Seem one has the right to yell and scream at a ticket counter person – whom much like you- is very fustrated that the flight has been cancelled and now that it’s acceptable to yell at an airport(or so it seems)the poor ticket agent has to endure all this abuse even though she/he has nil control over the weather, flight canx due to mech. issues and/or if a pilot decides to call sick. Do these same people also yell at waiters if their food is late, yell at toll collectors if there is traffic on the bridge, and so forth. Why is OK to act like a complete jerk at the airport ?
We understand the fustration and almost all of us try to help each passenger but keep in mind, if only a few of us are scheduled, we didn’t decide that either. So this weekend – if you have a problem at the airport – keep in mind – we’re trying to help and – we’re working this long weekend while you’re not.

You have the right to run from one terminal to the next one after the plane delays have shortened your 1 hour layover to 10 minutes.

Very well said… the airlines are nothing more then paid criminals with no compassion for the travelers.

Like to add right number 21: You have the right to keep your frustrations to yourself. Any display of frustrations will hold you up further while the airlines decide whether you are a terrorist or an unset customer.

How true it is!! Too funny!!

You also have an automatic right to hop freely many cities which you never intended to,after paying for a non-stop flight coast-to-coast for the reason that the flight is full/delayed/cancelled.

You have the right to have your bags diverted to a much more enjoyable destination than you currently find yourself.

You have the right to completely forfeit your right of search and seizure.

Sorry to say, but this article is below the level of almost any high school paper. CNN: get rid of this “writer”.

21. You have the right to be knowinglly lied to about the cause of the delay.
22. You have the right to have the remaining portion of your flight canceled because the airline canceled one of your legs and since you didn’t make the flight the rest is cancelled.
23. You have the right to enjoy whatever tempature the airplane reaches while waiting on whatever piece of ground your on.
24. You have the right to gamble with your fellow seatmates or fellow airport dwellers on the odds of a flight making on time to a destination. You may also gamble on if a flight will fly and the odds of the canceled flights luggage making to the destination.

You have the right to speak with the foreign reservations agent for a domestic airline, who’s language skills will leave you paying more money to fly to an airport of their choice, on whatever itinerary they choose, possibly with your luggage.

I severely limited my flying 3 years ago. Now I either drive a car or take a train to my destination, whenever possible. What triggered this change was a disgusting service I have received during my flight on Air France from Prague via Paris to JFK. The 24 hour delay, accompanied by rudeness and indifference of the personnel at the C.DeGaulle airport, including prolonged searches of ALL passengers with American passports,
still bring back anger and nausea.

You have the right to an airfare with a price that seems to be determined mostly on whim. The same trip can be purchased from a bewildering variety of sources, with a bewildering variety of prices, depending on a bewildering variety of conditions that change without notice for a bewildering variety of reasons. You have no right to understand or receive a coherent explanation for any of this.

Hey,

Bitter, party of one, your table is ready! If air travel is so bad, go grey hound. Everybody wants the cheap fares/seats. In order to make that happen while still having the airline insdusty turn a profit to stay in business, every seat needs to be full. Demand had to go up because costs went down. Simple supply and demand. Even the regional carriers are feeling the pain of the fuel prices and are unable to hold fuel hedging costs. If customers want the perks of the past, they have to pay for that in higher ticket prices.
This is a very competitive industry and in order to make it you have to meet the cost demands along with identify what customers are willing to pay for a price of a ticket.
You failed to notice that in the past you paid a higher price for all the benefits you write in your blog. I’m certain that what you’re paying now is much less than what paid back in the 90’s.

In an effort to return feeling to the lower body after three hours in flight, you have the right to stand if the pilot remembers to turn off the fasten seatbelt light.

You have the right to provide alcoholic beverages to the passanger next to you, until they pass out, in an attempt to shut off their A/C, which at full blast, has been pointed straight at you for the past 2 hours.

- you have the right to bet with your seat neighbor on whether your luggage will arrive and if, when
- you have the right to chime in with the 2 year old nearby that has been crying their lungs out for the past 3 hours
- you have the right to envision violent scenes in your mind when thinking about how the guy in front of you who just smashed your knee when lowering his seat could be punished
- you have the right to not go to the restroom and test your bladder because you cannot climb the unconscious mountain next to you
- you have the right to wonder of how they can actually consider passing out these random quality surveys when you question yourself of why you are doing this to yourself
- you have a right to test your marketing skills by envisioning a great commercial for such pleasant experience

You have the right to “not have any right.”

Hey Mike from Chicago, wake-up. The airline industry is horrible. They have no regard for their customers. In any other business they would go belly-up. They are lucky the entry barriers are so costly. I personaly think that the american people should show some guts and reduce their flight time as much as they can to show the airline industry who really has the power.

Jim

If you are taller than 1,8 meters, you have the right to cut your legs to fit in the economy seats…
Flying is a lot worse than travelling on a bus or in a crowded tube…but a lot more expensive…unfortunately, there’s no other choice.

21. You have the right to be subjected to bad and rude flight attendants.
22. You have the right to a seat that is so cramped that it doesn’t qualify under the United Nations definition for cruelty to animals.
23. You have the right to sleep in your seat during the flight, as being awake is truly a nightmare.

I would also add to Mike from Chicago… I travel transcontinentally three to five times a month. I don’t think I could do that on a Greyhound. I believe that people in any aspect of our consumer culture have a right to the expectation of good service, of getting what they paid for. You pay for an apple you expect it not to be rotten. You pay for a diamond, it shouldn’t be made of glass. And if you pay to leave New York at 6 PM you shouldn’t end up sleeping on the floor of the airport waiting for news of when the airline will permit you to board an aircraft that is still in the Twilight Zone.

