[Avitas]

When airlines screw up such as when you miss a connecting flight due to an airline-caused delay, walking to the ticket counter or agent desk gets you paid. If you have a cell phone, a phone call to the airline gets you paid.

If you don't want to bother with walking to the airline reps in the airport or you are not comfortable interacting with people, AirHelp may be useful.

[mikestew]

Not always. We had a direct flight from Orlando to Seattle that was waiting on the plane to come from SEA (I assume they just run the plane back and forth between the two cities, based on the schedule). Except SEA had a little sprinkling of snow, so the plane never left. I woke up at 4:00 a.m., looked at my phone, and flight was cancelled. No "we rebooked you", no nothing. So I called. Their offer was to put us on a plane 36 hours later. That's not gonna work, we've got to go to work and get the dogs out of dog jail. Tampa's closer, can you stick on a flight out of there? Nope, not even an option. An hour on the phone got me nowhere.

My wife tried later, and after another hour of "no, that's not acceptable" finally got a later flight with a five hour stop in Washington, DC. Alaska Air at least gave us exit rows for the ride home. Granted, this wasn't a "missed a connecting flight" scenario, but the airline's lack of helpfulness does not give me confidence they would act differently. Man, for the good old days when you'd call or walk to the desk, hear "just a moment, sir <clickety, clickety, clickety> there, I have you on the next flight. I put you in first class for the trouble."

On a side note, I find it ironic that the only airline in SEA that was cancelling flights due to snow was the one with the word "Alaska" in its name.

[marquis]

I would use this if I didn't get any initial help - sometimes you don't. Or sometimes you get put up in a fancy hotel in Copenhagen without asking because there is a snowstorm and the pilot couldn't get there. But maybe I could have gotten cash instead?

[mixmastamyk]

Not in this day and age. United stranded me in Houston last year after leaving late from LA... said it was because of the weather and politely told me to "shove off." Well guess what, it was another perfect day in LA that day. If work hadn't paid for everything I'd be very angry. I'm still angry but busy and less motivated to fight.

A company that could do the fighting for me could be helpful. Even if they didn't produce a profit for me, I'd consider using it out of principle.

[saryant]

Weather upstream from your flight can still be responsible. If the aircraft your flight is going to use gets delayed due to weather earlier in the day, that's a weather delay, even if you had clear skies at your departure.

Airlines aren't responsible for weather delays, full stop.

[Avitas]

> Airlines aren't responsible for weather delays, full stop.

Yes, exactly.

"Airline-caused" means things like:

- flight crew delays/unavailable

- mechanical issues

- overbooking

[nicwolff]

Not even. If air crew is unavailable because a previous flight ran long due to headwinds and they are out of allowable flying hours for the day, week, or month? That's "weather-related" and you get nothing.

[Avitas]

I agree, I could have been clearer by repeating the exclusion for weather delays on one or more line items. I'm sure there are even borderline cases where a denial by the airline might be questionable and your only course of action would be to repeatedly and/or strongly state your case, escalate the matter up the chain-of-command, call/file your case with the government (e.g., DOT ACPD), file a request for arbitration (i.e., if your ticket requires), file a small claims suit, etc.

[mixmastamyk]

Nope, we sat ready at the gate for a half hour past departure time. Clear skies in Houston as well.