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I'll never understand this attitude toward airlines. What did you want them to do in this situation? Keep flying the plane with engine issues so you could make

I'll never understand this attitude toward airlines. What did you want them to do in this situation? Keep flying the plane with engine issues so you could make your important meetings? It sounds like the airline did the right thing here but you were still mad?

tacitusarc 29d ago
Do proper maintenance so they don’t have engine issues, and carry insurance to compensate passengers in case they do?
- usefulcat 29d ago
  There is no amount of maintenance that can avoid all mechanical issues. Take bird strikes, for example. Regarding "carry insurance": margins in the airline business are notoriously slim. They compete very heavily on cost, because the service they provide is a commodity (or close to it). Most airlines will probably not willingly add any extra costs that they don't have to, because that would put them at a disadvantage relative to their competitors. For those passengers who are willing to pay extra to be reimbursed for delays or other inconveniences, there may be travel insurance that can provide that.
Gud 29d ago
A decent reimbursement. Not parents fault the airline flies around with defective hardware. Usually this is regulated by law.
hock_ads_ad_hoc 29d ago
Perhaps they want the airlines to do a better job maintaining their fleet such that the airline is capable of meeting its obligations with respect to arriving on time without crashing.
- ctippett 29d ago
  This is an unfair take. Airlines already take maintenance very seriously. Knock them for their customer service all you want, but engineering doesn't deserve it.
ungut 29d ago
Uhm, properly compensate passengers that have concrete harm to point to instead of offering a laughable alibi payment? What I'll never understand is why some neoliberal schools of thought defend conglomerates like they're their children... This company has enough money to compensate for fuck-ups, at least it should have. Every insurance on the planet can do the simple math involved for this risk assesment.
akersten 29d ago
I suppose consider yourself lucky that you haven't yet been inconvenienced by an issue completely within the airline's control and been offered $50 in funny money even though you had to pay out of pocket for your dingy hotel and transport in/out of the airport at 11pm/6am the next morning. And no, they won't reimburse that, because you could have slept on the terminal floor for free I on the other hand will never understand anyone extending any grace to an airline. They are constantly testing just how poor of an experience they can deliver to their customers and stay in business. For starters, they could have offered more than $100 to OP here
- missedthecue 29d ago
  Because airlines don't -and can't- promise incident free travel. They promise to get you to your destination. They don't like engine problems and the domino effect that has on their routing any more than you do. Saying this as someone with over a million miles flown, I've seen the worst sides of airlines. But let's be real, their slim margins cannot support bonusing out every passenger with a sob story about getting delayed.
  - akersten 29d ago
    > They promise to get you to your destination. Critically they promise "by a certain time" as well. Surely with so many miles you are aware of the "significant disruption to my travel plans" aspect to getting compensated for a service that they failed to deliver. Plane crews timing out on the tarmac at midnight forcing everyone aboard to lose a day of travel is not a "sob story" it is a systemic and purposeful optimization on the airline's part, a gamble that they can put up enough customer service phone menus and hoops that they only have to comp a small portion of customers whose time and money they've misappropriated. ETA: my example above is to point out that even in the common failure cases airlines are awful, and as OP shares, even worse in the rare engine failure case. Yeah, they don't directly control that the engine failed (unless we start talking about how lack of maintenance and overworked mechanics contribute to that, which we should, and is under their control btw) but a hundred bucks for being stranded in the jungle is an insult no matter how you slice it
dmix 29d ago
Yeah I don't get what the airline did wrong there.
- ThrowawayTestr 29d ago
  They failed to uphold their end of the contract and caused OP to experience damages.
  - epolanski 29d ago
    Poor op. /s This is the kind of attitude that puts pressure on airlines and thus pilots to fly even when situation is dubious.
    - ThrowawayTestr 29d ago
      Poor billion dollar airline. They can carry insurance or spend the correct amount on maintenance so this doesn't happen.
      - epolanski 29d ago
        Airlines are notoriously businesses that barely make any money. And just for your information, since you seem to be oblivious, perfectly maintained equipment can still have issues. And whether the company owes you anything depends on the jurisdictions involved, in US you ain't entitled to much.
    - GuB-42 29d ago
      The company has a lot more to lose from pilots taking risks than from angry passengers who missed their meetings. Everything done to and in an airplane is recorded, there are standard procedures for emergency situations, which pilots are expected to follow, and if the pilot didn't, he needs a really good reason, and avoiding passengers suing the company for compensation is not a good reason. We may be taking criminal charges here, this is one of the few cases where high ranking officials can go to prison, in addition to fines big enough to bankrupt the company. This is serious business, and the reason why aviation is so safe despite the risks inherent to flying. Safety, and in particular compliance with safety regulations is non-negotiable. And you will notice that even the shittiest airlines (including Spirit) have a safety record on par with the best. It is just too risky to try to save money here.
BowBun 29d ago
This has nothing to do with OPs point though. Their point is about the data that was harvested and sold.
rotringlvr 29d ago
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romanovcode 29d ago
Agree, isn't this precisely what credit-card companies promise to cover? I'd think I would just claim flight-interruption with the credit card insurance and it should cover all expenses.
deleted 29d ago
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GuB-42 29d ago
The pilot did the right thing, the company didn't. I think that in the EU, compensation for such an event is at least 600€, plus all expenses paid (including meals, hotel, etc...). The airline most likely offered $100 as an attempt to settle for way less than what they legally owe. Without further information, we can't really blame the company for the incident itself, and they may have had no other option regarding what happened in Manaus, but they definitely had the option of offering proper compensation instead of threats.
