House Transportation Committee Grills Airlines on Customer Service Policies

During nearly four-and-a-half hours before the House Infrastructure & Transportation Committee Tuesday, airline executives detailed their strategies to reduce passenger bumping and improve customer service. Committee members indicated they might step in with regulations should those remedies prove ineffective.

The committee grilled American Airlines, United Airlines, Southwest Airlines and Alaska Airlines over a litany of woes—bag fees, delays and seat comfort, to name a few—last month's forcible removal of a passenger from a United flight was at the core of the discussion. United CEO Oscar Munoz detailed the significant policy overhaul the carrier announced last week, including reduced overbooking, a $10,000 compensation ceiling for denied boarding and increased training. "This is a turning point for United," Munoz said. "It's my mission to ensure we make the changes needed to provide our customers with the highest level of service and deepest sense of respect."

Other carriers also said the incident spurred them to review their policies in order to reduce denied boarding instances. American already had announced a policy to never ask passengers to give up seats after boarding, and now it has increased the number of employees who manage overbooking situations and established a hotline for gate agents who need to offer compensation in those situations, SVP of customer experience Kerry Philipovitch said. "We have not established an upper limit on what we will pay to solicit volunteers," she said. "We have entrusted our team to make the best decisions to serve our customers."

Alaska Airlines SVP of external relations Joseph Sprague said the carrier is "actively looking at policies" to reduce denied boarding instances, including granting customer service agents explicit discretion over compensation. Like American, that does not include a specific dollar amount, though Alaska might consider a "high-value, maximum upper limit" at some point, he said.

For its part, Southwest chief commercial officer and EVP Bob Jordan reiterated the carrier's recent decision to end overbooking altogether on May 8.

The carriers also emphasized that passengers are bumped infrequently and that the U.S. airline industry's customer service scores have improved over the past few years. Nonetheless, even House Transportation Committee members who usually lean away from new regulations said federal intervention is not off the table. "I shouldn't need to remind you that Congress will not hesitate to act, whenever necessary, to ensure your customers are treated with the respect they deserve," committee chair Bill Shuster said. "If we don't see meaningful results that improve customer service, the next time this committee meets to address this issue, I can assure you that you will not like the outcome."