Master Bing: Amen.

21. If you are brown-skinned or are overheard speaking any language other than English, you have the right to be all-but-cavity-searched in front of everyone at the security checkpoint by a TSA employee who can barely make a full sentence (in English or any language). Protesting this treatment may cause repeated searches, questioning, or detention. (It’s still happening, people.)

22. You have the right to any newspaper, book, or magazine in the terminal that has been left unattended for more than three seconds.

23. You have the right to the space your buttocks are applied to, but not to any corresponding space that your back, head, hands, or feet would then be touching if you sat comfortably. If you forget this right, other passengers will quickly and helpfully remind you.

If you have muscular dystrophy, and a wheel chair, and land in an airport other than the one you were destined for, you have the right to argue with the Delta personnel who refuse to give you your wheelchair when deplaning for the night.

You have the right to be shifted to another terminal across the Intercontinental airport within a 20 minute timeframe out of fear of missing your flight only to find out that your connecting flight was delayed 2 hours because of a faulty light bulb.

Our rights as passengers with the legal ease is very similar to our coverage from insurance companies when we the insured need them, it is well your not covered and if you read the fine print and the various sub-paragraphs 1-100 this is why. What’s the point of talking about it, we the people are screwed when it comes to our rights or lack there of, and the rights of these corporations to eliminate any possiblity of having to take responsibility for their actions.

21. You have the right to understand that traveling by commercial air is not a right.

22. You have the right to pay half, in inflation-corrected dollars, of what you paid for equivalent travel before deregulation (you have the right to thank the Carter administration for that wonderful move).

23. You have the right to join 128 other passengers in acting like South American soccer fans in verbally (and sometimes physically) abusing every airline employee in sight when weather, maintenance or a dozen other legitimate reasons cause flights to be cancelled or delayed.

24. You have the right to buy a share in NetJets and totally avoid the bargain of commercial airline travel.

Look, none of us like the situation. I’m an (early) retiree and former major airline pilot. I’m the guy who gets the last seat—on the rare occasion there is one—after all revenue passengers, misconnects, frequent flyer redeemers and every active employee and her 7 children grab theirs. My reward for 25 years of scratch-and-injury-free service was to get my pension terminated, and tens of thousands of still active employees (at least those who weren’t furloughed) took absurd pay cuts and benefit reductions so you all could enjoy your absurdly low fares and the packed airplanes they produced. What hasn’t been produced? Reliable profits. So be thankful that the system continues to somehow struggle along in spite of lots of warts. It’s a lot like Democracy—the worst possible system, except for all the rest.

You have the right to sit in a crowded aiport on your honeymoon, waiting to board a Delta flight that is six hours delayed (and NOT due to weather).
When you finally do reach your destination, you have the right to be told that your connecting flight is waiting for you, only to rush to the gate to find out it left 5 minutes ago because “they absolutely have to leave on time” (where was that guy on the last flight?!).
At that point, you have the right to be told that they will not give you any meal vouchers, and there are no toiletry kits left even if you can see them behind the counter.
In the morning, you have the right to get up early so you can be at the airport in time to wait around for your flight to be cancelled…
Please note, you also have the right to hear grouchy airline employees tell you that you have no right to be angry about any of this.

Yeah, Jessica, some of them are writing in, as you may notice.

Cute!

Hey Jerk off Take the bus next time you travel.

21. You have the right to have your plane piloted by two people who, as a condition, of being hired, could prove they could not tell time.

22. You have the right to talk to any airline employee you choose so long as you remember that s/he had to fail a minimum of five (5) lie-detector tests before being hired.

23. You have the right to be told by Delta that your flight from Atlanta to Tulsa is canceled because “Tulsa is under a tornado alert,” this on a mid-December day when there was not a cloud in the sky over Tulsa.

24. You have the right to escape terminal and plane bedlam by buying a lifetime membership in the AA Admirals Club and now be surrounded by screaming, out-of-control children about whose behavior their parents couldn’t care less because “kids have rights.”

25. You have the right at O’Hare to be patted down by TSA when you stopped and asked an airport rent-a-cop standing over 100′ from the nearest security point for help in finding a restroom at the airport.

26. You have the right to be screamed at and called an “a–hole” by a U.S. Scareways baggage employee @ Richmond Airport when you inquired when your bags might arrive at that airport.

27. You have the right to fly in First Class from DFW to Richmond with a child screaming non-stop at the top of his lungs the entire way while the parents make never a gesture to walk the child, silence the child, or apologize to anyone in First Class.

28. You have the right to know that all fired airline executives go to work in the cell-phone business.

29. You have the right to know that no senior airline executive ever flies on anything other than a private jet.

You have the right to realize your $100.00 round trip ticket DOESN’T entitle you to first class service. Pay for First Class if that’s what you DEMAND!

You have the right to the certain knowledge that whatever else they take away from you the airline can only take your sense of humor if you let them(besides refusing to take them seriously confuses them and gives you the ability to exact some small measure of revenge).

I had the right yesterday on a United Flight to be re-routed to another airport 60 miles away from my destination without any means such as a shuttle to get me to my destination. I went to the United customer service and spoke to a supervisor. This lady (Shelandra) said United has never offered ground transportation. This of course is a bald face lie because United has provided ground transportation in the past.