# Why are airlines allowed to bump passengers for crew? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [April 18, 2017, 12:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-airlines-allowed-to-bump-passengers-for-crew/784695 "2017-04-18T12:32:20Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 12\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![LSLGuy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lslguy/32/5813_2.png) [@LSLGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LSLGuy)\ **Post date:** [April 18, 2017, 9:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-airlines-allowed-to-bump-passengers-for-crew/784695/21 "2017-04-18T21:24:43Z")
> [@jtur88](#): > > [USskylink.com](http://USskylink.com) is quoting a rate of $3062, to fly four people from O’Hare to Louisville KY at 2:00 this afternoon in a piston-powered charter aircraft. That would be cheaper than paying four passengers $800 each , not even counting the accommodations. > > What would be he down side of this option, compared to the downside of having armed thugs haul screaming bleeding passengers off flights in front of YouTube cameras? > [@LSLGuy](#): > > Maybe because > A) That wasn’t the plan > B) In all the history of all the bumping industry wide that’s never happened before. > > But mostly because > C) once a person or company calls the police (any police), the situation (any situation) is utterly out of their control. Though moreso for most US big city police than other forces. > [@jtur88](#): > > None of the three are hard and fast arguments as to why this could not or should not be done. > > A) Must “the plan” always be the same, regardless of circumsances? > B) How do you know no airline has ever chartered a light plane to shuttle crew? > C) The airline has a standing policy of turning over to the police what is, at the start, the responsibility of the airline to resolve, possibly with an alternative plan that would not require police backup. I think we’re talking past one another. What I meant was A) The “plan” for how to remove a passenger did not include armed thugs and youtube. Yes that happened, but it wasn’t an inevitable step 6 on the passenger removal checklist. B) The occurrence of the police getting violent with a passenger and it getting on youtube hadn’t happened before in industry history and was not something the policy writers, or the line workers trying to implement the policy, might reasonably have foreseen that day. C) Even if the plan for angry passenger disagreement resolution includes a step “call cops if necessary”, at that point the “plan” loses all control and the cops do whatever the heck their policies, procedures, and whims dictate. The airline can’t control, and hence can’t be strictly liable for, the specifics of what happens next. (Aside: The police department certainly is responsible for what happens next based on whatever it’s employees did vs. should have done.) As such, your proposed choice of “What would be he down side of this option, compared to the downside of having armed thugs haul screaming bleeding passengers off flights in front of YouTube cameras?” didn’t exist _in the prospective_. Which it seemed to me was what you were saying; that United and everybody else should have known this would lead directly and inevitably to a police beating so they shouldn’t have even started down that road to ask anyone off the plane for any reason. Upon reading your next post above I think perhaps I misread you. You really meant: “going forward why not plan to send crew some other way? It’s about the same cost as paying bumping compensation and a lot better PR.” If that’s what you meant, I apologize for misunderstanding you. And you raise a good point. ---
**Author:** ![LSLGuy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lslguy/32/5813_2.png) [@LSLGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LSLGuy)\ **Post date:** [April 18, 2017, 9:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-airlines-allowed-to-bump-passengers-for-crew/784695/22 "2017-04-18T21:44:29Z")
> [@Dinsdale](#): > > My understanding was that there are regulatory limits on how much a crew can work over a certain period. Seems to me that sitting in a seat would be less physically and mentally demanding than doing one’s job. Whether an employee gets paid for travel time impresses me as somewhat different from whether “commuting” time renders one incapable of working in the future. > > An odd situation, that this non-airline person has never thought much about. Of course, I tend to be like Seinfeld - I don’t just want them to TAKE my reservation… 😃 Good question. Speaking just to pilots, not flight attendants. … The Federal regs are arcane in the extreme, but the extremely 1040EZ short version is that if you’re someplace doing something for the employer, that’s “duty”. If you’re at home, a hotel, or traveling between those places and the workplace, that’s not duty. Duty is duty is duty. Whether flying, riding as a passenger (deadheading in the argot) or sitting around an airport killing time. That’s all equally duty. The standard maximum workday (on-duty) is 14 hours, followed by 10 hours minimum off-duty. Which adds to 24 so the cycle can be repeated day in and day out. The basis for this is physiological research that shows that after 16 hours awake, the standard human is as functionally impaired as somebody awake for a just couple hours but with a blood alcohol level (BAC) of 0.05. You’re right that flying the jet is harder work than passengering on the same jet. One might even get a nap while riding. 🙂 That’s why there are separate smaller limits for hours spent actually driving the jet. Typically 9 hours per duty shift for work done in the normal times of day and reducing to 8 hours for work performed wholly or partly on late night or graveyard shift. The big scheduling challenge when things go wrong is that we’re already planning ordinary workdays of 12 and 13 hours. That’s bog standard normal. So there’s not much slack left in the rules to accommodate major delays. Or, ref some suggestions upthread, to try to charter a bus or a light airplane or bizjet to move the crew other than on the airlines’ own high-speed high-volume transportation network. ---
