COSTS & BENEFITS FINAL SUMMARY « Airline Passenger Rights

COSTS & BENEFITS FINAL SUMMARY

Who Participated in the Costs and Benefits Discussion?

The Costs and Benefits issue generated a modest amount of discussion. 10 comments were made on this post:

6 comments by an estimated 6 users
(2 comments were gathered by site administrators from the site feedback page, and added to this post by the moderator. No username was associated with these comments)
4 comments by Regulation Room moderators

Commenters included primarily people who identified themselves as air travelers. One commenter identified himself/herself as working for a U.S. air carrier.

From September 13 to September 19, the Draft Summary was available for comment. No one made suggestions for changes. During this period, the Regulation Room team reviewed the comments on the Costs & Benefits issue post again; as a result of this review, some additional detail has been added to this summary.

General Comments on Costs and Benefits of Proposed Regulations

Commenters were equally split on whether the cost of the proposed regulations would exceed their benefits to consumers.

Two commenters are concerned that the costs to carriers will endanger the industry’s financial health and hurt consumers when these costs are passed on as higher prices. One considers the proposed regulations to be the equivalent of mandatory air travel insurance that covers passenger inconvenience, delays, and other events airlines cannot control. He/she predicts that the “premium” for this insurance will be high and believes that most customers, if given the choice, would prefer travel at lower cost to having additional travel interruption insurance. This commenter says that DOT Department of Transportation is micro-managing the affairs of private companies. The other commenter predicts not only increased consumer costs, but also further strain on carriers. He/she also mentions airports struggling with less traffic. This commenter believes that the problem is that airlines are underpricing fares to increase volume. This is a risk to people and the industry. He/she favors an approach that sets minimum fare prices at a level where necessary fees are covered.

Two commenters disagree. One sees this as an issue of passengers’ rights, not management freedom of private corporations. Focusing on tarmac delay, this commenter believes that passengers should have the option to deplane, choose another flight or means of transportation, or postpone travel. Contingency plans for ensuring this should be a condition of airlines’ getting the right to operate. The other predicts that the costs to airlines will be much less than what is currently spent on advertising that misleads consumers. Now, consumers incur considerable cost and inconvenience in trying to get refunds and other recovery for problems due to airlines’ nondelivery of promised service.

Comments Specifically on DOT Methodology

One commenter questions why DOT Department of Transportation estimates that fee disclosure to consumers has any quantifiable cost.

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One must have the patience of Job to add a comment on this very badly created website. The Webmaster should be ashamed of him/herself. Take some classes to learn how to do it right!

This is a horribly designed site. It took me 5 minutes just to find the proposed rules that we're supposed to comment on. There should be a "Proposed Rules" button on the main menu bar at the top of the page, not something unclearly labeled "Rule Dashboard" off to the side (with the type running vertically, so it's hard to read). A properly designed Web site should be intuitive. It shouldn't need to include videos that explain how to use it. You do a nice job of explaining the proposed rules. That same clarity should extend to the design of the site itself. Steve Millburg Homewood, AL stevemillburg@yahoo.com

will not accept my comment!

site is poorly designed and NOT user friendly. Too much is counterintuitive, and directions are muddled at best.

Wow, this is a really bad site - I've registered and tried to confirm my registration but I keep getting a blank page that says "done"?? When I go to the site to try and sign in I get a statement that says "this account does not exist"????

Says "Page not nound" when I try to activate my account from the link in your e-mail to me.

Slow script prevented me from submitting comments

I have never seen a more poorly deisgned site where it is hard to guess what and how to provide feedback.

This site is seriously buggy. I have now entered my comments two times and neither time have they been accepted. The pop-up windows come up at random times. I wasn't allowed to edit at one point. This site has potential but it needs serious work.

This website isn't working correctly. I'm logged in and when I click on the box to start submitting a comment, a pop up comes up telling me to log in - I do so, click on the box, and the log in pop up comes up again. The comment box behind gets grayed out and there's no way to type in anything! I've tried it on three different web browsers and it happens on all three.

This site is extremelety difficult to use. I try to make a comment, it asks for a log-in, I log-in, I try to make a comment, it asks for a log-in. This is Groundhog Day. Just give me a fricking e-mail address and I'll mail in my comments.