- deleted 29d ago
  [deleted]
freeplay 29d ago
Agreed. Before I had finished reading, I honestly thought you declined the $100 because everything ended up alright, you got to see some dolphins, and have a cool story to tell.
- dopamean 29d ago
  Same. I really thought that was going to be the next sentence. Was honestly shocked when I kept reading. Such a strange attitude.
  - etc-hosts 29d ago
    I only get mad when an airline temporarily misplaced my luggage.
    - therealdrag0 29d ago
      I got mad when airline checked us in for a flight, during a blizzard, took our luggage, then cancelled our flight and refused to give us our luggage back promising to fedex it to us. Fortunately we noticed a lot of luggage on the ground and eventually found ours and just took it despite protests.
725686 29d ago
I hate some airline polices as much as anyone, and it is absolutely terrible to loose a meeting, family reunion, cruise ship vacation, etc. for something like this, but it is way worse to die. If airlines compensated with whatever money you think you deserve, the tickets would cost way more than they already are. Shit happens. You are not entitled to compensation for everything shitty that happens in the world.
- sbarre 29d ago
  > You are not entitled to compensation for everything shitty that happens in the world. This is true, but not relevant here? If you pay for a service, and you don't get that service, are you implying that you should just be SOL? If the plane has an issue, and the pilot rightfully lands it for safety concerns, but the paying passengers don't get where they are going, that sounds like the airline's problem to me, not the passengers' problem. At the very minimum the passenger should be refunded for their ticket, because they didn't get what they paid for. There are already too many negative consequences in the world of commercial transactions that the end-consumer gets saddled with simply because they don't have the leverage, money or time to fight for redress.
jbstack 29d ago
I'll flip this around and say I've never understood why an airline is viewed as a special case. In the general case, if you enter into a contract and pay for a service, then don't receive that service, you're entitled to sue the service provider for your losses. For example, if I turn up to a hotel I booked only to find that the room isn't available, I'm entitled to sue the hotel for my cost in finding a reasonable last minute replacement. That's the case even if the room wasn't available because it was unsafe for some reason. Of course nobody is expecting that they "keep flying the plane with engine issues so you could make your important meetings". But ultimately you relied on them to get you to that meeting, and they failed to do so, so you should be compensated so that you're no worse off than if they had provided the service. The fact that an airline will sometimes fail to get their customers to their destination and will have to compensate them for it, is just the cost of doing business. Luckily in the UK and the EU your right to compensation for delayed flights is enshrined in law.
- dopamean 29d ago
  I believe the contract you enter into is that the airline will get you to your destination safely. I don't believe there's any special case there. FWIW I think we should have the same laws in the US that you all have in the UK and EU.
- arein3 29d ago
  There are exceptional cases, detrimental to both you and the company. Company already swallowed a pretty serious loss, in that case arguably common sense is to let it go, sometimes sh*t happens.
  - thayne 29d ago
    If they truly were exceptional that would be fine. But long delays happen a lot, and I am sure there are things airlines could do to improve that like maintain the planes better so they aren't grounded as often and having backup planes so that if one has problems they can put customers on a different one.
    - 29d ago
rcpt 29d ago
Also wondering why you'd fly Spirit from Brazil to the US.
- wavemode 29d ago
  Parent commenter never said it was Spirit. (I kind of doubt that they ever operated in Brazil.) Just that this is the kind of data they would be worried about being sold.
jrockway 29d ago
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ptero 29d ago
I read the main objection as being with an airline exploring option to put a traveler on a no-fly list. Not due to anything related to security, but purely as a punishment for exploring compensation options. This, in my book, is VERY bad and and deserves public shaming of the airline, complaints to regulators, etc. etc. Everything else IMO is just fine. The airline landed the plane safely, made some promises (including a single room), could not keep all of those promises, the passenger pushed for more compensation than what airline offered, etc. That happens thousands of times every day all over the world. But this does not remove the big black mark of exploring putting a passenger on a no-fly list. My 2c.
- dopamean 29d ago
  Read his comment again. He says he rejected the $100 and then started arguing and threatening to go to court. That's when they started exploring banning him from the airline.
  - ptero 29d ago
    > Read his comment again. He says he rejected the $100 and then started arguing and threatening to go to court. Going to court is the standard, and usually the only, path for resolving disagreements that parties cannot easily resolve between themselves. Retaliating by putting the passenger on a no fly list deserves public shaming and pushback. For example, a major grocery store can put people on a "do not come here again" list. But this is an easy way for a big business to hurt a person and should not be used for minor issues. I might see this "the business bans whoever it wants for any reason" as a legitimate defense, but not in a regulated business with high barrier to entry.
thayne 29d ago
When something like this happens, at the very least you should get the full cost of your ticket back, plus reimbursement for lodging and food, at least. Then maybe airlines would have more of an incentive to maintain their fleet better, and have backup planes so this kind of thing doesn't happen very often.
- deleted 29d ago
  [deleted]
everdrive 29d ago
I don't think you understood his comment. The emergency landing was not necessarily the problem; it was everything the airline did to remediate that after the fact.
Illniyar 29d ago
They are supposed to make sure this doesn't happen. Or if it does have better recovery. Don't skimp on maintenance, make sure you have planes that can do divert in time. If there was engine troubles in the middle of the ocean would it still be okay?
xyst 29d ago
Op clearly wasn’t mad at the pilot for doing their job. Op is mad at the company for trying to downplay the situation with $100. Insane bruv
epgui 29d ago
I think you’re failing to identify the important part of the story.

