A woman is suing American Airlines for as much as $216,000 after online check-in failed to work ahead of an international flight from Paris to Chicago O’Hare in June. The woman claims the glitchy online check-in system forms part of a wider injury under the Montreal Convention, as well as disability rights laws, which saw the airline fail to accommodate her disability needs.
Kelsey Brickl from Illinois filed her suit in a Chicago district court earlier this week, arguing that American Airlines is legally obliged to make its online check-in system accessible to people with disabilities.
Kelsey lives with severe mobility, cardiac, and neuromuscular impairments, which require her to use a bespoke powered wheelchair. In addition, her son is autistic.
The incident unfolded on June 12 when Kelsey tried to use the online check-in system ahead of an international flight from Paris to Chicago for her, along with her son and husband.
When she attempted to use check-in, however, the system accidentally showed the wrong titles for her son and husband, which, in effect, “triggered a system lockout that barred her from online check-in and forced her and her family to conduct same-day airport check-in.”
This led to increased “physical and physiological burden and fatigue, time compression and disruption of medical routines, and risk to pre-arranged disability accommodations.”
Despite contacting American Airlines’ customer support lines to resolve the issue, the agents were unable to help and simply suggested that online check-in sometimes just doesn’t always work overseas.
Attempts to get a Complaint Resolution Officer (CRO) involved, as is required when requested by someone with a disability, went unanswered, and it is alleged, customer service agents would terminate the chat.
The complaint explains: “For individuals with disabilities and their dependents with complex medical or neurodevelopmental needs, such as Plaintiff and her son, advance online check-in is not a discretionary convenience but an essential and protected right under federal law.”
Explaining how this might be considered an injury under the Montreal Convention, the complaint suggests that the airline’s administrative and technological failures formed part of an overall accident that subsequently led to injury.
This is important because of what happened next when Kelsey arrived in Chicago and discovered that her custom wheelchair had been sent straight to baggage reclaim, rather than to the aircraft door as is supposed to happen.
American Airlines wanted to send Kelsey to baggage reclaim to collect her wheelchair and only agreed to have her mobility device redirected to the aircraft door after she refused to leave the plane, citing her federally protected rights.
During this time, Kelsey says she suffered significant emotional distress that led to cardiovascular instability.
“The Defendant’s actions caused Plaintiff substantial and foreseeable harm, including physical pain, humiliation, emotional trauma, and a documented medical decompensation in the weeks following the right,” the complaint explains.
While waiting for her chair to be returned to the gate, a flight attendant admitted that mobility devices are often sent straight to baggage reclaim, despite the fact that US law requires airlines to bring them to the aircraft door unless there are exceptional circumstances.
American Airlines did offer Kelsey a $75 future travel voucher, but the lawsuit dismisses this offer as “grossly inadequate and insulting.”
Article 17 of the Montreal Convention is a treaty recognized in many countries that gives airline passengers certain rights in regards to their baggage and injuries they might suffer while on an international flight.
In the case of injuries sustained by passengers, airlines can be held liable for accidents that took place onboard a plane, either during a flight or during boarding and deplaning.
The maximum amount of compensation that can be claimed under the Montreal Convention is set at 151,880 Special Drawing Rights, which represents a basket of currencies. Currently, 151,880 SDR is worth around US $219,033.
Airlines generally try to settle claims under the Montreal Convention before they get to a court hearing, meaning that there isn’t a huge amount of case law surrounding what kinds of claims are likely to prevail.
Kelsey is also suing American Airlines for breaches of the Air Carrier Access Act and the Rehabilitation Act, demanding injunctive relief to prevent American Airlines from treating other disabled travelers in the same way in the future.
As Kelsey explains: “Fundamentally, this case is not about seeking wealth for herself but about seeking justice for this incident and for other Disabled passengers, who are routinely disrespected and have their rights trampled on by airlines.”
Last October, American Airlines was slapped with a record $50 million fine for its treatment of passengers with disabilities and for mishandling wheelchairs.
In a consent order, the DOT said American Airlines had made “numerous serious violations of the laws protecting airline passengers with disabilities,” which resulted in disabled passengers being injured or receiving undignified treatment.
The DOT’s investigation looked at a barrage of complaints made against American Airlines between 2019 and 2023, many of which were about the carrier damaging or losing wheelchairs and failing to provide timely assistance to disabled passengers.
