South African Airways is among several global carriers fined $2.5 million by US authorities for failing to refund passengers for tickets purchased during the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020.

The US Department of Transportation (USDOT) also imposed civil penalties on Lufthansa, Air France, and KLM Royal Dutch Airlines.

These fines address delays in refunding over $900 million owed to passengers after flights were grounded during the pandemic, leading thousands of airline customers to wait months for their money.

In 2022, USDOT announced plans to seek higher penalties for airlines and other entities that violate consumer protection rules, aiming to prevent future infractions.

KLM informed USDOT in June 2020 that it had begun offering refunds to all consumers holding non-refundable tickets on disrupted US flights.

However, the airline cited staffing and technical issues and a high volume of refund requests as reasons for the prolonged wait times for many consumers.

KLM stated it has since implemented one of the industry's most customer-friendly ticket refund and exchange policies, providing $84.15 million in refunds to US flight customers who were initially not entitled to them.

In 2022, the US government said it had completed investigations into 10 airlines over delayed pandemic passenger refunds, with 10 more probes still pending.

Lufthansa told Reuters passengers faced refund processing times exceeding 100 days in 2020. Lufthansa stated it has fulfilled all required refunds and attributed the delays to the unprecedented number of refund requests during the pandemic.