Travelers on Northwest face uncertain summer

It will be a long, hot summer of uncertainty for travelers on Northwest Airlines.

Lockout and strike talk is swirling. Bankruptcy may be in the wings. NWA has advertised for replacement mechanics and flight attendants. Informational pickets are up.

What does it mean for travelers? Pay attention and protect your travel plans.

Here are suggestions:

•If you have a big trip coming up, get travel insurance. Companies like Travel Guard, Travelex, CSA and Access America cover you in the event of labor dispute or “supplier default” – if a company goes bust or declares bankruptcy.

Travel Guard, the largest, won’t insure for trips anymore on United or U.S. Airways, but will for Northwest, and so will competitors. Compare travel insurance at www.insuremytrip.com.

•To safeguard frequent flier miles, think about cashing in your Northwest World Perks miles on a trip flown by a partner airline, such as KLM or Hawaiian Airlines.

•If news becomes more ominous or a labor talks impasse is declared, book tickets on alternate carriers.

Although Northwest CEO Douglas Steenland assured New York analysts last month that NWA would serve passengers in a labor dispute “on day one,” it is unlikely the nation’s fourth-largest carrier could offer full service right away. Passengers also may balk at flying on planes serviced by replacement mechanics.

Worst case? In a labor dispute, you could be stuck with a refund and no flight.

The most likely chance of a strike or lockout is this fall, analysts say. Your summer travel likely will be unaffected.

Here’s some more advice from Tim Winship, publisher of FrequentFlier.Com and an expert on airline tickets:

•If you have a paid ticket and there’s a strike or lockout, what happens?

“It depends on whether your paid ticket is an expensive, unrestricted ticket versus a restricted ticket,” he says. “In this situation, an unrestricted ticket is fully endorsable over to another airline. If you have a restricted ticket, the airline could endorse it over if it wanted to, but it becomes a PR issue. They have to pay another airline, and these days, with all of them in a bad financial situation, they might not want to do that.”

•In a strike or lockout, can competitors add extra flights quickly?

“No.”

•What happens to frequent flier miles?

“When Eastern, Pan Am and TWA shut down … another airline came to the rescue and migrated the programs of failed airlines to their own miles program,” Winship says.

However, he adds, “It is very dangerous to assume such a scenario would play out today … almost certainly members would see their miles disappear.”