**Author:** ![Beren\_Erchamion](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/90ced4/32.png) [@Beren\_Erchamion](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Beren_Erchamion)\ **Post date:** [April 18, 2017, 10:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-airlines-allowed-to-bump-passengers-for-crew/784695/23 "2017-04-18T22:29:59Z")
> [@Dinsdale](#): > > BTW, as far as I could tell, in this instance, a limo or chartered plane could easily have gotten them from Chicago to Louisville in time for their next day’s duty. That’s not the issue. The issue is whether or not it would have given them enough rest time to be legal for the next day’s duty. > [@](#): > > The idea that a crew member sitting in a seat counts as duty time strikes me as odd. What you find odd doesn’t matter. What matters is what the regulations say. ---
**Author:** ![snowthx](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/snowthx/32/10660_2.png) [@snowthx](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/snowthx)\ **Post date:** [April 18, 2017, 11:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-airlines-allowed-to-bump-passengers-for-crew/784695/24 "2017-04-18T23:03:35Z")
It must be a nightmare of logistics for an airline when things don’t go according to schedule. You may have crew or aircraft out of position at any time, which can end-up like dominoes. I can understand why they would try very hard to get someone to give up their seat to accommodate a crew that needs to be somewhere at at specific time, with limited other easy options. As has already been speculated - they just need to reflect the value of that situation to them by providing stronger incentives for people already booked on the flight to give up their seat. There are limits, but I am sure if they kept upping the $$ and offered other incentives they would have managed to find 4 willing participants. And as has been pointed out, that would have been much cheaper than the situation they have now. ---
**Author:** ![RivkahChaya](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rivkahchaya/32/8919_2.png) [@RivkahChaya](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RivkahChaya)\ **Post date:** [April 18, 2017, 11:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-airlines-allowed-to-bump-passengers-for-crew/784695/25 "2017-04-18T23:34:50Z")
I’ve experienced the sort of thing that can happen when you have staffing over a large area. I can’t imagine having to staff over the whole country. I’ve had things like a person supposed to work 8am-6pm with client A call the emergency pager at 5am to say she has been throwing up and can’t work. So I wait until 6am to start calling for subs, because someone who gets called at five will not agree due to being pissed. At 6:45, I get a call back from staff person X, who is trained to work with client A, but can’t get there until 9am. I find another person Y who is trained and doesn’t really want to do it, but will go in for one hour. I then have to get ahold of the payroll person to get authorized to pay her for two hours because it’s not worth her drive time and gas money if she can’t get paid for two hours. In an emergency, it gets approved. The alternative would be for me to do it, but aside from the fact that I need to be available for real emergencies (like if a client has to go to the ER, or needs a medication refill), I live too far away to get there on the dot of 8am, and staff person Y is closer. I’m sure airlines have situations where flight attendant A is supposed to cover flight 1, and is already in city of flight 1, but wakes uppuking in the middle of the night. Flight attendant B is cleared to cover it, but is in another city. No problem; there’s a flight she can take that will get her there in plenty of time. Flight is overbooked, but so what? Well, then that flight becomes the rare flight where every single passenger shows up. That’s what. That’s how you end up with a flight attendant showing up at the last minute and expecting a seat. ---
**Author:** ![kayaker](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kayaker/32/441_2.png) [@kayaker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kayaker)\ **Post date:** [April 18, 2017, 11:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-airlines-allowed-to-bump-passengers-for-crew/784695/26 "2017-04-18T23:47:34Z")
> [@RivkahChaya](#): > > I’m sure airlines have situations where flight attendant A is supposed to cover flight 1, and is already in city of flight 1, but wakes uppuking in the middle of the night. Flight attendant B is cleared to cover it, but is in another city. No problem; there’s a flight she can take that will get her there in plenty of time. Flight is overbooked, but so what? Well, then that flight becomes the rare flight where every single passenger shows up. That’s what. I’m sure flight attendants have an important job, but I’d be perfectly understanding if I had to miss drink service due to my flight being an attendant short. Of course, there are likely federal regulations. ---
