Airlines' Obligations to Disabled Passengers

In My Humble Opinion
21

The flight attendant could have found a better way to explain things, but she may have a point.

If it’s not your job, it’s not your job. Indeed, I wouldn’t be surprised if regulations forbid flight attendants from helping with baggage for OSHA/workers comp reasons. There are rules for jobs that require this kind of physical labor. Furthermore, a flight attendant has many other duties, many of them essential to the safety of all the passengers, that need to be cared about during boarding. Asking them to take on tasks outside of their primary duties during this critical period may not be very fruitful.

The airport/airline should make it clear what services they do and do not provide. It seems like this woman expects a companion to accompany her and aid her throughout the trip, which seems to be something that they do not provide. If you need that level of care, then yeah, maybe flying alone may not be an option for you. If you need special services, you may end up waiting a while to get those special services, and honestly if they are being offered for free, perhaps you shouldn’t complain too much? That’s a harsh reality, but it’s a reality.

From the LJ post, it seems like this woman got her panties in a little bit of a bunch. Am I really supposed to believe the flight attendant “gave her a disapproving look” when she asked for a whiskey and Coke? I cannot imagine a flight attendant, who does this all day, would even bother to have a reaction at this extremely ordinary request. She was too upset to take BART so she spent $45 on a taxi? Cry me a river.

Sounds like she’s being a bit of a drama queen. Flying sucks for everyone. Sometimes you gotta suck it up and not pick at every detail.

I say this as someone who once spent eight hours on an unpaved bus ride followed by an overnight train in sub-Saharan Africa with a broken back. I’ll tell you, if you want something that sucks for the disabled try the Cameroon Rail Company!

22

Okay, we’ve established that the flight attendant can assist. But that’s a far cry from being required to assist – which is even different from the question of whether one feels that they should. I won’t argue that the FA is described as being callous, but I won’t argue that she should be required to assist, either.

23

That’s like saying a waiter can bring your food to your table but they aren’t required too.

It is a service the airline specifically offers. If the FA is unwilling to provide the service they should be fired.

24

But would a waiter be required to carry your luggage? :stuck_out_tongue:

25

Airlines are subject to the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) just like most other companies. If the disabled passenger made official notice during flight booking, the airline would have had someone store their carryon for them. If the airline did not make a reasonable accommodation during boarding when they were notified during flight booking, the passenger would probably have a good case of discrimination.

The blog doesn’t reference the passenger made a reasonable accommodation at booking, nor at checkin. At one level it probably was reasonable for the flight attendant to refuse helping the passenger. However, the flight attendant should have either helped the passenger, or asked for assistance. That’s customer service.

The flight attendant was an ass for poor customer service. The passenger was an ass for playing the pity party game.

26

That seems like a bit of a stretch. If I go to the website and see that that is a service that is offered by United, and then I try to use that service and I’m told not only do they not offer it, but the supervisor isn’t sorry I wasn’t helped because it’s not in there contract - well, I would be pissed.

Perhaps the writer actually checked the website, noted that it was an offered service and elected not to check her bag for just that reason.

Besides - carry on usually has an upper weight limit of about 18 lbs. Being able to lift 18 lbs seems like a perfectly reasonable job requirement for an airline attendant - aren’t these people suppose to help evacuate passengers in the event of an emergency? I should think 18 lbs would be no problem.

27

Not at all. The waiter’s job is to take your food order and bring it to you. Believe it or not, stowing overhead baggage ranks pretty far down on a list of flight attendant priorities and duties.

As to your second claim, I don’t see this being noted anywhere as a service offered by the airline – per your own cite, it reads as though United is permitting flight attendants to do so at their discretion (likely a necessary release for reasons already noted in this thread). Were this a policy or declaration of service, I imagine it would read more like “our flight attendants will help.”

Carry ons have a weight requirement, you’re right. Does that mean that a passenger will comply with that weight limit? Of course not. Especially since no one is weighing their carry-on bag, and checking a bag on United costs money. The primary role of a flight attendant is not to serve passengers – it is to look out for their safety. One could argue that if a flight attendant is busy stowing overhead luggage, he or she may miss something important and potentially safety-impacting going on elsewhere.

28

Can we get some verification that this aggrieved party’s carry on luggage was really small and lightweight? I’ve seen the sizes of carry-ons lately and it seems a bit… uncharacteristic…

Before rushing to the handicapped person’s defense, perhaps we should make sure she wasn’t abusing the carry-on size/weight policies to avoid having to pay checked baggage fees like 99% of other passengers?

It just seems a lot more plausible that this woman came on board with a grossly overladen bag and the stewardess didn’t want to risk injury, instead of the stewardess not wanting to literally lift a finger to help a passenger.

couldn’t really have put it better.

29

nm. i have problems reading.

30

It is still on the list.

It does not say they can help at their discretion. It says they can help. It is reasonable to expect they can and will help if asked.

31

That blog post makes the stewardess sound like an unhelpful ass. The very least she could have done would be to ask someone else around her to help with the bag.

Upon reflection, I usually take Korean Air or Asiana when traveling. That might account for the difference in the quality of service, I suppose.

32

It’s also reasonable to understand that they have no obligation to do so. I’m really not seeing the disconnect that exists here. Do you honestly believe assisting customers with their luggage is one of a flight attendant’s primary duties?

Again, I’m not arguing that she shouldnt’ve helped. She probably should’ve. I don’t know-- I wasn’t there, we have a one-sided story, and I can’t make judgements on events I didn’t witness without some corroboration. I’m simply saying that passengers, disabled or not, should not expect assistance with something like luggage – especially when it’s not one of the flight attendant’s primary duties, especially when there’s no indication that any notice was given indicating the woman needed reasonable accommodation, and especially when United policy explicitly states that FA’s can help, but have other duties to tend to.

