American and Delta will work together to assist stranded travelers

Delta Air Lines and American Airlines have implemented a new agreement that will help customers as it allows each airline to put potentially stranded passengers on the other carrier’s planes during irregular operations situations such as computer outages or bad weather. A Delta spokesperson praised the new ticketing and baggage agreement with American saying “this tool will give our employees more options to help customers.” American and Delta already have similar pacts with United and their global partner airlines.

These types of agreements are less commonly used by low-cost carriers such as Spirit and Frontier. With no or limited agreements in place, passengers could be stranded for days if the airline offers only limited service to or from a particular destination. Southwest Airlines currently does not have comparable arrangements in place with other carriers that would allow them to put their customers on other airlines during times of irregular operations.