Quote:
Originally Posted by AirlinesMustPay
About a week before the hearing, AA's Attorney wrote to me saying they would pay in full.
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His initial proposal was that the airline would pay me in full before the date of the hearing, and I would sign a document saying that I would not disclose the details of the settlement, and on the date of the hearing I would withdraw the claim, so the settlement would not be entered in the records of the Court.
I wrote back saying that AA had an opportunity to settle before it reached Court, reminding him that Daisy in Miami had told me to "Go right ahead" to Court, so why did they want confidentiality now? They must have known that when a claim comes up in Court, it is heard before a court room full of people.
I think passengers need to know that small claims courts are available in most jurisdictions. Just go to the Court and you may get help from the clerks there as to how to draw up your claim and their procedures. Most aggrieved passengers just walk away, thinking perhaps the airline is in the right, or thinking the airline will have "big lawyers" or they can't afford the day off from work, etc.
Airlines bank on the fact that passengers will do just that - complain a little and walk away aggrieved. Airlines are quick to cry "weather", "act of God", "Air traffic problems", although often even if there is a problem related to one of these things, there are things in the control of the airline to relieve the passengers distress and I dont mean to just hand the passenger a distressed passenger voucher for a discount room in a hotel.
If you are on an international flight, the Warsaw Convention or one of its amendments will apply. The wording of Article 20 found in the Convention and all its amendments is: "In the carriage of passengers and baggage,and in the case of damage occasioned by delay in the carriage of cargo, the carrier shall not be liable if he proves that he and his servants and agents have taken
all necessary measures to avoid the damage or that it was impossible fo them to take such measures."
Courts have been slow to find that efforts of airlines to avoid the damage, have provided them with a defence in this section, even when acts of God and ATC problems are concerned.
Airlines seem content to lie to their own agents who would then refuse to fairly compensate passengers (as Airhead admitted earlier), saying this and that is their policy, but their managers and lawyers know full well what is right and wrong and when taken to Court, the big bad airlines then become meek pussycats, asking you to settle quietly.