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JetBlue accepted the reservation for my 14 year old (the minimum age for JetBlue to take a minor as an adult). They were code sharing that flight with American,

JetBlue accepted the reservation for my 14 year old (the minimum age for JetBlue to take a minor as an adult). They were code sharing that flight with American, who requires a minor to be 15. So, JetBlue took the money for a service they knew they could not provide (but I didn’t, having read the various airline rules and settled on JetBlue as a result). When it came time to fly, American wouldn’t carry them (now 700 miles away from the family) and JetBlue wanted to keep the money, offering a JB credit expiring in 1 year. All I did was get a JetBlue customer care agent to confirm they would not issue a refund and took that screenshot to my credit card company who approved the chargeback. We ended up having to pay the unaccompanied minor fees and aggravation on both ends to get them home on Delta, who is at least in the linked business of selling tickets and actually transporting passengers on those tickets, while JetBlue is better at the former than the latter.

mrandish 3y ago
Yes, as the parent of a 14 year-old currently attending boarding school in Europe, the way that many airlines have in recent years increased their minimum age rules to fly unaccompanied creates huge problems and costs. We've had to become experts in code share logistics because, for example, Swiss Air will happily accept 13 and above but they code share flights with Lufthansa who requires 15. Whether your kid can board the flight depends on which airline's code is used for the flight number, and it's not always clear on the airline's own websites (much less other sites), despite being the same seat on the same plane. The real mess happens when a flight is cancelled and the airline rebooks passengers already in-route. Last year our kid was on an Iceland Air route in a connecting city when they cancelled the next leg. Someone at their flight operations center "helpfully" rebooked the ticket to a British Air flight leaving that city an hour later, except BA has a 14 limit and denied boarding (kid was a few weeks shy of 14 at the time). In fact, the BA gate agents couldn't even understand how it was possible for a 13 year-old to be issued a ticket (because it was done in the back-end inter-airline system). So our kid ends up stranded in a distant connecting city. We ultimately had to buy a last-minute one-way ticket on a third airline to a different city for a connection on an airline that would board her. It took months of calls to eventually get a refund from Iceland Air for a multi-thousand dollar business class ticket, on a flight they cancelled. (note: For anyone concerned, our kid is a hyper-savvy frequent flyer who grew up flying international routes. Also, for international routes we always book her business class in an isolated seat that's in its own row right next to the crew galley.) We have a friend who's kid goes to a boarding school in the U.S. (but on the opposite coast). All the major U.S airlines now have 15 or 16 age limits. For spring break a few weeks ago, they had no choice but for one parent to fly across the country and back, both ways, just to "accompany" their kid past the gate boarding agents. Because almost all U.S airlines are now unaccompanied kid hostile, our kid can't even connect internationally from our local airport. Instead we have to drive her three hours to an airport that international airlines fly direct from.
- CaliforniaKarl 3y ago
  Please clarify something for me, about major US airlines having 15 or 16 age limits. Per https://www.united.com/en/us/fly/travel/accessibility-and-assistance/unaccompanied-minors.html https://www.united.com/en/us/fly/travel/accessibility-and-as..., it seems like they’ll accept unaccompanied minors potentially as young as 5.
  - NovemberWhiskey 3y ago
    When an airline says "unaccompanied minor" they mean "we'll charge you hundreds of dollars to escort your child"; the OP is referring to the age above which that escort is not required.
  - sokoloff 3y ago
    The age for a minor to fly alone and without going through the unaccompanied minor process [considerable hassle and expense]. (In other words, to fly as "any other passenger".)
  - forbiddenvoid 3y ago
    "Unaccompanied minors" require an escort to and from the gate, so they are only unaccompanied on the flight itself. For truly unaccompanied minors (who do not require an escort), the age limits are as stated above.
  - mrandish 3y ago
    The condition is that it requires non-stop flights. For those coming from or going to "feeder cities", there are often no direct flights. That's what the issue is for our friends as they are both coming from, and, going to feeder cities in the U.S. For us, no U.S. airline offers direct flights from the U.S. West coast to Geneva. There are many routes but they are all connections through NY, Chicago, Atlanta, Dallas, etc. Swiss Air also has no direct flights from the U.S. West to Geneva, but they do have direct flights from an airport over three hours drive from our home to Zurich. Six hours driving round-trip is a hassle but at least possible (sometimes requiring an airport hotel stay for very early or late flights). From Zurich it's an easy one hour flight to Geneva and from there a couple hour train ride to the school. Fortunately, Swiss Air (and a lot of international airlines) have no problem with 13+ year-olds connecting. It's been 13+ for a long time because I did it internationally when I was a kid - and that was the era of carbon triplicate paper tickets and no cell phones :-). I think Lufthansa changed their policy a few years ago only because they code share so much with United. It's really the U.S. airlines that started changing from 13 to 16 being the minimum for unaccompanied connections. I suspect a U.S. airline had some unaccompanied connecting teen go AWOL and got sued over it, then their lawyers decided the legal exposure just wasn't worth it. Unintended consequence: free-range and outward bound Summer camp and school experiences got a lot more expensive and challenging for U.S. 13 to 15 year-olds. The international boarding school our daughter attends is terrific (and going was her idea). It has students from over 80 countries but they told us there are a lot fewer from the U.S. in the last five years.