tacitusarc 29d ago

Do proper maintenance so they don’t have engine issues, and carry insurance to compensate passengers in case they do?

usefulcat 29d ago
There is no amount of maintenance that can avoid all mechanical issues. Take bird strikes, for example. Regarding "carry insurance": margins in the airline business are notoriously slim. They compete very heavily on cost, because the service they provide is a commodity (or close to it). Most airlines will probably not willingly add any extra costs that they don't have to, because that would put them at a disadvantage relative to their competitors. For those passengers who are willing to pay extra to be reimbursed for delays or other inconveniences, there may be travel insurance that can provide that.

Gud 29d ago

A decent reimbursement. Not parents fault the airline flies around with defective hardware. Usually this is regulated by law.

hock_ads_ad_hoc 29d ago

Perhaps they want the airlines to do a better job maintaining their fleet such that the airline is capable of meeting its obligations with respect to arriving on time without crashing.

ctippett 29d ago
This is an unfair take. Airlines already take maintenance very seriously. Knock them for their customer service all you want, but engineering doesn't deserve it.

ungut 29d ago

Uhm, properly compensate passengers that have concrete harm to point to instead of offering a laughable alibi payment? What I'll never understand is why some neoliberal schools of thought defend conglomerates like they're their children... This company has enough money to compensate for fuck-ups, at least it should have. Every insurance on the planet can do the simple math involved for this risk assesment.