The record fine against American Airlines is 25 times larger than the DOT’s previous biggest penalty served on a carrier for violations of disability rights laws, although the carrier was only required to pay half of the penalty as $25 million was credited for investments that American Airlines had already made in improving its service towards disabled passengers.
Change Log:
- August 11, 2025 – Headline changed
- August 11, 2025 – Additional context of lawsuit added
- August 11, 2025 – Background around the DOT fine on American Airlines added.
One of the more ridiculous lawsuits I’ve seen in recent memory.
So why didnt her husband just go get the chair?
Ok, explain how husband goes and gets the chair, comes back to the gate and then reboards the plane.
I’ll wait.
It is also a Customs and Immigration issue.
Baggage claim in Terminal 5 at O’Hare is on the other side of Customs and Border Patrol. He wouldn’t have been able to bring it back. She makes it very clear in the lawsuit that a transport chair wasn’t medically safe, too.
We have the ADA simply because people who have not experienced seriously impactfull ‘disabilities’ do not and honestly cannot understand how much they can limit the most simple activities that most just take for granted. Just getting up out of a seat walking is a blessing that appears like a miracle to those who have lost their mobility. You don’t know until you know. So get off your buff and take care of business, especially customer care. Just do your job and realize that those special accommodations are necessary and can be life saving.
Is her name Karen? Because she’s acting like one.
This is why we can’t have nice things.
How is SHE the Karen when she can’t walk and has rights the airline responded to the situation the way they did, by breaking the law and not being sorry and thenlawyering up? Sounds like AA is the Karen!
And I can fuss over hawaiian air and service dog ignorance to policy
What was my solution?
After finally getting the supervisor to add him to my ticket and verified yes he flies in cabin that maybe some education to staff might be in need. Yes there are issues. I do my best to also accommodate on my end by buying a bulkhead seat, get on plane last, why? I have a 65 lb poodle I honestly cannot function 3 minutes without.
But to sue over it? Nah, waste I’d energy I can be flying to another country and spending valuable old age time on..
If she needs that much assistance she should have never been allowed to fly in the first. Online check-in is a convience, but not essential. They have the wheelchair at the airport and the people to push them, so her power chair isn’t essential for her getting off the plane. This person is using the ADA just to get her way. All American needs is a good laywer and this will be dismissed with prejudice.
This statement is both factually inaccurate and prejudicial toward Disabled individuals.
Regardless of any professional bona fides you might profess, you have not seen the entirety of the Plaintiff’s medical records and are not a part of The Plaintiff’s medical team and are therefore not qualified to issue judgment on the Plaintiff’s fitness to fly. The Plaintiff in this case (Case No. 1:25-cv-09158) travels with the express permission of her extensive team of qualified specialist physicians at Northwestern Medicine and UChicago Medicine in Chicago. The Plaintiff meets all FAA medical fitness requirements for air travel. She requires reasonable accommodations to which she is entitled under the Air Carrier Access Act (ACAA), 49 U.S.C. § 41705, and its implementing regulations at 14 C.F.R. Part 382. These are laws specifically designed to ensure passengers with disabilities can fly safely and with dignity.
Please note that the Plaintiff’s medically necessary, custom-configured power wheelchair (prescribed at the Shirley Ryan AbilityLab) is not a “preference” but a prescribed mobility device essential for preventing physical harm and enabling safe, independent deplaning, as documented by her treating specialists who have issued extensive documentation — used for insurance purposes and to be submitted to the court — that the exact type of manual wheelchair proposed for transport by American Airlines on June 12, 2025, is medically unsuitable and dangerous for the Plaintiff.
Airlines are legally required to return wheelchairs to the door of the aircraft unless doing so is impossible. It was not impossible in this case. Defendant’s crew and staff brought the wheelchair in question back once the Plaintiff informed the Defendant’s crew and staff that the proposed transport chair was not safe for her and invoked her legal rights. This proved they could have brought the chair all along but chose not to comply with the law, and the airline’s diversion of this custom prescription wheelchair, despite it being explicitly tagged for return to the aircraft door, directly violated 14 C.F.R. § 382.125. This extended delay, without access to needed PRN medications or a bathroom, caused documented medical decompensation while the Plaintiff was facing pressure from flight attendants and her husband was mistreated on the jet bridge, unable to board the aircraft again.
