According to Delta’s 51-page conditions of carriage, the airlinewill give passengers a full refund, in the original form of payment, in the event their flight is canceled or diverted or delayed more than 90 minutes.
Advertisement
Sometimes, Delta took extreme measures to preserve that record such as letting delays roll on throughout the day instead of canceling.
The airline has been scrambling to recover from a six-hour global shutdown on Monday. The problems continued into Tuesday and Wednesday.
Delta previously said it expected fewer than 100 flights to be Wednesday, but that estimate ultimately proved too conservative. But it was still affected by displaced flight crews and crews that were bumping up against their maximum allowable time on duty.
Delta Air Lines is spending $150 million this year on technology upgrades, including a better mobile app. Recent flaws in computer systems quickly escalated into corporate black eyes that exact costs in both money and reputation.
Bastian, a longtime Delta executive who became CEO last spring, said only the government-ordered grounding after 9/11 caused a shutdown as complete as Monday morning’s after the computer systems failed.
Delta is providing $200 in travel vouchers to all of its customers who experienced a delay of more than three hours or a cancelled flight on Monday or Tuesday as a result of the system-wide outage.
“We continue to ask our customers to check their travel plans and flight status”.
Delta canceled 317 flights on Wednesday.
But patience was starting to wear thin at some airports.
A computer outage Monday morning grounded planes around the world, stranding thousands of summertime travelers left in limbo as Delta struggled to sort out the mess, its reputation as an on-time airline severely tarnished. She was unable to download a boarding pass online and missed her flight.
Lines at the LAX terminal almost extended out the door as passengers arriving for flights tried to check in.
Rival Southwest Airlines Co. forecast on Wednesday a further drop in a key profitability metric for the current quarter due to delays and cancellations of more than 2,000 flights after an outage hit its computer systems in July.
The company did not provide much detail on the extent of the blackout, but did suggest that a “back-up system” was used by airport staff to check in passengers.
But in the midst of the busy summer travel season, finding seats to accommodate all the affected passengers has been a nightmare for the airline.
Advertisement
The system the airline uses to check in and board passengers as well as dispatch its planes is still slow, Gil West, Delta’s chief operating officer said Tuesday. Since this is the airline’s first major outage – and as long as there isn’t another one – Corridore said “Delta may get a pass here”.
