Barrier Free Travels

More and more travel agents are handling accessible travel these days, especially cruise travel agents. To be honest, you really need to have some level of expertise in access issues if you sell cruise travel, because sooner or later you are going to have to make arrangements for a disabled client.

As far as sorting out the logistics, booking an accessible cabin isn’t that difficult, especially with assistance from the cruise line’s special needs department. But when it comes to planning for accessible shore excursions and ground transportation, then it gets a bit tricky. And then, there are those helpful tips you want to share with your clients before they sail. After all, that’s why they use travel agents -- because of their expertise.

Well, although I can’t help with the shore excursions and ground transportation (besides referring you to Emerging Horizons and my books), I can offer up some tips to share with your disabled clients.

In fact they are featured at the end of Judi Erickson’s excellent article about accessible travel (All-Acess Pass), in the December 7 issue of Travel Age West.

My tips are only included in the on-line version so you’ll have to visit the Travel Age West website to get them.

But it’s just a short surf away -- and it’s well worth the trip.

As you might imagine, I get a lot of reader feedback; but to be honest it’s hard to pass on any comment that mentions sheep. OK, it’s more than just sheep, it’s a service animal issue. And throw in an innkeeper with an attitude, and you have my undivided attention. Such was the case with Kristen, who merely wanted to get away with her husband to celebrate their 15th wedding anniversary.

Kristen has a service dog (Clifford), and like most service animals he travels everywhere with her. Heck, he wouldn’t be much of a service animal if she had to board him every time she took a trip, now would he? But I digress.

Kristen found the perfect (or so she thought) place to celebrate her anniversary -- the Juniper Lane Guest House near Friday Harbor, Washington. The property met her access needs, was a green property (important to her) and was within driving distance of her home. Sounds perfect, right? Well, not exactly.

When Kristen called up to make a reservation, innkeeper Juniper Maas told Kristen that Clifford wasn’t welcome. Why? Because, of course, they have a "no pets" policy. Kristen explained that Clifford wasn’t a pet and that she was required to accommodate her under Title III of the ADA. All to no avail. According to Kristen, Juniper became very condescending and pulled out the old sheep defense. Yes, that’s right, I said sheep. Juniper claimed that since there’s a sheep ranch next door, she didn’t have to accommodate Kristen because Clifford would chase the sheep.

OK, I don’t even want to go there. File it under ignorant. The wheel is turning but the hamster is dead.

But here’s the cool thing -- Kristen chose a unique course of action. Sure, she could have fought the whole issue and taken it to court; after all the innkeeper is clearly wrong and hey, that just happens to be what Kristen does for a living. But Kristen just wanted to celebrate her anniversary.

Instead she chose to let her pocketbook do the talking and opted to take her money elsewhere. I mean, think about it, do you really want to fight someone just to force them to take your money? Of course not!! Instead, why not give it to someone who truly wants your business. In this day and age there are a lot of folks out there who truly welcome everyone. And if we give those folks the business, then the Junipers of the world will either learn how the real world works or fold up shop and move along. Personally I’m hoping for the latter, but hey, that’s just me.

So next time you run into a ignorant person, fight back with the most effective weapon -- your money!! It’s a pretty effective weapon in a very competitive market.

Happy anniversary Kristen!

It’s pretty well known that our ACAA and ADA (in the US) provides a decent amount of protection to disabled travelers. By that I mean, it’s not like your journey is going to go off without any glitches, but at least you are afforded certain basic rights. One of those rights is to be treated fairly and not to be charged extra because you happen to be disabled. Although this seems like common sense and not something that has to be written down, that’s not the way it is around the world.

For example, there’s the case of our good friend Michael O’Leary of Ryanair who for a time charged some disabled passengers for airport wheelchair assistance. Of course that’s history now because of court decisions and a subsequent EU regulation that prohibits that discriminatory action, but still, it happened.

And as far as I know, Air Asia and Nationwide still charge for this same assistance. So what we take for granted in North America, isn’t exactly the norm around the world.

Such is the case in India where they are trying to come up with some uniform regulations for air travel for disabled passengers. Apparently they had some proposed guidelines that were to go into effect on Jan. 1, 2008 but because of opposition by the Federation of Indian Airlines (FIA), those plans have been scraped. At issue is, "providing free assistance to disabled passengers".

Now mind you, none of the Indian airlines currently charge customers for wheelchair assistance, but apparently they don’t want this legislated. They don’t want to be "denied the right to charge and recover costs for services provided" in the future. They also pointed out that earlier versions of the regulation allowed the airlines to "charge for any additional service provided to passengers with special needs".

In looking deeper into the issue, it appears the big airline complaint isn’t about providing free wheelchair assistance at airports, but instead more about the logistics of stretcher travel. The new rule states that airlines can’t refuse to transport a person in a stretcher if they are accompanied by a caregiver, but apparently it makes no stipulation about what they can charge for this service. In other words since a stretcher takes up the space of nine seats, the FIA feels it should be able to charge for those nine seats; however because the new regulation states that you can’t charge disabled passengers more for services, it would appear that they could only charge stretcher passengers for one seat.

I’m not sure that’s exactly fair. I mean if you take up nine seats, you should be charged for the space. That’s the way it works for stretcher travel here in the US. And lets not even talk about Southwest Airlines, who charges "people of size" for two seats. And if you travel with a vent and it takes up an extra seat, you have to pay for that extra seat. Heck, if you travel with a cello and it takes up an extra seat, you pay for the extra seat.

Bottom line, there are a few holes in the new regulations, but at least they are working on them. It’s a work in progress and I expect to hear more about it throughout the year. But then again, our own Access Guidelines for Passenger Vessels (cruise ships) is also a work in progress (sigh), and you know what they say about the whole glass house crowd. Personally I’m looking (and hoping) for some progress on that front as well this year.

OK, I’m crawling back into my corner and putting my stones down now.

There’s been a lot of discussion about the whole "Las Vegas Tarmac" incident in the past few days.

As one astute reader pointed out, "If her plane was 38 minutes late and she missed her connection, wasn’t she cutting it a bit close? Shouldn’t wheelchair-users allow more time between flights?"

Good point. Yes they should. So perhaps this incident can act as a gentle reminder to wheelers everywhere, that sometimes the minimum connecting times allowed by the airlines aren’t adequate when you have to wait for that aisle chair. After all, wheelchair-users are the last folks off the plane and sometimes it’s takes time to get an airport wheelchair or even your own gate checked wheelchair. And all the time, the clock is ticking.

And then there’s the restroom issue. In the ideal world it would be great if you actually had enough time to use the airport restroom, especially if you can’t access the on-board lavatory. All of these things take time. And throw even a slight delay into it, and well, you are apt to miss your connecting flight.

Sure the airline will book you on the next flight out, but that may mean sitting around the airport for hours, or even having to overnight in your connecting city. And it will mean standing in a line and dealing with a customer service agent to get rebooked, and even stressing out about it all. And if someone is meeting you at your destination, you’ll have to call and tell them of your change in plans.

So, best advice is to go outside of the minimum connecting time (usually a mere 50 minutes) and instead opt for the next flight out when making your travel arrangements. Give yourself plenty of time in a connecting airport. After all, your goal is to get to your destination with a minimum of muss and fuss, and the best way to do that is to plan ahead.

Have a safe and barrier-free 2008!