Case Ingrid Guimarães: Find out what is downgrade, a practice that was applied abusively against actress, says expert

Ingrid Guimarães has “huge chances” of gaining a lawsuit for moral damages against American Airlines, if he decides to face the company in court. This is what lawyer Rodrigo Alvim, a specialist in consumer law with experience in defense of the air passenger, heard by F5.

Last Sunday (9), the actress reported an abuse situation that lived on a flight out of New York to Rio de Janeiro. She suffered a “downgrade”, which is when the passenger buys a better seat and is forced to travel in a worse seat. The practice is common and is within the law, but the way it was applied configures abuse against the passenger, explains the lawyer.

Ingrid, who was sitting in the premium economy class, was forced to switch seats to the economy to make another downgrade, that of an executive passenger who had a broken seat.

“Downgrade happens when the flight gives overbooking [vende mais passagens do que tem]or when the aircraft maintenance is not up to date and one of the seats is unusable, “he explains. When this happens, the company needs to send the passenger to the class immediately lower than his. If there is no available seat, it would have to be relocated to two classes below, ie to the economic.

“If he refused to travel in the economy or it was an obese passenger, the company would be required to put it on the next flight and fund hotel, transportation and food, and is subject to process,” explains the lawyer.

That is, to relocate the broken seat owner, the company also realized Ingrid for a class below. “This is a complete absurdity,” says Alvim. “Realocating someone else to relocate the first passenger is something that does not exist,” he says.

Threat

According to the lawyer, American Airlines violated four articles from the Consumer Protection Code. They are Article 6, item 6, which talks about the “prevention and repair of property and moral damages”; Article 14, which concerns the “repair of damages caused to consumers for defects related to the provision of services”; Article 20, in which “the service provider is responsible for the quality defects that make them inappropriate for consumption”, and 39 item 2, which provides for “refusing to meet consumer demands.”

About the threat that the actress suffered from employees, who said they would have to evacuate the aircraft if she did not change place, the lawyer says she does not proceed. “It was an empty threat. The company pays very expensive for every minute surplus on the ground. They would not waste this time,” he says. “The correct thing would be to provide passage on another flight to the broken chair passenger.”

‘Woman traveling alone’

Ingrid states that when he questioned one of the commissioners about what the criterion for choosing who will be forced to downgrade, he obtained as an answer: “Woman traveling alone.”

“This is a complete abuse of authority, and precisely in a week when a bill is being discussed to benefit women traveling alone,” says the lawyer. Senator Daniella Ribeiro’s (PSD-PB) bill would allow unaccompanied passengers to choose seats alongside other women on interstate and international travel.

The lawyer explains that there are situations where a passenger can be chosen randomly to change places. One of the common case is weight imbalance between both sides in the aircraft. On these occasions, people traveling alone is often an easy target of the company.

“The choice is random, but of course they calculate the damage. In this case, however, they calculated very badly when choosing a famous person,” he adds.

HUMILIATION

For him, Ingrid has a good chance of gaining an action claiming reparation for moral damages “for the disorder, wear and embarrassment combined with what the downgrade already brings, which is traveling less comfortably, the frustrated expectation, to go through all the humiliation she has gone through,” he says. The actress can also, of course, charge material damage by the difference between the value of the passage she bought and the seat she traveled.

“I believe she would get the reparation, what they did with her was absurd. And she will only get worse if she gets witnesses to report all the abuse committed by the company.”

In an interview with Globo on Monday (10), Ingrid said he will sue the company, but “no money pays the humiliation” he suffered.

Otherwise

In a note sent to F5American Airlines said “the company’s goal is to provide a positive and safe trip to passengers.” “A member of our team is contacting the customer to understand more about your experience and resolve the issue.”