DOTC adopts greater airline passengers' rights

MANILA, Philippines - The Department of Transportation and Communications (DOTC) is set to fully implement the on the overbooking of flights by local airlines next month as the government continued to implement measures that would help decongest the Ninoy Aquino International Airport (NAIA).

Transportation Secretary Mar Roxas said in a press conference that the government has already finalized the draft Passenger Bill of Rights that would lay down the rights of passengers as well as the obligations of local airlines.

Roxas told reporters that the agency would conduct a public hearing on Friday wherein the proposed draft would be made available to consumer groups, local airlines, the Department of Tourism, the Senate, the House of Representatives, and other groups.

He pointed out that the public hearing would serve as “due process” for the draft proposal and that the agency would conduct two to three public consultations this month.

“We expect two to three hearings maximum, then we will put out the final regulation by August,” he said.

According to him, the highlight of the proposed draft is the process of bumping off passengers due to airlines’ practice of overbooking flights.

“You can only get be bumped off if you will voluntarily and consensually agree,” the DOTC chief said.

He explained that there should be a system of bidding where if there is a need to bump off passengers because of overbooking, the airline companies will start offering incentives which gradually increases until they get enough number of passengers who will accept it and opt to back out and take the next flight.

“But the decision which passenger who would be bumped off will no longer be at the hands of the airline companies,” he added.

The CAB ordered the suspension of airlines’ overbooking option “until further notice, or conditions are such as to assure the Board that the practice is not inherently inimical to public interest” after the DOTC chief took note of the mounting number of passenger complaints due to delayed and cancelled flights as well as other concerns on lost or misrouted baggage.

Meanwhile, Roxas said local airlines voluntarily agreed to delay flights under a coordinated arrival slotting system being implemented by Civil Aviation Authority of the Philippines (CAAP) to decongest NAIA especially during peak hours between 7 am and 4 pm.

He revealed that local airlines tapped a foreign third-party slotting coordinator that would help limit the number of takeoffs and landings at the NAIA runway to a maximum of 40 during peak hours.

Data of actual flights in a certain week during the summer 2012 passenger season, a total of 2,620 events were registered at the NAIA runway. Actual events in per hour slices went to as high as 48.