How to handle getting bumped off a flight

Consumer journalist Wendy Knowler joins Pippa Hudson.

Listen below.

Is that even legal?!

That's the question many baffled X users were left with recently after local airline FlySafair admitted to overbooking its flights.

The carrier was responding to a post by passenger Thato Miles Nsala who shared how, having arrived at the airport for his flight, he was told there was no seat for him.

"So we show up at the airport and FlySafair says we don’t have seats for the same flight we paid for. If you have 200 seats why take payments for 300 passengers 😮😮😳😭😭," he wrote.

FlySafair claims the practice is to keep tickets 'as affordable as possible'.

That may be so, but is it legal?

Enter consumer ninja Wendy Knowler. It's a tricky one, she says.

"... It's illegal if done intentionally, and the airlines will argue they never intentionally deprive anyone."

- Wendy Knowler, Consumer journalist

"It's not a practice where they sell you something and they know they're not going to provide you with a seat."

- Wendy Knowler, Consumer journalist

So, what exactly does the law say?

Section 47 of the Consumer Protection Act deals with over-selling and over-booking.

It states that:

A supplier must not accept payment or other consideration for any goods or services if the supplier:

(a) has no reasonable basis to assert an intention to supply those goods or provide those services; or 

(b) intends to supply goods or services that are materially different from the goods or services in respect of which the payment or consideration was accepted.

And what about compensation and/or expenses for the inconvenience and costs incurred as a result of being bumped off a flight?

"The legislators originally proposed that the airlines should be responsible for paying not just the direct costs as compensation... but consequential losses as well. But in the final version of the Act, it was only direct costs."

- Wendy Knowler, Consumer journalist

Knowler says while it is infuriating for passengers, it is a global practice on the part of airlines, in a bid not to have empty seats.

FlySafair’s Kirby says:

"There are a surprisingly large number of people who book flights but simply never arrive for them. It’s an international phenomenon and airlines have come to work the reality into their pricing structures – effectively allowing airlines to trade seats at slightly lower prices because they know there will be breakage - much like a gym will sell more memberships than they have treadmills."

Kirby suggests that FlySafair usually only overbooks one or two seats.

"The aim is not to have empty seats, but the seats are paid for, they're not losing!"

- Wendy Knowler, Consumer journalist

To reduce the likelihood of being bumped off a flight, Knowler suggests arriving in good time.

If it does happen to you and you get a later flight, keep all your receipts to claim from the airline.

ALSO READ: What does it mean to be bumped off a flight?

Scroll up to the audio player to listen to the interview.