akersten 29d ago

I suppose consider yourself lucky that you haven't yet been inconvenienced by an issue completely within the airline's control and been offered $50 in funny money even though you had to pay out of pocket for your dingy hotel and transport in/out of the airport at 11pm/6am the next morning. And no, they won't reimburse that, because you could have slept on the terminal floor for free I on the other hand will never understand anyone extending any grace to an airline. They are constantly testing just how poor of an experience they can deliver to their customers and stay in business. For starters, they could have offered more than $100 to OP here

missedthecue 29d ago
Because airlines don't -and can't- promise incident free travel. They promise to get you to your destination. They don't like engine problems and the domino effect that has on their routing any more than you do. Saying this as someone with over a million miles flown, I've seen the worst sides of airlines. But let's be real, their slim margins cannot support bonusing out every passenger with a sob story about getting delayed.
- akersten 29d ago
  > They promise to get you to your destination. Critically they promise "by a certain time" as well. Surely with so many miles you are aware of the "significant disruption to my travel plans" aspect to getting compensated for a service that they failed to deliver. Plane crews timing out on the tarmac at midnight forcing everyone aboard to lose a day of travel is not a "sob story" it is a systemic and purposeful optimization on the airline's part, a gamble that they can put up enough customer service phone menus and hoops that they only have to comp a small portion of customers whose time and money they've misappropriated. ETA: my example above is to point out that even in the common failure cases airlines are awful, and as OP shares, even worse in the rare engine failure case. Yeah, they don't directly control that the engine failed (unless we start talking about how lack of maintenance and overworked mechanics contribute to that, which we should, and is under their control btw) but a hundred bucks for being stranded in the jungle is an insult no matter how you slice it

dmix 29d ago

Yeah I don't get what the airline did wrong there.

ThrowawayTestr 29d ago
They failed to uphold their end of the contract and caused OP to experience damages.
- epolanski 29d ago
  Poor op. /s This is the kind of attitude that puts pressure on airlines and thus pilots to fly even when situation is dubious.
  - ThrowawayTestr 29d ago
    Poor billion dollar airline. They can carry insurance or spend the correct amount on maintenance so this doesn't happen.
    - epolanski 29d ago
      Airlines are notoriously businesses that barely make any money. And just for your information, since you seem to be oblivious, perfectly maintained equipment can still have issues. And whether the company owes you anything depends on the jurisdictions involved, in US you ain't entitled to much.
  - GuB-42 29d ago
    The company has a lot more to lose from pilots taking risks than from angry passengers who missed their meetings. Everything done to and in an airplane is recorded, there are standard procedures for emergency situations, which pilots are expected to follow, and if the pilot didn't, he needs a really good reason, and avoiding passengers suing the company for compensation is not a good reason. We may be taking criminal charges here, this is one of the few cases where high ranking officials can go to prison, in addition to fines big enough to bankrupt the company. This is serious business, and the reason why aviation is so safe despite the risks inherent to flying. Safety, and in particular compliance with safety regulations is non-negotiable. And you will notice that even the shittiest airlines (including Spirit) have a safety record on par with the best. It is just too risky to try to save money here.

BowBun 29d ago

This has nothing to do with OPs point though. Their point is about the data that was harvested and sold.

rotringlvr 29d ago

[dead]

romanovcode 29d ago

Agree, isn't this precisely what credit-card companies promise to cover? I'd think I would just claim flight-interruption with the credit card insurance and it should cover all expenses.

deleted 29d ago

[deleted]

GuB-42 29d ago

The pilot did the right thing, the company didn't. I think that in the EU, compensation for such an event is at least 600€, plus all expenses paid (including meals, hotel, etc...). The airline most likely offered $100 as an attempt to settle for way less than what they legally owe. Without further information, we can't really blame the company for the incident itself, and they may have had no other option regarding what happened in Manaus, but they definitely had the option of offering proper compensation instead of threats.

deleted 29d ago
[deleted]

freeplay 29d ago

Agreed. Before I had finished reading, I honestly thought you declined the $100 because everything ended up alright, you got to see some dolphins, and have a cool story to tell.

dopamean 29d ago
Same. I really thought that was going to be the next sentence. Was honestly shocked when I kept reading. Such a strange attitude.
- etc-hosts 29d ago
  I only get mad when an airline temporarily misplaced my luggage.
  - therealdrag0 29d ago
    I got mad when airline checked us in for a flight, during a blizzard, took our luggage, then cancelled our flight and refused to give us our luggage back promising to fedex it to us. Fortunately we noticed a lot of luggage on the ground and eventually found ours and just took it despite protests.