**Author:** ![Beren\_Erchamion](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/90ced4/32.png) [@Beren\_Erchamion](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Beren_Erchamion)\ **Post date:** [April 18, 2017, 11:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-airlines-allowed-to-bump-passengers-for-crew/784695/27 "2017-04-18T23:49:46Z")
> [@kayaker](#): > > I’m sure flight attendants have an important job, but I’d be perfectly understanding if I had to miss drink service due to my flight being an attendant short. > > Of course, there are likely federal regulations. Federal regulations require at least one flight attendant for every fifty seats or portion thereof on any plane with more than nineteen seats. Flight attendants are also more than glorified waitstaff. They’re safety professionals. ---
**Author:** ![kayaker](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kayaker/32/441_2.png) [@kayaker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kayaker)\ **Post date:** [April 19, 2017, 12:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-airlines-allowed-to-bump-passengers-for-crew/784695/28 "2017-04-19T00:00:35Z")
> [@Beren\_Erchamion](#): > > Flight attendants are also more than glorified waitstaff. They’re safety professionals. Ahh, yes, my apologies. I’d forgotten the whole connecting your seatbelt speech. ---
**Author:** ![Dinsdale](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/97f17d/32.png) [@Dinsdale](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dinsdale)\ **Post date:** [April 19, 2017, 12:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-airlines-allowed-to-bump-passengers-for-crew/784695/29 "2017-04-19T00:27:21Z")
> [@Beren\_Erchamion](#): > > That’s not the issue. The issue is whether or not it would have given them enough rest time to be legal for the next day’s duty. If you aren’t going to remember what you write, I guess I won’t trouble myself to respond to it. > [@](#): > > …and since a car is much slower than an airplane it also might not have worked from a scheduling standpoint–it might not have gotten them there by the time they needed to be there. Thanks for all the answers, folk. I won’t belabor things with any more of my musings. ---
**Author:** ![Kent\_Clark](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kent_clark/32/105_2.png) [@Kent\_Clark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kent_Clark)\ **Post date:** [April 19, 2017, 12:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-airlines-allowed-to-bump-passengers-for-crew/784695/30 "2017-04-19T00:55:00Z")
> [@kayaker](#): > > Ahh, yes, my apologies. I’d forgotten the whole connecting your seatbelt speech. Yeah, and the real Miracle on the Hudson was that Sully not only successfully ditched the plane, but personally escorted each and every passenger off.:rolleyes::rolleyes::rolleyes::rolleyes::rolleyes: ---
**Author:** ![Ann\_Hedonia](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ann_hedonia/32/319_2.png) [@Ann\_Hedonia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ann_Hedonia)\ **Post date:** [April 19, 2017, 2:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-airlines-allowed-to-bump-passengers-for-crew/784695/31 "2017-04-19T02:05:46Z")
> [@Tom\_Tildrum](#): > > Well, but the tickets they issue to their passengers bind the airline to its [contract of carriage](https://www.united.com/web/en-US/content/contract-of-carriage.aspx), I think. It’s not clear to me that United’s contract of carriage permits bumping passengers for crew. Rule 25 sets forth procedures for denying boarding to a passenger when a flight is “oversold,” but Rule 1 defines “oversold” to mean “more passengers than available seats,” and “passengers” is defined to exclude “members of the crew.” Now, I am not a lawyer but if I was a lawyer for United I might argue that if the airline needs a seat for a purpose other than passenger transport then the number of available seats on the plane is reduced and the flight then meets the contract definition of overbooked - they have sold more tickets than available seats. I’ve seen the same thing happen when they have to switch planes and the only available plane has fewer seats. I’ve also seen passengers bumped because a flight was overweight, not oversold. I’ve seen this happen a lot, usually on flights to a major skiing or golfing destination. They actually bump people because of the weight of all the golf clubs. And I’ve seen it happen after boarding, now that I think about it. Now I’m not going to defend the people that beat up that guy, but I don’t get the outrage over the actual bumping. I don’t consider myself any sort of a frequent traveler but stuff happens when you travel by air. When I really really HAD have to be somewhere I give myself an extra day. , I’ve also noticed, in the last couple of years, a huge increase in delays due to crew delays. Now this might be coincidence since I usually only fly 2-3 times a year (but I’m old so that adds up to lots of flight experience in a lifetime.) But I wonder if there’s another reason, like maybe changes in crew regulations. I know there was a lot of attention to crew hours after pilot fatigue was blamed for a regional jet crash. ---
**Author:** ![Beren\_Erchamion](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/90ced4/32.png) [@Beren\_Erchamion](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Beren_Erchamion)\ **Post date:** [April 19, 2017, 2:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-airlines-allowed-to-bump-passengers-for-crew/784695/32 "2017-04-19T02:18:41Z")
> [@Dinsdale](#): > > If you aren’t going to remember what you write, I guess I won’t trouble myself to respond to it. I remember exactly what I wrote. I also remember _everything_ I wrote. Specifically, the point you quoted was but _one part_ of what I said–my original comment also dealt with the duty-day regs. There’s a reason the bit you quoted had the word “also” in it. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-airlines-allowed-to-bump-passengers-for-crew/784695.md?page=1)