This is something I've never thought of. Mostly because I almost always use travel credits I've received from airlines. I did once let ~$120 in Southwest flight credits expire after cancelling a...
The fight boils down to a simple question: when a passenger cancels and never flies, who has to send the money back—an airline, or the government that collected the fee?
This is something I've never thought of. Mostly because I almost always use travel credits I've received from airlines. I did once let ~$120 in Southwest flight credits expire after cancelling a return leg of a round-trip flight. I -- or my employer since they paid for the flight -- should have gotten that $5.60 passenger security fee back.
I feel like there are a couple easy ways to deal with this.
FORCE AIRLINES TO REFUND BACK TO ORIGINAL FORM OF PAYMENT! Unless the customer specifically requests travel credit. This would practically guarantee a refund of the passenger security fee, along with other unused taxes and government fees. I shouldn't have to pay for a more expensive, higher tier ticket to get a cash refund. But that's a separate argument for a different day.
Since that'll never happen in the US, issue travel credit for the bulk of the ticket (ugh), but then separately refund the security fee and other unused taxes and government fees back to the original payment method.
I do think Southwest, or any airline (there's another court case, Hahn vs JetBlue, that's basically the same argument, but a customer bringing suit), should be the one refunding the fee. A commenter makes a great point:
Fundamentally, how is that any different from retailers who collect state and local sales taxes on behalf of a state and its subdivisions and then periodically remit those taxes to the state?
If a customer returns taxable goods to a retailer, the retailer refunds the sales tax collected and offsets the sales tax refunded to the customer against the next periodic remittance of sales tax to the state.
But given it's the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals, it'll probably rule for Southwest. So TSA will be on the hook. Though if that's the case, doubt we'll see much movement by the government to get people their money. Especially these days.
This is something I've never thought of. Mostly because I almost always use travel credits I've received from airlines. I did once let ~$120 in Southwest flight credits expire after cancelling a return leg of a round-trip flight. I -- or my employer since they paid for the flight -- should have gotten that $5.60 passenger security fee back.
I feel like there are a couple easy ways to deal with this.
I do think Southwest, or any airline (there's another court case, Hahn vs JetBlue, that's basically the same argument, but a customer bringing suit), should be the one refunding the fee. A commenter makes a great point:
But given it's the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals, it'll probably rule for Southwest. So TSA will be on the hook. Though if that's the case, doubt we'll see much movement by the government to get people their money. Especially these days.