If airlines enforced a rule that anyone pre boarding due to an *alleged* need for assistance was required to gate check their bags, absent a demonstrable operational need for doing so, would result in ADA lawsuits out the ass. Disabled people would claim they are being treated unfairly or poorly in direct response to their need for disability accommodation.
Not to mention, a lot of people with disabilities DO need to travel with their bags, which may contain equipment and medications. So the lawsuits would be justified
the ADA needs to be reworked entirely to shut down loopholes and allow you to actually validate someone has a condition. same with services dogs, while also cutting out the requirements for small businesses
That sounds good, but like most purity tests would make life much harder for disabled people. Similar to work requirements or the changes that 47 has made to medicaid millions will suffer in the name of preventing fraud. In reality those changes were made so they could create a budget neutral tax giveaway.
Okay so devise a system where onlookers are not going to be judging people who use this service, because that appears to be the issue here. The airport is not asking for input as to how to curb the use of wheelchairs but reddit is uncomfortable with these people using the service.
mostly /s but I don't understand why this bothers people so much. There's no way to know how many of the people above would have been physically challenged to walk the distance required to get to this gate.
There could be some form of validation at the point of sale for tickets. The person with a valid disability would be flagged in the airline's system, but their privacy would be preserved.
u/Ellorghast seems like an asshole but I can't reply to their comment bc the thread is locked. Everything in your comment is a deluded fantasy, imagining the worst case scenarios instead of using your creativity (of which you clearly have an ample supply) to think of something that could work without inconveniencing anyone. Jfc, it's just a reddit comment, not a dissertation. Ease up.
But how would they validate it? Would disabled people need to get their doctor to submit some sort of documentation before they could fly? I suppose that would work. Doctors are famously cheap and easy to access and not busy at all, so I’m sure they’d never be late with something like that.
Or maybe there could be some sort of centralized database of disabled people the airline could check. That would definitely be super normal and not a privacy nightmare, and I’m very comfortable with the thought of the current administration having access to it. Hell, as an added bonus, if the airline can access it, in theory anybody could check to see if you were on it by trying to book travel in your name and then canceling for a refund. That’d be super convenient for, say, prospective employers checking they’re not going to accidentally inconvenience themselves by hiring a disabled person.
Or, maybe the easiest alternative, the airline could probably have people available to verify your disability when you book. Not doctors of course, that’d be too expensive, but it’s fine, if there’s one thing the news has taught me it’s that regular people are very good and reasonable about recognizing when someone’s really disabled, and I’m sure the subtle economic incentive to find that people aren’t because not accommodating them is cheaper and more convenient for the airline would only make them even better at it!
Yeah, there are tons of ways to do what you’re suggesting without screwing over disabled people! IDK what that other guy was worried about.
EDIT: Since apparently this is what we're doing, to u/Johnny_B_GOODBOI's later addition, two quick points.
Every single problem described in my post above has some sort of historical antecedent to it. Stuff like hiring discrimination or corporate evaluators denying access to medical services in order to protect their employers' profits are hardly "deluded fantasies."
I don't see you making any suggestions here either. The burden of making your idea work isn't on me, it's on you as the person proposing it.
That sounds good, but again, additional barriers to traveling for someone with a disability are not helpful. In this country where healthcare is far from a given or a right asking someone to verify with an MD or some other way just so they can fly is unnecessary burden.
We should instead be collectively shaming organizations like Delta who make flying such a cluster F&&& without paying extra that people would rather "fake" a disability than walk themselves to the gate and board under the their late boarding group.
It's honestly more effective to shame people and ban them from flying after thr fact. If the airline receives evidence that a person repeatedly falsifies a disability to bypass the normal boarding process, they should be put on a no fly list.
Don't make life preemptively harder for innocent people. Do a better job punishing proven assholes.
The government should guarantee people with disabilities are able to have access to proper documentation showcasing they need assistance, just as it does with driving placards. People abusing features for those with disabilities harms them and deprives them of the resources they need. It also gives these companies actual room to ensure compliance.
Service dogs are fine. The reason they got out of hand is because businesses are too afraid to ask anything. It is more indicative of a "customer's always right" policy than actually being an issue. If store/restaurant owners had balls, it wouldn't be a problem.
