What are my rights?

[Miracle]

Hi,

I would like it if someone can tell me what my rights were regarding compensation for the following situation.
Note: I was traveling with my wife and 5 children, ages 12,10,7, and 3.5 twins

We had a 12pm flight from Chicago to JFK that got cancelled because of weather.
They automatically put us on a 430 PM flight to La Guardia (fyi, I specifically did NOT want to fly to La Guardia when I booked my flights. I paid extra for JFK because LGA is not an easy airport to deal with) but put us on standby flight 130 going to LGA. They put all 6 of our luggages on that stand by flight, saying worse case, if there's no room for us on the 130, at least we have seats on the 430 and our luggages will just wait for us for 3 hours in LGA.

When we tried getting on the flight, everyone refused to take us on since we were 7 people and we would not be sitting together. They didn't let us split up our seats (within the plane) because we had little children. So they adviced us to just stick it out until 430 which was OK with us. We didn't care too much.

Now we're on the 430 flight. 10 minutes before arrival, the Pilot says we're not able to land in LGA and we're landing in JFK (our original destination!!!!!) the problem is - OUR LUGGAGE was at LGA from the 130 standby flight!! Of course we were stuck on the plan for 2 hours because we didn't have a terminal or crew to bring the plane in.. by this time, it was 10pm

We went to baggage claim hoping for them to deliver our luggage to my dad's car, since he was waiting for us in LGA. They told us it's not possible because our luggage was in Boston since the 130 flight got diverted there. It was 12 am and they told us we'd get our luggage delivered the next day. We got an email saying they located our luggage and it would arrive Fri around 1pm. It came Shabbos night, 11 pm...

What is American Airlines suppose to give us, legally? We don't know what to ask for. I asked them for compensation, they said it was the "act of Gd" and they couldn't give us anything.

I booked the tickets on Sapphire Pref Card, they told me we'd get $100 per luggage per day for whatever American Airline doesn't pay.

Please advise. Thanks

[chff]

Rights? Doesn't exist in the USA

[Miracle]

I'm legally suppose to be compensated for something...
I don't even know what this is catergotized under: Baggage Delay, Trip Delay, Trip Cancelled?  All the above?
No idea what to ask for.

[a good yeshiva bachur]

you definitely have the right to post in the correct thread:
https://forums.dansdeals.com/index.php?topic=13574.3930

[Sig]

Hi,

I would like it if someone can tell me what my rights were regarding compensation for the following situation.
Note: I was traveling with my wife and 5 children, ages 12,10,7, and 3.5 twins

We had a 12pm flight from Chicago to JFK that got cancelled because of weather.
They automatically put us on a 430 PM flight to La Guardia (fyi, I specifically did NOT want to fly to La Guardia when I booked my flights. I paid extra for JFK because LGA is not an easy airport to deal with) but put us on standby flight 130 going to LGA. They put all 6 of our luggages on that stand by flight, saying worse case, if there's no room for us on the 130, at least we have seats on the 430 and our luggages will just wait for us for 3 hours in LGA.

When we tried getting on the flight, everyone refused to take us on since we were 7 people and we would not be sitting together. They didn't let us split up our seats (within the plane) because we had little children. So they adviced us to just stick it out until 430 which was OK with us. We didn't care too much.

Now we're on the 430 flight. 10 minutes before arrival, the Pilot says we're not able to land in LGA and we're landing in JFK (our original destination!!!!!) the problem is - OUR LUGGAGE was at LGA from the 130 standby flight!! Of course we were stuck on the plan for 2 hours because we didn't have a terminal or crew to bring the plane in.. by this time, it was 10pm

We went to baggage claim hoping for them to deliver our luggage to my dad's car, since he was waiting for us in LGA. They told us it's not possible because our luggage was in Boston since the 130 flight got diverted there. It was 12 am and they told us we'd get our luggage delivered the next day. We got an email saying they located our luggage and it would arrive Fri around 1pm. It came Shabbos night, 11 pm...

What is American Airlines suppose to give us, legally? We don't know what to ask for. I asked them for compensation, they said it was the "act of Gd" and they couldn't give us anything.

I booked the tickets on Sapphire Pref Card, they told me we'd get $100 per luggage per day for whatever American Airline doesn't pay.

Please advise. Thanks

You were the recipient of a significant effort on the part of a bunch of people at an airline to get you as close to your destination as they could despite a whole lot of weather delays and irregular ops making it very difficult. What do you want, a pound of flesh? I would suggest that if your bags are crucial you carry on, with a bunch of kids you can divide an conquer as long as you're not carrying anything that has to be checked. If you are, then just check that one thing. I'd also suggest that if you can't deal with the inconveniences that come with inevitable irregular flight ops due to weather you consider not traveling by air instead of making travel more expensive for the rest of us by demanding compensation.

[yelped]

You were the recipient of a significant effort on the part of a bunch of people at an airline to get you as close to your destination as they could despite a whole lot of weather delays and irregular ops making it very difficult. What do you want, a pound of flesh? I would suggest that if your bags are crucial you carry on, with a bunch of kids you can divide an conquer as long as you're not carrying anything that has to be checked. If you are, then just check that one thing. I'd also suggest that if you can't deal with the inconveniences that come with inevitable irregular flight ops due to weather you consider not traveling by air instead of making travel more expensive for the rest of us by demanding compensation.

This is not the United Club One Time pass thread.

[mochjas]

This is not the United Club One Time pass thread.

I guess this guy is a united moderator. No reason for him to go ballistic on the guy.

[ludmila]

I guess this guy is a united moderator. No reason for him to go ballistic on the guy.

+1 There was no need for this whatsoever.