Furthermore, sir, this lawsuit is not about the Plaintiff “getting her way.” This is a federal civil rights lawsuit based on American Airlines’ own written and recorded admissions of violating federal law, not only by diverting her wheelchair, but also by denying her access to a Complaint Resolution Official (CRO) in Paris as required under 14 C.F.R. § 382.151. The Plaintiff is seeking not only unspecified compensatory damages but also injunctive relief. These are court-ordered policy changes designed to stop these admitted violations from recurring against other passengers with disabilities who fly American Airlines in the future. This case is designed not just to seek justice for this flight but to assist other disabled passengers in the future.
For you to mischaracterize such systemic violations as an abuse of the ADA (which does not even govern air travel) willfully erases the lived realities of millions of Americans with disabilities and ignores the purpose of federal civil rights protections in aviation. Therefore, this comment required a very thorough correction.
Typical French Arrogance. This is why, EUROPE IS A WASTE OF SPACE.
This is seems extreme for online checking not working. Its technology. It doesn’t always work. Someone is looking for a quick payday.
This uninformed, damaging comment must be addressed.
This Plaintiff’s federal civil rights lawsuit is not predicated on the inconvenience of a failed online check-in. Instead, this lawsuit arises from American Airlines’ admitted violations of federal disability law relating to flight AA151 on June 12 2025, including:
(1) denial of access to a legally required Complaint Resolution Official (CRO) when the Plaintiff attempted to escalate a disability-related issue, in violation of 14 C.F.R. § 382.151;
(2) diversion of the Plaintiff’s medically necessary, custom-configured power wheelchair (which had been explicitly tagged for return to the aircraft door) without her consent and attempting to force her to go through the entire airport and US Customs and Border Patrol in an ordinary airport transport chair, which was an unsuitable and unsafe solution and a violation of the ACAA; and
(3) the resulting medical decompensation during this period, which was documented by specialist physicians at Northwestern Medicine who had been treating the Plaintiff regularly well before the flight.
This Plaintiff possesses very extensive written and recorded evidence in which American Airlines agents and counsel acknowledged these violations and present them as “not unusual” for the airline. The Plaintiff is not “looking for a quick payday”; this lawsuit seeks not only compensatory damages but also injunctive relief, which are court-ordered policy changes designed to prevent recurrence of such violations against other passengers with disabilities similar to the Plaintiff.
Comments like yours that falsely characterize this matter as the search for a “quick payday” disregard the systemic nature of the misconduct by American Airlines, the Defendant’s own admissions, and the critical protections enshrined in the Air Carrier Access Act.
Clarification here was essential.
Important Correction: This lawsuit is being widely misreported.
No, Ms. Brickl is not using for “$216,000 over online check-in.”
The $216K figure is the treaty cap under the Montreal Convention, not the amount Ms. Brickl has requested. This case is about multiple violations of federal disability law — some admitted by American Airlines in writing — not about a “glitchy website.”
American Airlines’ customer service agents and their counsel have admitted to Ms. Bricl and to federal regulators that the airline never had an immediately-available, federally required Complaint Resolution Officer in Paris, even though the law requires immediate CRO access for passengers with disabilities.
They have also admitted that diverting wheelchairs to baggage claim instead of returning them to the aircraft door, which 14 C.F.R. § 382.125(a) requires unless physically impossible, is “not uncommon” in their operations.
The injuries alleged by Ms. Brickl in her Montreal Convention claim are real and documented by Northwestern Medicine specialists: physical decompensation, cardiovascular instability, and severe medical impact in the weeks following the incident.
This is an Air Carrier Access Act, Rehabilitation Act, and Montreal Convention case, not anything governed by the ADA (which doesn’t apply to airlines). This is a case about whether a federally regulated airline can ignore multiple legal obligations to disabled passengers, admit it in writing, and still call it “just an inconvenience.”
Ms. Brickl is also seeking injunctive relief — meaning changes to their practices — so this doesn’t keep happening to other Disabled passengers and their families. She is also representing herself as a Pro Se Plaintiff. Fundamentally, this case is not about seeking wealth for herself but about seeking justice for this incident and for other Disabled passengers, who are routinely disrespected and have their rights trampled on by airlines.
the lady is imho crazy and she takes no criticism no jury will like her no lawyer represents her and she liks to make threats
the best thing would be for AA to ban her for life