Airline ‘bumping’ hits record low
After a high-profile incident of a passenger getting dragged off a plane, airlines bumped a record-low number of passengers last year, according to a Transportation Department report.
Airlines reported involuntarily denying boarding to 0.34 passengers out of every 10,000 in 2017, the lowest rate since the Bureau of Transportation Statistics began keeping track in 1995.
The previous low for the dozen airlines that report their bumping was
0.62 in 2016, according to the department’s Air Travel Consumer Report.
The lowest rates were at Delta Air Lines with a rate of 0.05 passengers denied boarding, the report said.
Hawaiian Airlines had a 0.09 rate and United Airlines had a 0.23 rate. United focused attention on the problem in April, when officers at Chicago’s O’Hare airport dragged a
69-year-old passenger off a full flight to make room for crew members.
The passenger, David Dao, lost two teeth and suffered a concussion in the incident.
Congress held hearings about airline service. United apologized repeatedly and reached a confidential settlement with Dao.
Airlines began boosting compensation to coax flexible passengers off overbooked flights and tinkered with urging passengers to change plans days before full flights.
The carriers with the highest bumping rates were Spirit Airlines with a rate of 0.82 passengers per 10,000, Frontier Airlines with a rate of 0.57 and ExpressJet Airlines with a rate of 0.54.
In other airline service, carriers had
2.46 reports of mishandled bags for every 1,000 passengers last year, down from 2.7 in 2016.