[Federal Register Volume 75, Number 46 (Wednesday, March 10, 2010)]
[Proposed Rules]
[Pages 11075-11077]
From the Federal Register Online via the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
[FR Doc No: 2010-5244]


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DEPARTMENT OF TRANSPORTATION

Office of the Secretary

14 CFR Part 234

[Docket No. DOT-OST-2010-0039]
RIN No. 2105-AE00


Enhancing Airline Passenger Protections: Response to Requests To 
Extend Compliance Date

AGENCY: Office of the Secretary (OST), Department of Transportation 
(DOT).

ACTION: Notice of proposed rulemaking.

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SUMMARY: The Department of Transportation is proposing to extend by 45 
days, or until June 14, 2010, the compliance date of the provision in 
its final rule entitled ``Enhancing Airline Passenger Protections,'' 
published December 30, 2009, and effective April 29, 2010, that 
requires airlines to publish flight delay information on their Web 
sites. This proposal is in response to the petition of the Air 
Transport Association of America (ATA), the Regional Airline 
Association (RAA) and the Air Carrier Association of America (ACAA) for 
an additional 90 days time for airlines to comply with the requirement 
to display flight delay data on Web sites in view of the extensive 
changes to carriers' reporting systems that are necessitated by the 
rule and their contention that completion of these tasks is not 
possible by April 29, 2010, the current effective date of the 
requirement. The Department acknowledges that additional time to comply 
with the posting of flight delay information on the carriers' Web sites 
may be warranted to ensure the posting of complete and accurate 
information but is not persuaded that the full 90 days requested by the 
carrier associations is needed. Therefore, this NPRM proposes to extend 
the compliance date for the provision in question for an additional 45 
days, from April 29, 2010, to June 14, 2010.

DATES: Comments on amending the final rule published December 30, 2009, 
at 74 FR 68983, effective April 29, 2010, should be filed by March 25, 
2010.

ADDRESSES: You may file comments identified by the docket number DOT-
OST-2010-0039 by any of the following methods:
     Federal eRulemaking Portal: Go to http://www.regulations.gov and follow the online instructions for submitting 
comments.
     Mail: Docket Management Facility, U.S. Department of 
Transportation, 1200 New Jersey Ave., SE., Room W12-140, Washington, DC 
20590-0001.
     Hand Delivery or Courier: West Building Ground Floor, Room 
W12-140, 1200 New Jersey Ave., SE., between 9 a.m. and 5 p.m. ET, 
Monday through Friday, except Federal Holidays.
     Fax: (202) 493-2251.
    Instructions: You must include the agency name and docket number 
DOT-OST-2010-0039 or the Regulatory Identification Number (RIN) for the 
rulemaking at the beginning of your comment. All comments received will 
be posted without change to http://www.regulations.gov, including any 
personal information provided.
    Privacy Act: Anyone is able to search the electronic form of all 
comments

[[Page 11076]]

received in any of our dockets by the name of the individual submitting 
the comment (or signing the comment if submitted on behalf of an 
association, a business, a labor union, etc.). You may review DOT's 
complete Privacy Act statement in the Federal Register published on 
April 11, 2000 (65 FR 19477-78), or you may visit http://DocketsInfo.dot.gov.
    Docket: For access to the docket to read background documents or 
comments received, go to http://www.regulations.gov or to the street 
address listed above. Follow the online instructions for accessing the 
docket.

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: Blane A. Workie, Office of the 
Assistant General Counsel for Aviation Enforcement and Proceedings, 
U.S. Department of Transportation, 1200 New Jersey Ave., SE., 
Washington, DC 20590, 202-366-9342 (phone), 202-366-7152 (fax), 
[email protected] (e-mail).

SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: On December 30, 2009, the Department of 
Transportation published a final rule in the Federal Register (74 FR 
68983), titled the ``Enhancing Airline Passenger Protections'' final 
rule that, among other things, requires certificated air carriers that 
account for at least 1 percent of domestic scheduled passenger revenues 
(reporting carriers) to provide certain flight delay data on their 
websites. Under the rule, a reporting carrier must display on its Web 
site flight delay information for each flight it operates and for each 
flight its U.S. code-share partners operate for which schedule 
information is available. More specifically, the rule requires that 
reporting carriers provide on their websites the following on-time 
performance information: (1) Percentage of arrivals that were on time--
i.e., within 15 minutes of scheduled arrival time; (2) the percentage 
of arrivals that were more than 30 minutes late (including special 
highlighting if the flight was late more than 50 percent of the time); 
and (3) the percentage of flight cancellations if 5 percent or more of 
the flight's operations were canceled in the month covered. As 
published, the effective date of the rule is April 29, 2010.
    The Air Transport Association of America (ATA), the Regional 
Airline Association (RAA) and the Air Carrier Association of America 
(ACAA) have requested that the Department of Transportation extend the 
compliance time for publishing flight delay information on airlines' 
websites by 90 days. The carrier associations state that the compliance 
date of April 29, 2010, is unworkable because of the extensive changes 
to carrier reporting systems and internet displays needed to comply 
with the rule. ATA asserts that, on average, each carrier will need to 
expend 1550 hours to comply with the new disclosure requirements. ATA 
explains that this work involves a number of company disciplines and 
that each area of work must be completed in succession. For example, 
according to ATA, the work to ensure compliance with the flight time 
disclosure requirements in the rule must be completed in a particular 
order: Each carrier must first design changes based on its current data 
capabilities, which on average will take approximately 415 hours; once 
the design is completed, programming changes, which on average will 
take approximately 560 hours, will need to be done; the testing period 
once programming is completed will then take on average approximately 
445 hours; and finally the deployment process, once testing is 
completed, will take on average approximately 130 hours. ATA points out 
that, during the past month, while some work has began, carriers have 
spent the majority of the time determining the new regulatory 
requirements including seeking clarification on aspects of the rule and 
identifying the system changes that are needed in order to begin the 
first phase of system design. ATA also calls attention to the fact that 
delays at one carrier will impact the compliance schedule of all of its 
domestic code-share partners because the rule requires reporting 
carriers to post flight delay information not only for each flight it 
operates but also for each flight its U.S. code-share partners operate 
for which schedule information is available. Some of the code-share 
partners of the reporting carriers, it is noted, do not report on-time 
performance data to the Department. This will likely necessitate the 
reporting carriers collecting the on-time performance data for these 
carriers through third party entities. In addition, ATA notes that a 
number of U.S. carriers are discussing the possibility of creating and 
implementing an International Air Transport Association (IATA) standard 
for displaying code-share information to be shared among carriers, but 
that such standardization is likely to require a minimum 60-day 
approval process once the data standards are defined. For these 
reasons, ATA asserts that carriers need additional time to fulfill the 
Department's goal of providing accurate flight delay information for 
the public. Interested parties can read the carrier associations' 
requests to extend the compliance date in their entirety at DOT-OST-
2010-0039.
    The Department tentatively agrees that some extension of time in 
the compliance date for publishing flight delay data on airlines' Web 
sites may be warranted, but does not believe that a 90-day extension is 
justified. Instead, the Department is proposing to revise 14 CFR 234.11 
to extend the compliance date of sections 234.11(b) and (c) by an 
additional 45 days until June 14, 2010. We believe this revised 
compliance date will provide the airlines adequate time to comply with 
the requirement to provide certain flight delay data on their Web 
sites. We emphasize that this proposed extension of time is limited to 
that portion of our ``Enhancing Airline Passenger Protections'' rule 
described above dealing with publication on carrier websites of flight 
delay data. It does not affect any other provision in the ``Enhancing 
Airline Passenger Protections'' rule, including the provision requiring 
U.S. carriers to allow passengers on domestic flights to deplane after 
three hours on the tarmac subject to exceptions for safety, security or 
ATC considerations, and the compliance date for those provisions 
remains April 29, 2009. In proposing the June 14, 2010, compliance date 
for the requirements pertaining to publishing delay data on carriers' 
websites, the Department is balancing the benefit of having accurate 
and complete flight delay data available to consumers with the 
capability of airlines to comply with the additional requirements being 
imposed upon them in a reasonable timeframe. We are specifically 
inviting comment on the issue of the proposed change in the compliance 
date. Is a 45-day extension too long or too short? We are not convinced 
at this juncture that a 90-day extension is necessary and invite 
carriers to provide evidence to the contrary in their comments on this 
proposal.
    The Department is providing a very limited comment period on this 
proposal because the issue on which comment is sought is limited to a 
change in the compliance date of only a small portion of the 
``Enhancing Airline Passenger Protections'' final rule. Additionally, 
the final rule has an effective date of April 29, 2010, less than two 
months from today. We believe that, under these circumstances, fifteen 
days will provide the public with meaningful participation in the 
regulatory process and enable the Department to review the comments 
submitted and issue a final rule on this matter sufficiently before 
April 29, 2010, to permit the air carriers to

