By James Pilcher
The Cincinnati Enquirer

Delta Air Lines' hub pricing policies have dragged the company into a $1 billion class action lawsuit. The suit stems from passenger actions designed to avoid high airfares at Cincinnati and other cities.

A federal judge in Detroit ruled Tuesday that a 1996 class action suit against Northwest Airlines can be extended to cover Delta passengers flying out of Cincinnati or Atlanta since June 11, 1995, along with US Airways passengers flying out of Charlotte, N.C., or Pittsburgh since May 18, 1995.

The six-page order says the suit covers those using full-fare tickets to and from the affected cities.

That could make millions more passengers eligible for the suit, which is over the practice of "hidden city ticketing." That's when travelers save money by using only part of a multi-stop ticket.

For example, a Cincinnati-bound passenger might buy a ticket from Dallas to Dayton and disembark in Cincinnati on the stopover - because it can be hundreds of dollars cheaper than a direct flight from Dallas to Cincinnati.

Airlines stopped allowing the practice in the early 1980s by withholding frequent flier miles, charging passengers more after the flight to make up the difference, or both.

Atlanta-based Delta operates its second-largest hub at the Cincinnati/Northern Kentucky International Airport, where it controls more than 90 percent of the flights. Local passengers pay 56 percent more than the national average for similar flights, according to federal statistics for the third-quarter 2003.

Delta officials would not comment Wednesday on the litigation.

U.S. District Judge Gerald E. Rosen ruled in 2002 that the suit could become a class action. The airline's appeal was denied by the U.S. 6th Circuit Court of Appeals in Cincinnati. The U.S. Supreme Court declined to hear the case.

In another matter, Delta officials confirmed Wednesday that the airline had given passenger records to the FBI shortly after the Sept. 11 terror attacks, but that the records were turned over under subpoena.

Three other airlines have come under harsh criticism for voluntarily providing more recent data to the Transportation Security Administration to test a new passenger-background screening program.

Delta spokesman John Kennedy said that while Delta was originally planning to cooperate with the TSA, it backed out because of privacy concerns and that no records have been provided since the subpoena.

E-mail jpilcher@enquirer.com