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American Airlines botches incident with “overweight passenger”

Theo

If a passenger falls into your seat, you shouldn’t be the one who has to suffer. An American Airlines passenger didn’t even receive compensation when he was squashed next to an obese passenger on a crowded flight. This is not how these situations should be handled by AA or any other airline.

American Airlines does not follow its own guidelines, Subject: Overweight passenger

An American Airlines passenger complained that he was seated next to an “overweight passenger” on a crowded flight who invaded his privacy, making the flight very uncomfortable. When he complained to American Airlines, he received a canned response with no compensation:

I flew last week and the person in the middle seat next to me was very obese. She couldn’t put the armrest down because of her size and more than half of my seat was taken up by this person whose body was pressed against mine. The flight was completely full and they (flight attendants) couldn’t offer me anything. That was a pretty uncomfortable flight. I wrote to AA to complain but their response was a canned letter that neither addressed my complaint nor offered any solutions or compensation.

This is a difficult situation, made worse by American Airlines simply looking the other way rather than enforcing its own rules. View From The Wing is absolutely right that AA has published a protocol for dealing with situations where extra space is needed:

  • When you call to book, the reservation ensures that you get two seats next to each other for the same price.
  • If you have not booked an extra seat in advance, ask an airport employee if two seats next to each other are available.
  • You may be offered a seat in a higher class of service with more space. In this case, you will have to pay the difference in price.
  • If accommodation is not available on your original flight, you can purchase seats on another flight for the same price as your original seats.

I know it’s easy for a gate agent to look the other way…there is no easy way to handle a situation and in many cases there is shame and embarrassment involved.

But that doesn’t make it right! If a passenger fails to prepare for their special needs, the suffering should not be placed on the victim.

I’m not attacking the fat passenger here… no rant about fitness and dieting today. But no matter what you’re facing (some people are tall and huge-boned, others have weight issues due to glandular problems, and still others just eat too many calories), you don’t have the right to take up someone else’s space on the plane. If you can’t fold down your armrest, you’ll have to get a second seat. How you do that is up to you… but taking up your seatmate’s space is unacceptable.

We’ll see if AA responds better this time than last time.

DIPLOMA

American Airlines has a reasonable approach to dealing with overweight passengers: it just needs to enforce its own policies. While complaining to a flight attendant or delaying a flight by refusing to sit down may seem petty, forcing passengers to give up their personal space to be “polite” is unreasonable.

> Learn more: American Airlines mocks passenger who complained about being ‘squeezed’ between two obese passengers

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