US DoT tentatively determines service obligations for US carriers under CARES Act

US Department of Transportation (DoT) issued (31-Mar-2020) an order, proposing that carriers which receive financial aid from the Coronavirus Aid, Recovery, and Economic Security (CARES) Act should be required to maintain minimum air services nationwide, with some exceptions. The CARES Act specifies that an air carrier receiving financial assistance should maintain scheduled service "to the extent reasonable and practicable", however the DoT is proposing certain parameters for how these service obligations will be implemented. The DoT has therefore made the following tentative decisions:

• Service obligations will only apply to direct carriers that accept financial assistance and hold certificates of public convenience and necessity for scheduled passenger service or commuter air carrier authorisation, excluding carriers with certificates of public convenience and necessity for charter operations and air taxi operators;
• Service obligations will apply to cargo carriers that apply for financial assistance and hold certificates of public convenience and necessity;
  • A priori service obligations will not be imposed on cargo carriers, however the DoT retains the right to impose service obligations on cargo carriers where appropriate;
• Service obligations will pertain only to domestic service and not international;
• Carriers will be able to consolidate operations at a single airport in cases where multiple airports serve the same point, meaning carriers will not need to maintain service to all such airports;
• The DoT will use OAG schedule data from the week ended 29-Feb-2020 and T100/OAG data from the year ended 31-Dec-2019 to determine the list of points served by carriers, with service obligations to pertain to any point served by carriers before 01-Mar-2020;
• Service obligations will require only minimum service levels for the following points:
  • Points previously served at least five times weekly will need to continue to be served five times weekly;
  • Points previously served less than five times weekly will need to be served at least weekly;
  • Points previously covered with any degree of scheduled service from more than one other point will need to be served from that point to one of the previously served points with the above frequency requirements;
• Carriers may meet minimum service obligations for a given point by dividing frequencies across multiple cities, however each carrier will be required to serve the point in accordance with minimum service levels regardless of whether multiple carriers serve the point;
• Carriers may request that points be exempted from service obligation, provided these points are believed to unreasonable or impracticable;
• The DoT will interpret service obligations to apply to regional carriers. For instance, regional operations operating as a franchise of the mainline carrier will be the responsibility of the mainline carrier.

Service obligations imposed under this order will be effective until 30-Sep-2020. [more - original PR]