Airline ticket contracts are long, complicated

Every time airline passengers buy tickets, they're agreeing to a lengthy contract that outlines the services the airline will provide and, just as important, the rights passengers have should something go wrong.

Southwest Airlines's runs 41 pages. American Airlines's contains 27 sections, covering such things as baggage, delays and refunds.

But how easy is it for the average traveler to navigate this complex bit of airline bureaucracy?

Not very, according to a recent government study, which described the legally binding contracts, which vary by airline, as 'generally lengthy and difficult to understand.”

In a survey of 11 domestic airlines, the U.S. Government Accountability Office found that the contracts of carriage ranged from 17 to 74 pages, with the average running 20,000 words. Understanding what's in the document requires a reading ability similar to that of a college graduate, the office found using an analysis that considers word and sentence length.

'They can really be summed up in one or two sentences,” said Paul Hudson, president of the not-for-profit advocacy group Flyer's Rights and member of the FAA's Aviation Rulemaking Advisory Committee. The airlines 'can do whatever they want whenever they want. They'll try to do what their ticket says, but don't hold them to anything.”

The contracts cover nearly every contingency, with airlines carefully laying out what they are and are not responsible for.

The issue came under The airline had attempted to bump Dao from a full flight - something it's increased scrutiny earlier this year, when a viral video captured David Dao being dragged off a United Airlines flight by police after refusing to give up his seat. allowed to do under the contracts of carriage. But already having taken his seat, Dao refused.

That led to a confrontation with law enforcement that United's CEO would later describe as a 'horrific event” - one he promised would never happen again.

Airlines are not out of place in modern world, where nearly every service or product comes with lengthy terms of service or consent forms outlining such things as how data will be collected and how a complaint or legal dispute would be handled.

Omri Ben-Shahar, a law professor at the University of Chicago, said these types of agreements are a common way for corporations to manage risk, and they've grown increasingly complex over time as technology and companies become more sophisticated.

'The disputes arise and next time around the business knows, just to be on the safe side, we have to add a paragraph” to the contract, said Ben-Shahar, author of 'More Than You Wanted To Know: The Failure Of Mandated Disclosure.”

'I don't know in the history of trade that there was a business that said, ‘Now we can delete a paragraph,'” he said.