5 travel traps lurking in the fine print
Your cruise ship may not be seaworthy. Your airline isn’t responsible for your checked luggage and if something’s stolen from your room, good luck getting the hotel to cover your losses.
Surprised? Don’t be. It’s all in the fine print.
Perhaps the only thing travel companies like more than taking your money is having their lawyers write rules that allow them to take even more of your money. And they’re often less than up-front about their intentions, burying cleverly crafted clauses deep within their contracts of carriage, cruise contracts and rental contracts.
According to travel attorney Alexander Anolik, there’s no telling what you’ll find in the fine print. “The more the company can exclude without completely scaring the customer away, the better,” he says.
Airlines, car rental companies, cruise lines and hotels have done this since there have been contracts to sign, of course. But in recent years, they’ve become more brazen in their efforts to aggressively embed customer-hostile provisions in their fine print.
Here are five clauses to watch out for in your travel contracts:
Our ship might sink
Before you set sail on your next cruise, you might want to have a look at your cruise contract (it’s on the cruise line’s Web site). Yeah, it’s full of legalese, but it can be a fascinating — and sometimes deeply troubling — read. Here’s what passenger Richard Pazara found in his Celebrity Cruises contract: “No undertaking or warranty shall be given or shall be implied as to the seaworthiness, fitness or condition of the Vessel or any food or drink supplied on board.” Pazara thought that was a little odd, but not as odd as what came next. “The contract had to be signed before embarkation or you were not allowed on board,” he says. Can you imagine a car rental company — or, God forbid, an airline — saying that about themselves? But it’s easy to see how a sentence about seaworthiness could save a cruise line money. If a ship sinks, it can say, “Well, we told you it might.”
We’re not responsible for your checked luggage
Think an airline will compensate you for the luggage it loses? Think again. Check the airline’s conditions of carriage and you’ll find a long, long list of items that aren’t covered. The contracts are all more or less the same. Here is American Airlines’ list of exclusions: antiques, artifacts, artwork, books and documents, china, computers and other electronic equipment, computer software, fragile items (including, strangely, baby strollers and car seats), eyeglasses, prescription sunglasses … you get the idea.
Anolik, the travel attorney, says this is the most-complained-about clause in the travel industry. “When you take out the heirlooms, electronics and cash, it leaves you with your dirty underwear,” he says. I recently asked an airline vice president why there were so many exclusions (other than the obvious reason that the airlines have to pay virtually no compensation to their customers when their bags are lost). The answer? The contract is a guide that is meant to help passengers know what to pack. Or, rather, what not to pack.
We don’t guarantee the safety of your valuables
Look carefully at the notice on the back of your hotel room door — the one that tells you the maximum room rate — and you’ll see the kind of fine print that will make you think twice before leaving valuables in your room. “Hotel is not responsible for lost or stolen items,” it will say. Not only do they mean it, but state law is usually on the hotel’s side. For example, California does not hold innkeepers liable for stolen items so long as they have posted the proper notice. California hotels do have some liability for such items such as “money, jewelry, documents, furs, fur coats and fur garments, or other articles of unusual value” that are stored in a hotel safe – but not as much as you might think. According to section 1860 of the state civil code, the hotelier must pay up to $500 if something is stolen from the safe. Better keep your valuables at home.
We can take your rental car back anytime we want
A few years ago, Hertz Rent a Car made headlines when it quietly changed its contract language to say that if your rental was damaged in a natural disaster, you were liable for it. But car rental contracts contain lots of other goodies. For example, Avis Rent A Car says it can confiscate your car more or less whenever it wants to: “We may repossess the car anytime it is found illegally parked, being used to violate the law or this Agreement, or appears to be abandoned,” its contract says. “We may also repossess the car anytime we discover you made a misrepresentation to obtain the car. You agree that we needn’t notify you in advance.” This gives Avis a broad license to take your car whenever it wants to. Not only that, but you also agree to pay for “actual and reasonable costs incurred by us to repossess the car.”
We can do whatever we want with your frequent-flier miles
Frequent-flier miles, as I’ve said many times before, are a dangerous addiction that usually benefit only the airline. Need proof? Check out the rules and conditions of your program. Few people do. But you’ll find some real gems in there, including the fact that your airline can change the rules whenever it wants to (check out the first paragraph in Delta Air Line’s contract, for example) and that they can delete your miles for pretty much any reason (see paragraph 7 of Northwest Airline’s terms and conditions). In the past, I’ve seen contract language that says miles are not worth anything and that frequent-flier miles actually belong to the airline, not to you. Don’t be shocked if you see that kind of language when you visit your program rules online. These contracts are fluid, and monitoring changes is difficult. Of course, the airlines love their frequent-flier programs. And why shouldn’t they? They get your loyalty but are obligated to give you nothing in return.
Besides studying the fine print, there’s only one way to avoid these clever traps. Fight them. When a travel company invokes one of its ridiculous rules, let them know you think these provisions are unjust and that you’re not afraid to ask a court for a legal opinion.
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