New bill likely won’t prevent passengers from being bumped on overbooked flights

TORONTO (NEWS 1130) – Aviation experts have their doubts over whether the practice of bumping passengers from overbooked flights will actually be banned in Canada when new federal legislation is introduced later this spring.

United Airlines continues to draw criticism after having a man dragged from the cabin of a Kentucky-bound flight on Sunday evening as the plane sat at the gate at Chicago’s O’Hare International Airport.

“I don’t think legislation should aim to eliminate airline bumping. It’s inevitable to a large extent that airlines would overbook. What we saw with the United flight was completely over the top and completely unwarranted to the situation,” explains Ambarish Chandra, an economics and business professor at the University of Toronto. “I don’t think we should eliminate overbooking. I don’t think it’s in the airlines’ interest and I don’t think it’s in passengers’ interests either.”

He adds overbooking flights is a long-standing practice and one that benefits both sides. “The phenomenon of passengers being overbooked and occasionally being asked to volunteer to get off is quite common. Honestly it does keep airfares down. It does help airlines mostly maintain full flights which helps them of course but it also helps passengers because it reduces our airfares,” says Chandra.

He says it’s far too profitable to ban it outright, saying that would go too far. Instead, he’d like to see more protection in it for flyers.

“What I would like to see is clear rules of compensation. So, for example, in the United States they offer four-times the price of your ticket if you’re bumped. Or protection against being left on the tarmac for many hours, for example the United States just passed a three-hour limit on that. I’d like to see some mandated compensation for passengers who are bumped,” says Chandra.

In the fall, Canada’s Transport Minister Marc Garneau said the government would be introducing a passenger bill of rights sometime this spring.

“Ideally I’d like to see airlines essentially perform an auction if they decide to overbook and ask passengers, ‘Who is willing to volunteer to leave at $200, $500, $800?’ Whatever it takes, that’s what the airlines to bear responsibility for,” says Chandra.

United Airlines CEO Oscar Munoz stood by his employees after the fiasco but later apologized calling the incident a “horrific event.”