725686 29d ago

I hate some airline polices as much as anyone, and it is absolutely terrible to loose a meeting, family reunion, cruise ship vacation, etc. for something like this, but it is way worse to die. If airlines compensated with whatever money you think you deserve, the tickets would cost way more than they already are. Shit happens. You are not entitled to compensation for everything shitty that happens in the world.

sbarre 29d ago
> You are not entitled to compensation for everything shitty that happens in the world. This is true, but not relevant here? If you pay for a service, and you don't get that service, are you implying that you should just be SOL? If the plane has an issue, and the pilot rightfully lands it for safety concerns, but the paying passengers don't get where they are going, that sounds like the airline's problem to me, not the passengers' problem. At the very minimum the passenger should be refunded for their ticket, because they didn't get what they paid for. There are already too many negative consequences in the world of commercial transactions that the end-consumer gets saddled with simply because they don't have the leverage, money or time to fight for redress.

jbstack 29d ago

I'll flip this around and say I've never understood why an airline is viewed as a special case. In the general case, if you enter into a contract and pay for a service, then don't receive that service, you're entitled to sue the service provider for your losses. For example, if I turn up to a hotel I booked only to find that the room isn't available, I'm entitled to sue the hotel for my cost in finding a reasonable last minute replacement. That's the case even if the room wasn't available because it was unsafe for some reason. Of course nobody is expecting that they "keep flying the plane with engine issues so you could make your important meetings". But ultimately you relied on them to get you to that meeting, and they failed to do so, so you should be compensated so that you're no worse off than if they had provided the service. The fact that an airline will sometimes fail to get their customers to their destination and will have to compensate them for it, is just the cost of doing business. Luckily in the UK and the EU your right to compensation for delayed flights is enshrined in law.

dopamean 29d ago
I believe the contract you enter into is that the airline will get you to your destination safely. I don't believe there's any special case there. FWIW I think we should have the same laws in the US that you all have in the UK and EU.
arein3 29d ago
There are exceptional cases, detrimental to both you and the company. Company already swallowed a pretty serious loss, in that case arguably common sense is to let it go, sometimes sh*t happens.
- thayne 29d ago
  If they truly were exceptional that would be fine. But long delays happen a lot, and I am sure there are things airlines could do to improve that like maintain the planes better so they aren't grounded as often and having backup planes so that if one has problems they can put customers on a different one.
  - 29d ago

rcpt 29d ago

Also wondering why you'd fly Spirit from Brazil to the US.

wavemode 29d ago
Parent commenter never said it was Spirit. (I kind of doubt that they ever operated in Brazil.) Just that this is the kind of data they would be worried about being sold.

jrockway 29d ago

[dead]

ptero 29d ago

I read the main objection as being with an airline exploring option to put a traveler on a no-fly list. Not due to anything related to security, but purely as a punishment for exploring compensation options. This, in my book, is VERY bad and and deserves public shaming of the airline, complaints to regulators, etc. etc. Everything else IMO is just fine. The airline landed the plane safely, made some promises (including a single room), could not keep all of those promises, the passenger pushed for more compensation than what airline offered, etc. That happens thousands of times every day all over the world. But this does not remove the big black mark of exploring putting a passenger on a no-fly list. My 2c.

dopamean 29d ago
Read his comment again. He says he rejected the $100 and then started arguing and threatening to go to court. That's when they started exploring banning him from the airline.
- ptero 29d ago
  > Read his comment again. He says he rejected the $100 and then started arguing and threatening to go to court. Going to court is the standard, and usually the only, path for resolving disagreements that parties cannot easily resolve between themselves. Retaliating by putting the passenger on a no fly list deserves public shaming and pushback. For example, a major grocery store can put people on a "do not come here again" list. But this is an easy way for a big business to hurt a person and should not be used for minor issues. I might see this "the business bans whoever it wants for any reason" as a legitimate defense, but not in a regulated business with high barrier to entry.

thayne 29d ago

When something like this happens, at the very least you should get the full cost of your ticket back, plus reimbursement for lodging and food, at least. Then maybe airlines would have more of an incentive to maintain their fleet better, and have backup planes so this kind of thing doesn't happen very often.

deleted 29d ago
[deleted]

everdrive 29d ago

I don't think you understood his comment. The emergency landing was not necessarily the problem; it was everything the airline did to remediate that after the fact.

Illniyar 29d ago

They are supposed to make sure this doesn't happen. Or if it does have better recovery. Don't skimp on maintenance, make sure you have planes that can do divert in time. If there was engine troubles in the middle of the ocean would it still be okay?

xyst 29d ago

Op clearly wasn’t mad at the pilot for doing their job. Op is mad at the company for trying to downplay the situation with $100. Insane bruv

epgui 29d ago

I think you’re failing to identify the important part of the story.