Air passengers have few rights

Name another industry that requires its customers to reserve and pay in full for their purchases weeks or months before getting what they're buying; one that provides the bare minimum in the way of customer service, amenities or considerations; one whose companies offer no guarantees they will provide the services they're selling; one that can choose to deny customers what they've paid for with virtually no compensation or recourse.

Passenger rights have never been good, but in recent years the term has become something of an oxymoron. There are more rules regarding the luggage they check than protections for the passengers themselves.

Here's how US Airways begins its 23-page "Terms of Transportation" (updated Aug 7, 2007), rules its lawyers have devised to outline its obligations to paying passengers.

In boldfaced capital letters, it writes, "Purchase of a ticket does not guarantee transportation. US Airways shall in no event be liable for any indirect, special, or consequential damages resulting from the performance or delay in performance of or failure to perform, transportation of customers and services incidental thereto [except baggage liability] whether or not US Airways had knowledge that such damages might be incurred."

This is not to single out any single carrier. All domestic airlines operate under similar, self-defined rules, as stipulated in their "Contracts of Carriage." When passengers purchase a ticket, they automatically agree to these complex collections of conditions and caveats, which can be found buried on the carrier's Web site.

Airlines don't guarantee their departure or arrival times, seat assignments, aircraft type or even that their flight will land at the stated destination. In addition, they are also free to change their rules whenever and however they wish and without notice.

In exchange for their tacit acceptance of these stipulations, passengers get virtually nothing in return.

Consider the issue of delayed and canceled flights, a situation that reached epic proportions this summer when at times thousands of flights were canceled and up to 40 percent of all departures failed to operate even close to schedule.

Once upon a time, a federal regulation known as Rule 240 required carriers to immediately re-accommodate passengers whose flights were canceled or inordinately delayed. If they couldn't get passengers on their next flight, carriers were legally bound to put them on the next flight operated by another carrier. Many delayed passengers still cite this rule when pleading for assistance from airline personnel.

Problem is, Rule 240 disappeared with the deregulation of the airlines nearly 30 years ago. Some carriers (United, Delta and Northwest) still refer to Rule 240 in re-accommodation clauses in their Contracts of Carriage, but it's a cruel sham. Their self-defined interpretations offer none of the guarantees travelers once had.

To use a ticket issued by one carrier on another's flight, the first carrier must agree to endorse the change and the second carrier must agree to accept it, both problematic. Almost no airline these days guarantees to rebook their stranded passengers on another carrier's flight. To complicate the situation further, because the primary travel document for the vast majority of trips these day are electronic tickets (indeed paper tickets soon will be totally eliminated), few passengers even travel with an endorsable ticket in their possession.

US Airways states it "will rebook the customer on its next available flight to the customer's ticketed destination without additional charge. If US Airways is unable to provide onward transportation, US Airways may attempt to rebook the customer on the next available flight of another airline with which US Airways has an agreement allowing the acceptance of each others tickets."

While airlines say they will put delayed passengers on their next available flight, with fewer departures these days, smaller planes and more of them flying full, the next available flight may be days away.

To be sure, bad weather and air traffic problems are always possibilities, but even if a carrier is totally responsible for a botched departure and strands its passengers in a distant airport, in the most cases, the only compensation they are guaranteed is a refund of the ticket price. If no suitable onward transportation is available, some carriers may give stranded passengers a meal voucher or hotel room. Others, such as AirTran, flatly state that they "will not provide or reimburse passengers for any expenses incurred due to delays or cancellations of flights."

Carriers are quick to cite competitive pressures to justify these hard-line positions. They set all the rules and leave passengers little recourse other than filing a complaint or taking their business elsewhere the next time around.

Unfortunately, as things stand, there may be no other option, and even if another airline offers suitable routing, none offer more assurances they'll actually get you where you're heading.

As stated, passengers have been more or less at the mercy of airlines for decades, but with the deterioration of service standards carriers have become increasingly callous and more travelers have been left literally holding their bags.

Some consumer groups have started lobbying for the federal government to re-regulate the airline industry, but is this an answer?

Probably not. While legally mandating a more balanced playing field for travelers is an enticing idea, it's hard to have faith that a politically expedient bureaucracy will be up to the task. Consider how efficient federal mandates have been at establishing enhanced airport security.

The one force airlines are likely to heed is the power of the purse. When the traveling public either chooses to give all its business to carriers that provide more than lip service to consumer rights or refuses to fly altogether, things will change.

Unfortunately, until that occurs, the situation is not likely to improve.