2016-26178: Enhancing Airline Passenger Protections III

Summary

The Department of Transportation is issuing a third "Enhancing Airline Passenger Protections" final rule to enhance protections for air travelers and to improve the air travel environment as follows: Expanding the pool of reporting carriers for service quality data; requiring reporting carriers to include service quality data for their domestic scheduled flights operated by their code-share partners; enhancing the Department's code-share disclosure regulation to codify the statutory requirement that carriers and ticket agents must disclose any code-share arrangements on their Web sites on the first display presented in response to a search of a requested itinerary for each itinerary involving a code-share operation; and prohibiting undisclosed biasing based on carrier identity by carriers and ticket agents in any electronic displays of the fare, schedule or availability information of multiple carriers. The amendments to the reporting requirements in this rule will ensure that the Department obtains and provides to the public expanded and enhanced service quality data from the airlines. The provision to strengthen the Department's code-share disclosure rule will also enhance air travel consumer protection. Additionally, this final rule corrects certain drafting errors and makes minor changes to the Department's second Enhancing Airline Passenger Protections rule to better reflect the Department's intent. Other topics covered by the proposed rule that are not addressed by this final rule will be addressed in two separate rulemakings. Specifically, the Department will be issuing a Supplemental Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (SNPRM) to seek additional information on the disclosure of fees for basic ancillary services to consumers at all points of sale. The remaining topics discussed in the 2014 notice of proposed rulemaking (e.g., customer service commitments by large ticket agents, prohibition on post-purchase price increases for ancillary services) will be addressed in another final rule that the Department plans to issue at a later date.

The agency’s own summary, as published.

What this changes

Amends 8 parts of the Code of Federal Regulations — the standing rules this notice rewrites.

• 14 CFR 234 Airline Service Quality Performance Reports
• 14 CFR 244 Reporting Tarmac Delay Data
• 14 CFR 250 Oversales
• 14 CFR 255 Part 255 [Reserved]
• 14 CFR 256 Electronic Airline Information Systems
• 14 CFR 257 Disclosure of Code-Sharing Arrangements and Long-Term Wet Leases
• 14 CFR 259 Enhanced Protections for Airline Passengers
• 14 CFR 399 Statements of General Policy