[[Page 11077]]

efficiently complete the tasks necessitated by the rule.

Regulatory Analyses and Notices

A. Executive Order 12866 (Regulatory Planning and Review) and DOT 
Regulatory Policies and Procedures

    This rulemaking action is not a significant regulatory action under 
Executive Order 12866 and the Department of Transportation's Regulatory 
Policies and Procedures. Accordingly, this rule has not been reviewed 
by the Office of Management and Budget (OMB).

B. Regulatory Flexibility Act

    Pursuant to section 605 of the Regulatory Flexibility Act (RFA), 5 
U.S.C. 605(b), as amended by the Small Business Regulatory Enforcement 
and Fairness Act of 1996 (SBREFA), DOT certifies that this rulemaking 
will not have a significant impact on a substantial number of small 
entities. The NPRM would impose no duties or obligations on small 
entities.

C. Executive Order 13132 (Federalism)

    This action will not have a substantial direct effect on the 
States, on the relationship between the national Government and the 
States, or on the distribution of power and responsibilities among the 
various levels of government, and therefore will not have federalism 
implications.

D. Executive Order 13084

    This notice has been analyzed in accordance with the principles and 
criteria contained in Executive Order 13084 (``Consultation and 
Coordination with Indian Tribal Governments''). Because the provision 
on which we are seeking comment would not significantly or uniquely 
affect the communities of the Indian tribal governments or impose 
substantial direct compliance costs on them, the funding and 
consultation requirements of Executive Order 13084 do not apply.

E. Paperwork Reduction Act

    The Paperwork Reduction Act of 1995 (PRA) (44 U.S.C. 3501 et seq.) 
requires that DOT consider the impact of paperwork and other 
information collection burdens imposed on the public and, under the 
provisions of PRA section 3507(d), obtain approval from the Office of 
Management and Budget (OMB) for each collection of information it 
conducts, sponsors, or requires through regulations. DOT has determined 
that there are no new information collection requirements associated 
with this NPRM. The NPRM merely proposes to provide an additional 45 
days to comply with a regulatory provision whose paperwork impact has 
already been analyzed by the Department.

F. Unfunded Mandates Reform Act

    The Department has determined that the requirements of Title II of 
the Unfunded Mandates Reform Act of 1995 do not apply to this 
rulemaking.

    Issued this 5th day of March 2009, in Washington, DC.
Ray LaHood,
Secretary of Transportation.

List of Subjects in 14 CFR Part 234

    Air carriers, Consumer protection, Reporting and recordkeeping 
requirements.

    For the reasons set forth in the preamble, the Department proposes 
to amend the final rule published December 30, 2009, at 74 FR 68983, 
effective April 29, 2010, amending Title 14, Chapter II, Subchapter A, 
part 234, as follows:

PART 234--AIRLINE SERVICE QUALITY PERFORMANCE REPORTS

    1. The authority citation for Part 234 continues to read as 
follows:

    Authority:  49 U.S.C. 329 and chapters 401 and 417.

    2. In the final rule published December 30, 2009, at 74 FR 68983, 
effective April 29, 2010, Sec.  234.11 is amended by adding paragraph 
(d) to read as follows:


Sec.  234.11  Disclosure to consumers.

* * * * *
    (d) A reporting carrier must meet the requirements of paragraphs 
(b) and (c) of this section by June 14, 2010.

[FR Doc. 2010-5244 Filed 3-9-10; 8:45 am]
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