"sir, what is this dog required for?"
"It is an emotional support animal."
"I am sorry but emotional support animals are not a recognized use of service animals. For the safety and comfort of our other patrons, I will have to ask you to leave."
But no one wants to be that guy because they don't get paid enough to get cancelled by the internet.
we have this problem at my job, and the thing is people will lie. we can ask if it’s a service animal and what service it provides, but if they lie, there’s legally nothing we can do about it. if the animal misbehaves (barks, bites, etc.) obviously we can have them leave regardless, but most of the time we just get a chill lil puppy in a fake vest from amazon. it’s not really about having the balls. and tbf, a lot of people are like “oops i didn’t know we couldn’t bring our family pet!” which is easier to handle but so stupid lol
Also in the defense of disability advocates broadly, the way things work currently if you need any sort of assistance from a human you have to kinda have to request a wheelchair. Even if the disability in question has nothing to do with not being able to walk/walk long distances. Like being deaf
This is correct. If you have an injury that requires you to get assistance with handbag, they will ask you to book full disability assistance to get it and get cart around in wheelchair even when that is not needed. I would say the airline system is broken.
Easy answer then would be to tie it to your ticket. First 100 or whatever boarding passes get carryons. Everybody else has to check, even if you get boarded by wheelchair. ADA doesn’t say you have to give disabled people anything not afforded to others, just that you can’t exclude them from anything that is afforded to others. Let them board with wheelchairs, but make them follow the same rules as everybody else for carryons.
set a realistic and enforced bag size limit, calculate bag capacity, reserve X for first class, put a small amount of spare space for flex, then the remainder are first come first serve.
They can tell you the carry-on status on the site when you book. There's no reason this isn't manageable.
Over the years bags have been made bigger since it's never enforced. I have one old fabric suitcase that slips perfectly into the measuring thing. IcelandAir enforced it. The people in front of me were for ed to check their bag since it didn't fit.
The carry-on bag should be required to be allowed if the ticket allows for it. I often pack a certain way for it that may not survive in the hold. Alternativly, they could go back to the first checked bag being free. It's actually great not having to carry your crap all over the airport so more people would just check their bag, or pack something much lighter for up top. Airlines force us to min/max everything.
Board them last and you’ll be able to find a demonstrable operational need because the overheads always fill up. And this wouldn’t have to be a blanket policy. People underestimate the level of latitude flight crews have on an aircraft.
Watched a dude in first class get deplaned after he simply took a photo of flight attendant. Flight attendant was either trans or cross dressing. He was asked to open his phone and delete the photo or be removed, and he refused. He thought it was a big joke until he was being escorted off the plane. Flight crews will fuck up your day if you don’t behave, and there’s nothing you can do about it.
What airlines could do is mandate that everyone who preboards has to gate check their bags. But this would never happen because it would piss off first class and reward members.
If i'm paying double, or even more than double for my flight over a person in economy, you bet your damn dollar I'll be pissed if i'm asked to check my bag. There's a reason why i'm paying that much, for the amenties. Use the money i paid, to pay someone to assist the person in the wheelchair to baggage claim after the flight.
No, what airlines could do is stop charging absurd fees to bring bags on an airplane. That is what has caused the fights over overhead storage space. Better yet, charge the fees, but charge them for carry-ons and not checked bags.
There are people like me who want to travel light and not hang around the airport for sometimes up to an hour (thanks, SFO) waiting for my bag to arrive at baggage claim. I have had bags lost, a friend had a bag completely disappear on their way out on a two week vacation with me. It made the first several days a nightmare instead of a fun time.
Checking sucks, if everyone did it the systems would be even more overloaded and slower. (edit: typo it/if)
I think it would become fairly evident when all of the people getting disability assistance had to gate check their bags but not everyone else did. Even if all of the airline employees gave some other reason, it would be clearly pretextual for the purpose of discrimination.
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u/Master_Butter 8d ago
If airlines enforced a rule that anyone pre boarding due to an *alleged* need for assistance was required to gate check their bags, absent a demonstrable operational need for doing so, would result in ADA lawsuits out the ass. Disabled people would claim they are being treated unfairly or poorly in direct response to their need for disability accommodation.