[Miracle]

I guess this guy is a united moderator. No reason for him to go ballistic on the guy.

No idea what his problem was. And for his information, I flew in from Israel to the States. Chicago to NYC was a stop over. Geez.

[mochjas]

No idea what his problem was. And for his information, I flew in from Israel to the States. Chicago to NYC was a stop over. Geez.

he gets cranky when he thinks people are taking advantage of UA

[Miracle]

he gets cranky when he thinks people are taking advantage of UA

I didn't even mention UA.. I mentioned AA )

[as2]

I didn't even mention UA.. I mentioned AA )

He has reading comprehension issues as well

[Miracle]

He has reading comprehension issues as well

lol

[Sig]

He has reading comprehension issues as well

Perhaps you can point out where I mentioned United in this thread that is clearly about an AA flight, because I'm confused by your complete non sequitur comment? Is this a Trumpian projection thing where the guy with no reading comprehension proactively accuses random people of not having any reading comprehension?

While you're at it, you can point out why it's bad advice to carry on something if you really need it and only check if you have to? Seriously, one wonders if the denziens of this board actually travel at all or just sit around pontificating about it.

[S209]

Perhaps you can point out where I mentioned United in this thread that is clearly about an AA flight, because I'm confused by your complete non sequitur comment? Is this a Trumpian projection thing where the guy with no reading comprehension proactively accuses random people of not having any reading comprehension?

While you're at it, you can point out why it's bad advice to carry on something if you really need it and only check if you have to? Seriously, one wonders if the denziens of this board actually travel at all or just sit around pontificating about it.

Denizens. Good word.   

[mochjas]

Perhaps you can point out where I mentioned United in this thread that is clearly about an AA flight, because I'm confused by your complete non sequitur comment? Is this a Trumpian projection thing where the guy with no reading comprehension proactively accuses random people of not having any reading comprehension?

While you're at it, you can point out why it's bad advice to carry on something if you really need it and only check if you have to? Seriously, one wonders if the denziens of this board actually travel at all or just sit around pontificating about it.

you can cut out all the fancy words. Yes no one here travels you are the only one who does.
And you are right you never said United but that’s not the point. The point was you didn’t need to make a whole rant about the guy. You could have simply said that since it was a weather issue he has no rights. The guy obviously went through a hard time and had losses so he was trying to see if he can recoup anything. It’s not like he posts something like this every day.

[Miracle]

you can cut out all the fancy words. Yes no one here travels you are the only one who does.
And you are right you never said United but that’s not the point. The point was you didn’t need to make a whole rant about the guy. You could have simply said that since it was a weather issue he has no rights. The guy obviously went through a hard time and had losses so he was trying to see if he can recoup anything. It’s not like he posts something like this every day.

Exactly.

[Sig]

you can cut out all the fancy words. Yes no one here travels you are the only one who does.
And you are right you never said United but that’s not the point. The point was you didn’t need to make a whole rant about the guy. You could have simply said that since it was a weather issue he has no rights. The guy obviously went through a hard time and had losses so he was trying to see if he can recoup anything. It’s not like he posts something like this every day.

If one wanted to convey that my post was overly harsh (point taken) then one would think you would simply say that rather than making some bizarre non-sequitur to United and reading comprehension, still unsure wtf that was all about? By the way, I write the same way as I talk. Dumbing down the way I write or talk would imply that I think the audience I'm speaking or writing to are uneducated and only semi-literate. Again bizarre to find someone offended by my assumption that you have a reasonable base level of intelligence and education.

On the original topic, the OP didn't have articulated losses. Apparently ended up safely at home without his luggage on a domestic flight leg, so the only DOT rule that may apply covering things like buying a toothbrush and a pair of clean underwear wouldn't be applicable to them. As far as we know from the post, the only issue they faced was the inconvenience of waiting a couple days for their trip's dirty laundry to be delivered directly to their home. That may not be the case, if so the OP can chime in with additional information at which point we could provide better information. Ironically it was the airline's extra effort to get them home that caused the baggage problem, if they hadn't offered standby and simply put them on a confirmed flight the next day they would most probably have arrived with their luggage, but given the choice most don't opt for that.

Why the rant? Imagine a world where every time there is a weather delay and it causes a luggage delay everyone gets compensated. That costs serious money, multiplied by many thousands of delayed bags its many millions of dollars. If you've run a business you understand what you do when faced with this type of situation, you try to minimize the cost from occurring and recoup what you can't minimize. In the airlines case this means you do everything you can to avoid providing the option to standby or do anything irregular that, while clearly in the best interest of the passenger and what they passenger wants, would trigger this compensation. So we all get stuck at airports when we could have flown standby knowing that we risk getting our bags a couple days late. And of course you raise fares to cover the inevitable cost for when you can't mitigate. Neither of those are beneficial to anyone, and if you travel more often than the annual family vacation it's a bit infuriating to hear people demanding their "rights" in a manner that would lead to a poorer experience for everyone else traveling just to grub a couple extra bucks. If you travel much this matters, the fact that it doesn't seem to register with several posters here would indicate that they don't travel much in which case their opinion isn't terribly informed and of questionable relevance.

[AsherO]

I only skimmed through this thread but I'm with Sig on this, the mandatory-compensation laws I know of specifically exclude weather related delays/cancellations because those are beyond the purview of the airlines' control and they thus shouldn't be held liable for them.

[mochjas]

I only skimmed through this thread but I'm with Sig on this, the mandatory-compensation laws I know of specifically exclude weather related delays/cancellations because those are beyond the purview of the airlines' control and they thus shouldn't be held liable for them.

no one is arguing with that.......