Recently, Hawaii’s hometown airline had several infuriating failures. And, based on my less serious issues with them, Hawaiian’s latest issues don’t surprise me at all. In fact, I’d say this is par for the course, just on a larger scale.
Hawaiian Airlines recently made national news for stranding a flight full of people for over thirty hours in New York while another flight got stuck in Las Vegas for twenty-six hours. All in the same week. Seriously. And, yes, both of these instances were due to mechanical issues.
Hawaiian’s Latest Issues Don’t Surprise Me
So what happened? Apparently, both of Hawaiian’s recent lengthy delays were the result of mechanical issues. What exactly happened? I have no idea. I had a friend on the Las Vegas flight who said that the reason kept changing and that an employee told him something completely different from what was being announced. Of course, from what I heard, it took forever for Hawaiian to actually acknowledge that the flight was delayed and then provide passengers accommodation for what, eventually, would become an extra overnight stay. But at least these passengers got accommodations and meal vouchers.
In New York, it appears that an issue with the aircraft’s APU resulted in the release of noxious fumes into the cabin, triggering a maintenance delay, which eventually led to the crew timing out. In this case, though, aside from Hawaiian not providing updates, they didn’t provide accommodations and gave passengers a single $12 meal voucher. Oh, and they didn’t offload passengers’ bags and wouldn’t allow them to rebook.
Of course, as the title of this post states, Hawaiian’s latest issues don’t surprise me. You see, every time my flights on Hawaiian get delayed, they tend not to inform you of the delay until AFTER your departure time comes and goes. And once the delay happens, Hawaiian often isn’t good about keeping you informed on what’s going on, how long to expect to be stuck, and so forth.
On another occasion, my flight from Kahului to Honolulu initially got delayed due to a hydraulic leak. However, after 20 minutes, our flight was canceled. Initially, we were supposed to arrive back home around 7 pm. After a lengthy wait in line, we were accommodated on the last flight out, arriving back in Honolulu at about 10 pm. Because of this, my travel party asked for meal vouchers. Our request was promptly denied by the station manager. Not cool. But that is within their contract of carriage.
Understand Your Rights
As I’ve said before, you really need to know your rights during irregular ops. For passengers of these flights, Hawaiian absolutely owed them accommodations, as the delays were a result of preventable (mechanical) issues, and they were certainly long enough (greater than three hours). The issue, of course, is that Hawaiian likes to try to skirt their own contract of carriage.
For example, in the case of the New York flight, Hawaiian refused to cancel the flight in an effort to prevent requests for accommodations. Yet, their own contract of carriage states:
- Hotel Rooms. If (i) the delay is expected to exceed 3 hours and extend into the period 10:00 pm through 6:00 am, and (ii) no scheduled alternate transportation is available to your destination or stopover point, we will provide one night’s lodging at an accommodation we select, provided, however, that we will not provide lodging for you if you reside in the city where the delay occurs.
Yet, according to passengers, Hawaiian refused. Hawaiian states that there was a lack of availability nearby. I’m sorry, but that doesn’t seem like it should’ve mattered. They should have provided lodging and ground transportation to passengers, even if it meant having to go back to Manhattan. Of, Hawaiian should’ve worked with partner JetBlue to try to get passengers to Honolulu using alternate routings. But no.
Even then, $12 for what should have eventually been at least two meals at JFK? Yeah right. You’ll be lucky if $12 gets you a crappy sandwich and a bottle of water. What a joke!
Of course, Hawaiian did offer passengers a $1,000 travel voucher. If passengers accepted this, it would absolve Hawaiian of providing any further accommodations. And I’m sure this is something most people don’t know. From their contract of carriage:
- Alternatively. We may provide you a with a travel credit in lieu of any of the above. Your acceptance of a travel credit indicates your waiver of any of the above amenities. Travel credit (i) will be valid for travel only on Hawaiian within 365 days of the date of issue, (ii) will apply only to online transportation via Hawaiian, (iii) may not be endorsed to or accepted by any other carrier, and (iv) is not refundable, nor saleable, transferable, or assignable by you.
Hawaiian’s Latest Issues Don’t Surprise Me, Final Thoughts
While it’s unusual for Hawaiian to have severe delays like this, experiences with their long deteriorating inter-island service made is to that Hawaiian’s latest issues don’t surprise me one bit. And I fear things will continue to get worse, especially as Hawaiian grapples with its return to profitability, its IT missteps, and integrating a new type into its fleet. Honestly, I’m not sure what’s going on with them, but I feel that 2023 has been the airline’s worst year yet. Something has got to change.
This is where, having a local mentality can get Hawaiian into trouble. Being reactive instead of proactive and not being assertive and finding solutions just kind of hanging loose and hoping it all works out it’s not a strategy. But I see that in a lot of things that employees of Hawaiian do. I was delayed in Maui for eight hours about three months ago. It was weather related, so I guess I have no right, but they still treated us like cattle and didn’t keep us informed.
Not sure if it’s necessarily that, or more just being cheap? Hawaiian has a habit of operating like a cut-rate carrier while trying to operate like an upper-end one. After all, they’ve resisted WiFi until now because our passengers are “all on vacation.”