mrandish 3y ago

Yes, as the parent of a 14 year-old currently attending boarding school in Europe, the way that many airlines have in recent years increased their minimum age rules to fly unaccompanied creates huge problems and costs. We've had to become experts in code share logistics because, for example, Swiss Air will happily accept 13 and above but they code share flights with Lufthansa who requires 15. Whether your kid can board the flight depends on which airline's code is used for the flight number, and it's not always clear on the airline's own websites (much less other sites), despite being the same seat on the same plane. The real mess happens when a flight is cancelled and the airline rebooks passengers already in-route. Last year our kid was on an Iceland Air route in a connecting city when they cancelled the next leg. Someone at their flight operations center "helpfully" rebooked the ticket to a British Air flight leaving that city an hour later, except BA has a 14 limit and denied boarding (kid was a few weeks shy of 14 at the time). In fact, the BA gate agents couldn't even understand how it was possible for a 13 year-old to be issued a ticket (because it was done in the back-end inter-airline system). So our kid ends up stranded in a distant connecting city. We ultimately had to buy a last-minute one-way ticket on a third airline to a different city for a connection on an airline that would board her. It took months of calls to eventually get a refund from Iceland Air for a multi-thousand dollar business class ticket, on a flight they cancelled. (note: For anyone concerned, our kid is a hyper-savvy frequent flyer who grew up flying international routes. Also, for international routes we always book her business class in an isolated seat that's in its own row right next to the crew galley.) We have a friend who's kid goes to a boarding school in the U.S. (but on the opposite coast). All the major U.S airlines now have 15 or 16 age limits. For spring break a few weeks ago, they had no choice but for one parent to fly across the country and back, both ways, just to "accompany" their kid past the gate boarding agents. Because almost all U.S airlines are now unaccompanied kid hostile, our kid can't even connect internationally from our local airport. Instead we have to drive her three hours to an airport that international airlines fly direct from.

CaliforniaKarl 3y ago
Please clarify something for me, about major US airlines having 15 or 16 age limits. Per https://www.united.com/en/us/fly/travel/accessibility-and-assistance/unaccompanied-minors.html https://www.united.com/en/us/fly/travel/accessibility-and-as..., it seems like they’ll accept unaccompanied minors potentially as young as 5.
- NovemberWhiskey 3y ago
  When an airline says "unaccompanied minor" they mean "we'll charge you hundreds of dollars to escort your child"; the OP is referring to the age above which that escort is not required.
- sokoloff 3y ago
  The age for a minor to fly alone and without going through the unaccompanied minor process [considerable hassle and expense]. (In other words, to fly as "any other passenger".)
- forbiddenvoid 3y ago
  "Unaccompanied minors" require an escort to and from the gate, so they are only unaccompanied on the flight itself. For truly unaccompanied minors (who do not require an escort), the age limits are as stated above.
- mrandish 3y ago
  The condition is that it requires non-stop flights. For those coming from or going to "feeder cities", there are often no direct flights. That's what the issue is for our friends as they are both coming from, and, going to feeder cities in the U.S. For us, no U.S. airline offers direct flights from the U.S. West coast to Geneva. There are many routes but they are all connections through NY, Chicago, Atlanta, Dallas, etc. Swiss Air also has no direct flights from the U.S. West to Geneva, but they do have direct flights from an airport over three hours drive from our home to Zurich. Six hours driving round-trip is a hassle but at least possible (sometimes requiring an airport hotel stay for very early or late flights). From Zurich it's an easy one hour flight to Geneva and from there a couple hour train ride to the school. Fortunately, Swiss Air (and a lot of international airlines) have no problem with 13+ year-olds connecting. It's been 13+ for a long time because I did it internationally when I was a kid - and that was the era of carbon triplicate paper tickets and no cell phones :-). I think Lufthansa changed their policy a few years ago only because they code share so much with United. It's really the U.S. airlines that started changing from 13 to 16 being the minimum for unaccompanied connections. I suspect a U.S. airline had some unaccompanied connecting teen go AWOL and got sued over it, then their lawyers decided the legal exposure just wasn't worth it. Unintended consequence: free-range and outward bound Summer camp and school experiences got a lot more expensive and challenging for U.S. 13 to 15 year-olds. The international boarding school our daughter attends is terrific (and going was her idea). It has students from over 80 countries but they told us there are a lot fewer from the U.S. in the last five years.