To expand on the restaurant analogy, this is more akin to asking your waiter to direct your tardy friend to your table. Sure, it’s something the waiter can do. And, time permitting, I see no reason he shouldn’t. But in no way would I expect that he is obligated to do so – and it’s something you should be prepared to do, yourself, if necessary.

33

What does it matter if it is a primary duty? Did she say I can’t get to it yet? She said she wouldn’t do the duty. I’d accept if she said I’ll help you after everyone is seated etc.

If the restaurant specifically listed a policy saying their waiters can direct tardy members to your table I’d expect them to do so. I understand if the tardy member had to wait 5 minutes while the waiter did his primary duties. I’d find it completely unacceptable if the waiter said sorry I won’t do that.

I know I’m going out on a limb here expecting a business to actually offer a service they said they offer.

34

yeah, you are going out on a limb there, your sarcasm notwithstanding.

pretty much every brochure/website of a company promoting a service and the “benefits” that they provide to their customer has always been a whole lot fancier/better/nicer in theory and on paper than in actual practice.

35

The problem here is that your interpretation of United’s statement is that they are outright offering a guaranteed service to customers, while my interpretation differs. I suppose it’s a difference in understanding of “can” (as ridiculous as that sounds). Can is used to express ability.

My personal policy is that I can give you $50.00… but it certainly isn’t that I will, or that I must.

36

For what it’s worth, despite the fact that everyone does it, and every airline allows it, wheeled bags are not intended to be stored in overhead bins, but rather to be stored in that oh-so-ample room under the seat/seat in front of you. The overheads are for light items such as coats and purses. The reason for this is safety; the door latches are rated for a certain amount of force, and they can and do tend to pop open when heavy objects push suddenly against them such as in turbulence. Keep in mind most of these bins/aircraft were designed before the wheeled bag so commonly used today. Wheeled bags falling on heads hurt more than raincoats do.

Although it’s a bit of a disconnect with reality, perhaps the fact that the bag in question didn’t belong in the bin in the first place affected the flight attendant’s decision?

37

Based on that link I would assume that a disabled person could ask the United flight attendant to stow their bag for them and they would do so. I mean, I am not disabled, but if, say, my dad were traveling to see me and was using a cane then I would tell him “No worries, I researched it online. Just tell them you can’t lift anything above your head and they’ll put it away for you.” I like to think my reading comprehension is reasonably good, compared to the average US air traffic passenger.

That said, from reading the blog who knows what actually happened. I’ll keep this in mind next I travel, it would not occur to me that a young woman who left her bag in the aisle was actually unable to lift it herself. But as for choosing an airline … eh, they all suck now. I think everyone has the right to boycott who they want, but personally I’ll still go by price.

38

atomicbadgerrace, you’re really going out of your way to take devil’s advocate. UA’s policy doesn’t say, “Flight Attendants MAY be able to help with baggage”. The implication of “Flight Attendants CAN help with baggage” is that they’re available for help if needed.

Your argument sounds like something from a third grader on a playground. “I said I COULD help, I didn’t say I WILL! Neener neener!”

That being said, I often took the Amtrak train to college, with a full-sized totally-stuffed suitcase (40-50lbs?) I had no HOPE of putting in the overhead compartment. The conductor ALWAYS, and with a smile, lifted it up for me. It never even occurred to me that there wouldn’t be someone around, on staff, to help.

39

Meanwhile, why couldn’t they gate-check her bag if it was such an issue? Or store the thing at the front of the plane with the strollers, etc.? There are a ton of other options that don’t involve one frail flight-attendant throwing her back out with this woman’s carryon.

40

I think the complicating factor here is that her disability is not outwardly visible. As she makes clear in several points in her blog-post, she is certainly able to walk at least a moderate distance without assistive devices.

If you were a flight attendant and a well-appearing woman demanded that you put her luggage into the bin for you the moment after she successfully walked down the aisle of the plane, one might have some pause about the situation. The flight attendant didn’t threaten the woman or tell her to get off the plane, merely that she’d have to enlist a volunteer passenger for help with the bag. Unless the blogger was recording the whole episode, the “quote,” from the blog probably isn’t a verbatim quote, so were left with the distortions and prisms of the blogger’s perspective on the incident.

IMHO, the woman writing complaining in the blog-post is a a bit of a histrionic whiner. Her story is either entirely inconsistent or else she was, “assisted,” by no fewer than three people at the Seattle airport who are routinely in a position to assist people in wheelchairs transit the airport and she was utterly dissatisfied with the assistance she received from all of them. She claims that she wasn’t picked up on time, that she was, “dumped,” at the security checkpoint and had to make it through on her own at the peril of a, “hot flash,” that the person driving her wheelchair (presumably a different employee because she claims to have been abandoned at the security checkpoint) tried to dump her at the gate-area instead of wheeling her onto the plane, etc.

Should we also blame United for, “The flight itself was mostly uneventful, except for the screaming headache that started up even before take-off courtesy of a family with several young children sitting about three rows behind me?”

Are we actually to believe that the United staff responsible for ordering wheel-chairs to the plane after it lands opted not to do so for her at the risk of a PR clusterfuck like this one just because they could, or they were going to prove that this lady really wasn’t disabled? Doubtful. I think its far more likely that anyone identifying themselves to United as requiring a wheelchair will get one, but it might not be the first wheelchair to arrive at the gate and apparently that’s unsatisfactory for this woman.

Are we actually to believe that this woman somehow crawled on her hands and knees through the security checkpoint unassisted? Or is the reality of her level of disability and what people assume when they read, “spinal injury,” and the events which actually transpired lost in the fog of the retelling as a part of otherwise unprecedented event of a passenger expressing anger about an airline on the internet?