Free Flight Changes for Chicago Flights Due to Winter Storm
Update: Some offers mentioned below are no longer available. View the current offers here.
Due to bad weather in Chicago on Sunday, American Airlines and United have issued travel waivers allowing passengers to change their flights for free.
Thus far, 110 flights to and from Chicago O'Hare (ORD) have been cancelled on Sunday and another 254 have been delayed, according to FlightAware. The situation is likely to get worse, as the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) has issued a delay advisory for Chicago flights. The ground delay program starts at 2pm Central time and is expected to run through midnight. The system expects average delays of 94 minutes, with the potential for delays over three hours.
Remember, if you can't delay your itinerary, airlines aren't going to be responsible for paying for your meals or hotels in the case of weather-related delays/cancellations. But some top credit cards have flight delay/cancellation insurance that can reimburse you for weather issues, including the Citi Prestige ($500 per passenger for 3+ hour delay), the Chase Sapphire Reserve ($500 per ticket for 6+ hour or overnight delay) and Chase Sapphire Preferred ($500 per ticket for 12+ hour or overnight delay).
As of 1pm Central, the following airline waivers are available:
American Airlines
- Travel dates: January 7
- Airports covered: Chicago (ORD)
- Must have purchased your ticket by January 7
- Rebook travel anytime between January 7-12
- You can't change your origin or destination city. Must rebook in same cabin or pay the difference.
United
- Travel date: January 7
- Airports covered: Chicago (ORD)
- The change fee and any difference in fare will be waived for new United flights departing on or before January 12, as long as travel is rescheduled in the originally ticketed cabin (any fare class) and between the same cities as originally ticketed.
As of publishing, the following airlines haven't released waivers: Alaska, Delta, JetBlue, Southwest, Spirit, Virgin America.