Air Carrier Access Act: Accommodations for persons with hearing impairments

Regulation Effective May 13, 2009:

14. C.F.R. § 382.43 Must information and reservation services of carriers be accessible to individuals with hearing impairments?

(a) If, as a carrier, you provide telephone reservation and information service to the public, you must make this service available to individuals who use a text telephone (TTY), whether via your own TTY, voice relay, or other available technology, as follows:

(1) You must provide access to TTY users during the same hours as the telephone service is available to the general public.

(2) You must ensure that the response time for answering calls and the level of service provided to TTY users is substantially equivalent to the response time and level of service provided to the general public (i.e., non-TTY users).

(3) You must not subject TTY users to charges exceeding those that apply to non-TTY users of telephone information and reservation service.

(4) In any medium in which you list the telephone number of your information and reservation service for the general public, you must also list your TTY number if you have one. If you do not have a TTY number, you must state how TTY users can reach your information and reservation service (e.g., via a voice relay service).

(5) If you are a foreign carrier, you must meet this requirement by May 13, 2010.

(b) The requirements of paragraph (a) do not apply to you in any country in which the telecommunications infrastructure does not readily permit compliance.

14 C.F.R. §382.69 What requirements must carriers meet concerning the accessibility of videos, DVDs, and other audio-visual presentations shown on- aircraft to individuals who are deaf or hard of hearing?

(a) As a carrier, you must ensure that all new videos, DVDs, and other audio-visual displays played on aircraft for safety purposes, and all such new audio-visual displays played on aircraft for informational purposes that were created under your control, are high-contrast captioned. The captioning must be in the predominant language or languages in which you communicate with passengers on the flight.

(b) The requirements of paragraph (a) of this section go into effect with respect to audio-visual displays used for safety purposes on November 10, 2009.

(c) Between May 13, 2009 and November 9, 2009, U.S. carriers must ensure that all videos, DVDs, and other audio-visual displays played on aircraft for safety purposes have open captioning or an inset for a sign language interpreter, unless such captioning or inset either would interfere with the video presentation so as to render it ineffective or would not be large enough to be readable, in which case these carriers must use an equivalent non-video alternative for transmitting the briefing to passengers with hearing impairments.

(d) The requirements of paragraph (a) of this section go into effect with respect to informational displays on January 8, 2010.

Regulation before May 13, 2009:

14 C.F.R. § 382.47 Accommodations for persons with hearing impairments.

(a) Each carrier providing scheduled air service, or charter service under section 401 of the Federal Aviation Act, and which makes available telephone reservation and information service available to the public shall make available a telecommunications device for the deaf (TDD) service to enable persons with hearing impairments to make reservations and obtain information. The TDD service shall be available during the same hours as the telephone service for the general public and the response time for answering calls shall be equivalent. Users of the TDD service shall not be subject to charges for a call that exceed those applicable to other users of the telephone information and reservation service.

(b) In aircraft in which safety briefings are presented to passengers on video screens, the carrier shall ensure that the video presentation is accessible to persons with hearing impairments.

(1) Except as provided in paragraph (b)(2) of this section, the carrier shall implement this requirement by using open captioning or an inset for a sign language interpreter as part of the video presentation.

(2) A carrier may use an equivalent non-video alternative to this requirement only if neither open captioning nor a sign language interpreter inset could be placed in the video presentation without so interfering with it as to render it ineffective or would be large enough to be readable.

(3) Carriers shall implement the requirements of this section by substituting captioned video materials for uncaptioned video materials as the uncaptioned materials are replaced in the normal course of the carrier's operations.