Wednesday, November 5, 2008

Airline Policies for Peanut Allergy Sufferers

With the holidays coming up, you might be in the market for some airplane tickets.

I thought I'd take the time to pull together links to the allergen (aka 'peanut') policies for some of the major airlines (you may have to scroll down the page in the link to get to the peanut policy):

United

JetBlue

Southwest

American

Virgin

British Airways

Delta

Continental
(their policy sucks the most of all airlines I think)

Alaska
(their policy comes in second in suckage factor)

Northwest

US Airways
(theirs comes in third I think)

Air France: Couldn't find a policy online

Lufthansa: Couldn't find a policy online

Japan Airlines

EasyJet
You really have to scroll down the page to learn that they sell peanuts on their flights. But if you give them advance notice, they say they will try to prevent the sale on your flight.

KLM

And just for good measure, I found a small tidbit on Amtrak (scroll down to the bottom or do a page find for 'allergies'). Basically, if your child has a life threatening food allergy, they can't travel alone on Amtrak (I can't imagine EVER sending B on a trip by herself with PA, but that's another post).
------------

Most have the "we can't control what other people bring on the flight" disclaimer, but isn't it great to see so many that say that they don't serve peanuts or products containing peanuts? I love it!! You should have a pretty good choice of safe(r) airlines if you have a peanut allergy and are choosing air travel this holiday season or otherwise.

Did I miss anyone? Leave me a comment and I'll add it to the list!

Gab

13 comments:

Tara said...

http://www.foodallergy.org/advocacy/airlines.html

Not sure if this is still happening... we fly Continental at least 10x a year (we live by the Newark hub). And knock on wood, they have been great in dealing with Ava's PA. We shall see what happens for T'giving though!

Elaine at Matters of the Heart) said...

Thank you for posting this....That was a lot of work and much appreciated...

Gab said...

Hopefully Continental will update their site, if they truly are phasing them out. Their peanut allergy wording as of today is:

"Continental does not remove peanuts from our aircraft for any flight. Our primary concern is the safety of our customers. Given the widespread use of peanut products in the food service industry, we cannot guarantee that our aircraft and food products will be 100% free of peanuts, peanut oils and/or peanut by-products. Consequently, we cannot provide a "peanut free" flight. If you have health considerations, we encourage you to bring your own peanut-free foods onboard your flight."

Tara said...

I know, Gab... I saw that too. Weird, since that FAAN update was from over the summer, I think?

Maybe I'll have my husband check into it... he can use his legal mumbo-jumbo to get an answer!

Nicole said...

I flew Delta two weeks ago (w/out my peanut allergic child) - I was in the back of the plane and my co-worker was up front and was in a peanut free zone, the woman had a peanut allergy but no epi-pens. The stewardess came back to ask me if I had mine on me (co-worker told her I always carry some just in case) in case there was a problem. I'm thinking, yes but they are for a CHILD. Good news, no epi-pens needed and Delta did live up to their buffer zone policy.

Alexis Ahrens said...

Thanks for doing this research, Gab! Very helpful to know!

Anonymous said...

First, thank you for providing this information! I flew Delta recently with my three daughters and my youngest (13 months) has a peanut allergy. Delta claimed they would offer a buffer zone of at least 3 rows ahead and three rows behind, but they only offered it one row ahead and one behind. And, the flight attendant asked me if it was okay to give people PB crackers instead of PB. I asked if she could withhold those as well and she said she would. Everything was fine and they were very flexible about letting us board early with the car seat to wipe everything down (even though they don't allow for early boarding with kids in Orlando because most people are there for Disney). The kicker was my husband noticed the woman behind us eating a PB&J sandwich! He politely asked her to put it away and offered to buy her anything else she might want from the menu, but she actually had brought a sunflower butter sandwich, too, so she took that one out instead. And, then she said "I'm a nurse and I don't feel like working today, so I'll put it away" Gee, thanks. ;)

Anyway, it's definitely true that you can't keep other people from bringing PB on board, but knowing, on Delta, that at least the people in front of you and behind you won't be offered peanuts was helpful. It's my hope that the major airlines stop serving peanuts all together, though! :)

Anonymous said...

Sorry, meant to say she wanted to give PB crackers instead of peanuts! :)

Ann said...

Thought you might want to know that your Delta link is not working. Thanks for putting the list together.
Ann@FoodAllergiesToGo.com

Gab said...

Ann,

I just tested the link and it works fine for me. Odd. I wonder if it's the browser or something?

Gab

Anonymous said...

Ww used to fly north west - never had a problem. THEN they became Delta, and their policy is quite poor. Now we have all these points we can't use...
Continental has been great, flying with Air Tran on vacation, they only serve pretzels.

Anonymous said...

We flew jet Blue in December, 2010, and they were great with Caitlin's PA. They created a buffer of 2 rows and then made an announcement that there was a little girl on board with severe PA, and asked the passengers to not eat any peanut products they may have brought on board. We were impressed!

I agree about Continental. The only time we flew with Caitlin with them, they told us to prepare to use our epi-pen.

Heather said...

My son has severe peanut allergy and has reactions to peanut dust. We have flown numerous times and Continental has been the best. Delta is the absolute worst. We have thrown away free tickets because we can not fly with them with my son. Delta has not honored their "buffer zone" when I used t call them numerous times in advance. To fly Southwest would be idiotic. Evan if they do not serve peanuts on one flight and clean the airplane at night, the risk of peanut dust being in the air or on surfaces is too great. Best wishes to all and everyone's safety.