipment swap- in order to avoid having to report an involuntary denied boarding to the FAA. He’s going to have to work pretty hard to find other members for his class given Delta’s reported IDB numbers.
Should airlines be allowed to oversell flights and run the risk of bumping passengers?
I’m voting a strong no..No matter what type of flight. The one example that was given that Delta gave 8 passengers $10K each ,that’s their exorbitant mistake. How about an overnight stay or double the airline ticket cost. If you look at another service industry like the hotels , I don’t believe they oversell rooms they sell what they have.. Aside from this issue what about the other issues now where you can search forever . TRY and find a direct flight to your destination without having to stop at THEIR hub.. Every business wants to make money but not at the cost of their customers being shoved aside…
No. Stop overselling flights. As a gate agent I can tell you, the agents HATE working oversold flights. Especially lately that these stories of insane amounts of compensation are getting out there, well people dont budge because they think they will get $50,000 if they just sit there and ignore you. In all honesty depending on the route I can see overselling by ONE seat. That scenario always ends up fine with that one person not showing up. But other than that, its a stupid horrible practice. The agents are SICK OF IT.
I wonder if he was not there when the gate did passport/visa verification and as a result his flight was canceled.
I feel there is a lot missing from this story.