Travelers whose schedules are flexible and have purchased either cheap airplane tickets or cheap vacation packages to fly on Delta Air Lines now are being invited to inform the airline how much money they would accept to give up their seats if their flight is oversold.
Passengers are being encouraged to participate in what amounts to be a blind auction that allows travelers to submit their price when they check in online or at an airport kiosk.
This allows us to eliminate the auction process at the gate, lets you tell us how much value you place on changing your travel plans, and gives our agents more time to rebook you and get the flight on time, according to Delta.
Some travel experts believe that by introducing competition between passengers for price flexibility that Delta may be able to reduce its payouts over time for bumping passengers.
When no or not enough passengers volunteer to rebook their flights and customers are involuntarily bumped, each passenger is entitled to $400 compensation if their new flights are scheduled to arrive one to two hours later than the original arrival. For international flights the time frame is one to four hours.
Involuntarily bumped passengers are entitled to $800 if scheduled to arrive more than two hours later for domestic flights and more than four hours later for international flights.
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