Mother sues American Airlines and wins: She was told children weren’t entitled to seats and could be deported for any reason
This is the story of fighting against a company that makes crazy claims – and winning.
A mom flew an American Airlines passenger from Portland to Dallas to Tallahassee with her two 18-month-old twins. Since only one child can fly on her lap, she bought the other child her own seat using her miles, but a flight attendant refused to allow her to use it, saying that children under two years old were not allowed to occupy seats without a car seat. It was wrong. The passenger sued American because he I will not refund the seat they had purchased it but were not authorized to use it.
According to the American,
- They are only required to transport a passenger, not to transport them in a seat. Since the toddler flew, he received the full value of his ticket.
- The flight attendant, who threatened to kick passengers off the flight and refused to use the seat based on a misunderstanding of the policy, had the right to do so. even if they were wrong.
This is literally insane. According to the American website, a child can sit in their own seat, without a car seat, if they can “sit upright in your seat without assistance and have your seat belt properly fastened during taxiing, takeoff, landing and whenever the “Fasten Seat Belt” sign is illuminated.
Everything was fine on Erika Hamilton’s first flight, but on her connecting flight, a crew member told her that it was “the policy of the FAA and American Airlines not to allow a baby less than two years old to occupy their own seat without a car seat.
The crew member threatened to move the family away, but another passenger intervened and offered to let the second child sit on them. their tower, which is considered less safe than flying in their own seat with seat belt.
But since the stranger helped them, the family has been traveling, and that’s the reason American Airlines refused the refund.
Erika Hamilton and the twins when they are allowed to sit on seats
And according to American, their contract of carriage says nothing about whether a passenger actually has a seat. So they can be like Pakistan International Airlines and carry 7 passengers standing in the aisle for a 1,700 mile journey.
The plaintiff alleges that American violated the CoC by refusing to let her infant occupy the seat she purchased. The child, however, had a ticket that required American to transport her from Portland, Oregon, to her final destination, Tallahassee, Florida. Although Plaintiff alleges that there was a dispute over where and how the baby should sit, Plaintiff does not dispute that the baby was in fact flown safely from Portland, Oregon , in Tallahassee, Florida.
Plaintiff presents no facts to support the terms of the CoC supporting its claim for breach of contract by American, and there is nothing in the existing contract that requires American to do anything beyond transporting a passenger from one place to another on the date and time of the ticket. Even the allocation of a passenger’s seat is not guaranteed by the contract.
I think it’s actually a lot simpler than that.
- The family purchased a service, a seat that they were not allowed to use, so this service had to be reimbursed. (Lap babies travel free on domestic flights, so the trip was completed without the need for the purchase that the airline refused to allow them to use.)
- In fact, American Airlines doesn’t regularly carry more passengers than seats. The idea that a seat This is how ticketed passengers should be transported is assumed, and no one ever thought it necessary to state this explicitly until American Airlines claimed otherwise.
Meanwhile, the idea that flight attendants can deny passengers boarding for any reason or no reason, and such decisions cannot be reviewed, is simply wrong. Here, the flight attendant acted directly against airline policy, and American’s contract of carriage states that the airline acts as the sole judge of a passenger’s fitness to fly – and not as a crew member acting against the advice of the airline.
And Americans surely would not agree that a racist flight attendant determining that no African-American passengers are capable of following security protocols is justified in expelling all African-Americans. The power of cabin crew to evacuate passengers is therefore not unlimited, even in the eyes of the airline.
The American should have refunded the ticket rather than putting yourself in the position of making these stupid arguments. The airline failed to obtain a dismissal at summary judgment. And now the mom has now been vindicated with $3,500.
According to the woman, her goal was to make a simple point – a point she shouldn’t have had to make.
I took the case to court because I think a big problem with corporate America is that there is very little recourse for the “little guy” when a company is essentially stealing from you. What happened here was American Airlines sold me a ticket and then refused to let me use that ticket because they didn’t know or understand the terms and conditions of their own contract .
Erika Hamilton is a legend.
