PHOENIX – Anyone who flies a lot has experienced delays that leave you waiting for hours at your gate.

If you decide to forgo that flight and return home another way, airlines must now promptly refund you in cash.

“Passengers deserve to get their money back when an airline owes them – without the headaches or haggling,” Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg said on X.

In April, the U.S. Department of Transportation said it is issuing an automatic refund rulewhich explicitly sets out the specific circumstances in which airlines must issue refunds.

CLICK HERE TO LEARN MORE ABOUT THE NEW RULES

“A step forward for consumer protection”

“We only landed here about 15 minutes late,” said Shannon Mayes, a traveler at Phoenix Sky Harbor Airport.

We asked her if she had been delayed by several hours.

“Yes,” she said. “It’s not fun.”

A traveler named Dennis Medeiros, says he once canceled a flight and returned home to Rhode Island. He got air credits, but no cash reimbursement.

This is changing now.

New regulations are in effect that require airlines to provide an automatic refund if a flight is canceled or delayed more than three hours for domestic flights and six hours for international flights.

Katy Nastro from Go on a trip app says the change is a win for consumers, but questions remain.

“What exactly is automatic, according to Delta, for example. What exactly is automatic, according to Spirit, for example. There will be some variations between airlines, but the majority of these new regulations “are a step forward for consumer protection when it comes to air travel,” Nastro said.

The change in reimbursement regulations is part of larger changes announced earlier this year, which include greater transparency for so-called unwanted charges. The airline industry is suing to stop this change.

In a one-on-one interview with U.S. Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg earlier this year, he fired back.

“I was disappointed to see the airline industry lobby sue us over this rule. They basically said if we made sure passengers had this information it would create confusion,” he declared.

“I prefer to have money”

The US DOT website states: “For airlines, ‘prompt’ is defined as within 7 business days if a passenger paid by credit card, and within 20 days if a passenger paid by cash or by check. »

A traveler named Kyle Costa is happy for the change. He says credit to airlines isn’t enough.

“It ends up costing you more money than they usually credit you with, so I think it’s actually a really good rule to implement, to hold them a little more accountable,” Costa said.

Medeiros says he, too, would prefer to get a refund rather than a credit from the airlines.

“I’d rather have money. If you bother me, nine times out of ten, it’s the airlines’ fault. If it’s the weather, I understand. But nine times out of ten, it’s the airlines. “It’s my fault. I wish I had money,” he said.

Timing is also important. It’s just before the holiday season.

In recent years, weather conditions have caused massive delays and cancellations. This change could have a big impact if it happens again.