Late bag? Airlines may have to refund fees

The Transportation Department will propose that airlines be required to refund fees on checked baggage if the bags aren’t delivered to passengers quickly enough.

The proposal, if made final after a lengthy regulation-writing process, would also require prompt refunds for fees on extras such as internet access if the airline fails to provide the service during the flight.

A department official said the agency will issue the proposal in the next several days, and it could take effect by next summer.

The proposal will require refunds if airlines fail to deliver a bag within 12 hours of the passenger’s U.S. flight touching down or within 25 hours after an international flight.

Current regulations require refunds only if bags are lost, although airlines must compensate passengers for “reasonable” incidental expenses incurred while their bags are delayed.

The bag-fee proposal is the first of several airline-consumer regulations coming from the Biden administration under an executive order that the president will soon sign, according to a senior Transportation Department official, who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss a proposal that hasn’t been made public. The order will be designed to boost competition and give consumers more power, the official said.

Kurt Ebenhoch, executive director of Travel Fairness Now, an airline consumer organization, called the bag-fees refund “one consumer-friendly item in a long list requiring DOT action.”

He said top priorities include refunds for pandemic-related cancellations, stronger rules to let families with small children sit together without paying extra and more transparency in flight schedules and fares.