travelthunder.com

After September 11, it became almost unpatriotic to complain about flight delays, diversions, and cancellations. However the truth is that long delays and flight changes can cause you significant hardship, especially if you find yourself stuck in an airline lounge(or on the airport floor) for the night. The DOT reports that, in some particularly tough months (with labor strikes or bad weather patterns) as many as one flight in forty has been cancelled , and one in four flights will not arrive on time. On domestic flights, most airlines include language in their contracts of carriage that spell out the company’ responsibilities if a flight is delayed, diverted, or canceled for various reasons. Many of these clauses describe specifically the reimburse-merits for your meal and hotel expenses, and some contracts actually list these obligations depending upon your departure airport and your destination airport. They may also offer different benefits based on the cause of the delay or cancellation (for example, more generous terms for mechanical delays than for bad weather). These contract terms are your best bet for recovering your damages and expenses associated with these types of flight problems. Therefore, you should consider printing out this section of the contract of carriage from your airline’s website before you leave home.
On international flights, the airline will offer the compensation promised in its contract of carriage, but you will find it difficult to press for additional damages. The Warsaw Convention allows airlines to escape responsibility for damages caused by flight delays if they can show that they took all necessary measures no avoid the damage (or that it was impossible to take any measures at all). The airlines have generally won in court with this defense.

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