Your flight gets canceled and the airline says it doesn't have a seat for you for a full day. But you find another airline has a flight leaving in one hour. What to do?
你的航班取消了，航空公司说全天都无法给你安排座位，但是你发现另一家航空公司一小时后有一趟离港的航班，你该怎么办？
Beg the airline to send your ticket to its competitor. Do it nicely, because there's no rule that says the airline has to help you.
你只能请求航空公司把你的机票转给它的竞争对手。要好好求人家，因为没有一条规定说航空公司必须帮你的忙。
How to regulate good service and fair dealings, if at all, has been a quandary for years. But stakes are higher now. The average airline load factor -- the percentage of seats filled -- rose to 82.8% last year, the highest for scheduled air service since 1945. With planes so full, airlines have limited reserve capacity to rebook customers after flights get canceled. Some passengers wait for days to get to destinations.
如果航空业规范优质服务和公平交易多年来一直是一个让人为难的问题，而现在的风险则更高了。航空公司的平均载客率──座位使用的百分比──去年上升到了82.8%，是1945年以来定期航班载客率的最高水平。由于飞机载客太满，当航班取消之后，航空公司为乘客重新订票的备用票源非常有限。有些乘客等了好几天才到达目的地。
The Department of Transportation says over the last four years it has taken a more aggressive stance on passenger rights, pushing through regulations to curb long tarmac delays, increase compensation for ticketed passengers involuntarily bumped from flights and require airlines to always display the full price of airfares, including taxes and fees. Airlines let passengers either cancel or hold a reservation without penalty for 24 hours and reimburse baggage fees if bags are lost, because DOT requires them to.
美国交通部(The Department of Transportation)表示，它在过去的四年里为保障乘客的权利采取了更加激进的姿态，通过制定规章来限制长时间的停机坪延误，增加对那些非出于本意而未能上飞机的持票乘客的补偿，并要求航空公司始终明示含税费的全价机票价格。航空公司在24小时内可以允许乘客选择取消或保持预订而不用支付违约金，如果行李遗失，航空公司还要赔偿行李费用，因为交通部责令它们这么做。
Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood, who is stepping down after four years, said in an interview he became frustrated with airline service flying between Washington, D.C., and his home state of Illinois, and set out to force improvement. 'When people are paying a pretty good amount of money to fly, they ought to be given the service they paid for and they ought to be treated with respect and treated like adults,' he said.
履职四年后即将卸任的交通部长雷•拉胡德(Ray LaHood)在一次采访中说，他本人在华盛顿特区和家乡伊利诺伊州之间往返时的乘机体验，让他对航空服务深感不满，于是着手强制整改。他说：“当人们花了可观的一笔钱来坐飞机时，他们应该得到物有所值的服务，应该受到尊重，得到一名成年人理应得到的待遇。”
The Republican supported passenger-rights legislation every year when he was a U.S. representative, but every attempt in Congress has failed. As DOT secretary, Mr. LaHood grew outraged at passengers stuck on planes for nine-plus hours in deplorable conditions, and pushed through hefty penalties for airlines that keep people on planes longer than three hours without a chance to deplane. The tarmac delay rule has dramatically curbed lengthy strandings.
当拉胡德还是一名众议员的时候，共和党每年都支持有关乘客权利的立法，但是每次尝试都未能在国会获得通过。身为交通部长的拉胡德对乘客被迫在飞机上悲惨地滞留九个多小时这种事大为愤慨，于是他对那些让乘客在飞机上呆了三个小时以上时间还无法下飞机的航空公司开出了高额的罚单。限制停机坪延误的规定则大大抑制了飞机长时间滞留停机坪这类事情的发生。
Passengers have some other protections:
乘客还能享受到其它一些保护：
Airlines typically provide meals and hotels when travelers are stranded overnight because of an airline problem, though not because of weather or other exceptions.
由于航空公司的原因旅客被迫整夜滞留机场的时候，航空公司通常要为旅客提供餐饮和住宿，不过天气及其它一些意外原因不在此规定之列。
When airlines lose bags, they're on the hook to pay out as much as $3,300 per passenger for domestic trips. (Carriers set the value of possessions lost, however.)
当航空公司遗失了行李时，它们将面临为每位国内乘客支付可能高达3,300美元的赔偿。（不过，丢失财产的价值由承运商确定。）
Fliers bumped from overbooked flights and stuck for hours are entitled to four times their ticket price, up to $1,300, on the spot in cash.
因航班超额预订而未能登机的乘客以及被困机场数小时的乘客有权当场获得四倍于购票价格、最高达1,300美元的赔偿。
But beyond overbooking, baggage and tarmac delays, government and Congress have largely struggled to figure out rules and requirements. Last year Congress created a four-member committee to advise the DOT on what passenger protections were needed.
在超额预订、行李和停机坪延误等方面的问题之外，联邦政府和国会做出了很大的努力来制订其他方面的相关规章和要求。去年，国会组建了一个四人委员会，向交通部提交有关必要的乘客保护措施的建议。
The panel, which included airline and airport officials, advocated some basic principles like knowing the cost of the entire trip before purchasing a ticket.
成员包括航空公司和机场高管的这个委员会提出了一些基本的原则，比如，让乘客在购买机票前了解整个旅程的费用。
The only firm recommendation? That DOT require airports and airlines to provide 'animal relief areas.'
唯一具体的建议是什么呢？建议交通部要求机场和航空公司设立“动物排便区域”。
Passenger advocates say plenty more should be done. 'Passengers have very few rights and many of the ones on paper are not really enforced,' says Paul Hudson, executive director of the nonprofit Aviation Consumer Action Project, which advocates for airline passengers.
乘客权益倡导者表示，应该规定的事项还有很多。为飞机乘客代言的非盈利组织“航空消费者行动计划”(Aviation Consumer Action Project)的常务董事保罗•哈德森(Paul Hudson)说：“乘客本来就没有多少权利，而已成文的规定中有很多实际上并没有得到真正的贯彻。”
One of the biggest problems, Mr. Hudson says, is that Congress exempted airlines from state laws so consumers can only take disputes to federal court, not state court. That raises the cost and the legal threshold to sue an airline. 'In every other industry you have consumer protection laws that are state and local,' Mr. Hudson said. 'Airlines argue they can't be regulated by patchwork state laws, but Wal-Mart is.'
哈德森说，最大的问题之一是，国会让航空公司免于州法律的约束，因此消费者只能将纠纷起诉到联邦法院而不是州法院。这就提高了起诉航空公司的费用和法律门槛。他说：“对于其它的所有行业，你都可以找到保护消费者的州及地方法律。航空公司声称他们不能受各州不同的法律管理，可是沃尔玛(Wal-Mart)却可以。”
Airlines for America, the industry's lobbying group, says air travel is almost always crossing state lines and airlines can't be subjected to a particular state's rules. Carriers have improved service on their own and are responding to passenger issues without legislation or regulation that could raise ticket prices, the group says.
航空业的游说组织美国航空运输协会(Airlines for America)表示，航空旅行差不多都是跨越州界的，航空公司不能受某个特定州的规定约束。该组织表示，承运商已经自行改善了服务，并且对法律、法规没有规定、却又可能引起机票涨价的客运问题做出了回应。
'Other industries are not subjected to such irrational rules,' A4A Chief Executive Nick Calio said in recent Senate testimony.
美国航空运输协会的首席执行长尼克•卡利奥(Nick Calio)在最近的参议院听证会上说：“其它行业面临的情况没有这么特殊。”
When the industry was regulated before 1978, a federal rule known as Rule 240 required airlines to send customers to competitors if they canceled flights. Without Rule 240, passengers often can't use their ticket on another airline that might have available seats.
1978年以前，当航空业受到监管的时候，一项名为Rule 240的联邦法规要求航空公司在取消航班的时候把乘客转给竞争对手。如今没有了Rule 240的约束，乘客经常无法凭原有的机票改乘到另一家有空余座位的航空公司的航班。
Eight years ago, the European Union established what seemed like far-reaching consumer protections, requiring that airlines compensate passengers for long delays and cancellations. The intent was to force carriers to reduce delays and cancellations due to light bookings.
八年前，欧盟(European Union)制定了似乎可以切实保护消费者的措施，要求航空公司对长时间的航班延误和航班取消给予乘客赔偿，这样做的目的是强制承运商减少航班延误以及由于订票数量少而取消航班的行为。
But the groundbreaking effort didn't go particularly well. Passenger protections proved confusing and, to a large extent, hollow. Airlines were given a broad exemption for 'extraordinary circumstances' and often refused to pay passenger claims. Little has changed.
但是这一开拓性的努力并没有达到特别好的效果。这些乘客保护措施最终证明是令人费解的，而且在很大程度上是空洞无用的。航空公司被赋予了一大堆“非常情况”的豁免权，多数情况下都拒绝了乘客的索赔。情况没有怎么改变。
The European Commission's latest stabs at regulation take a more pragmatic approach. If enacted, it would give European travelers firmer protections than what U.S. passengers receive.
欧盟委员会(European Commission)最近起草了更为务实的监管政策。如果获得通过，它给予欧洲旅客的保护比美国旅客得到的保护会更实在。
Earlier this month, the commission proposed revisions that would strengthen some areas for consumers and give airlines more latitude in others. If an airline can't re-route a passenger within 12 hours, it would have to book a customer on another airline or train. But airlines would have five hours before they'd have to pay compensation for delays, instead of three hours.
上个月，欧盟委员会提出了修订案，强化了维护乘客利益方面的一些内容，而在另一些方面给予了航空公司更多的回旋余地。如果航空公司在12小时内不能为乘客安排另一个航班，它就必须为乘客预订另一家航空公司的机票或者火车票，不过航空公司因为航班延误而赔偿乘客的时限从三小时改成了五小时。
'Cancellations are always worse for the passenger than delay,' says Frank Laurent, a policy officer for the European Commission in Brussels who helped draft the rules. 'This proposal is much more realistic.'
布鲁塞尔欧盟委员会里参与起草这些法规的政策官员弗兰克•劳伦特(Frank Laurent)说：“航班取消对乘客的影响一般比航班延误更大。这项提案要务实得多。”
The EC plan has been criticized by consumer groups as a watering down of passenger protections and by airlines as an unnecessary burden in compensation and rerouting. Mr. Laurent says the criticism from both sides probably means the proposal found middle ground.
欧盟委员会的计划被消费者组织指责为削弱了对乘客的保护，而航空公司则批评该计划增加了不必要的赔偿及重新安排航班的负担。劳伦特说来自双方的批评也许意味着这项提案找到了中间立场。
'What we tried to do with this proposal,' he said, 'is to find a balance.'
他说：“对于这项提案我们尽力要做到的，就是找到平衡。”