Three tips to avoid holiday travel stress

The Thanksgiving, Christmas and New Years holidays are the busiest travel times of the year.

With so much increased activity at the airports, you might find travel a bit taxing.

Although it's hard to believe it's possible, air travel has gotten even more difficult and frustrating as the journey to more fees and more crowded flights continues.

"You're going to have a lot of people a lot of aircraft, a lot of congestion," said Jay Rollins, a retired airline captain.

Rollins is a veteran in both the cockpit and passenger seat, and he's got some advice on dealing with possible problems this holiday season.

For example, what do you do if your non-stop flight turns into a one- or two-stop flight? Marketing problems, aircraft problems and weather problems can all cause unwanted changes.

If you find your once non-stop now comes with a layover, you can ask to be put on another non-stop flight, even with another airline. And if there's not one available? You can ask for a refund if the new flight gets you in more than two hours later than the old one.
 
Once you're on the plane, if there's an emergency, don't expect to hear about it from the crew.

"If telling the passengers something they can't do anything about anyway, that will disrupt that flight, they won't give you that information," said Rollins.
 
The Federal Aviation Administration says it's up to the airline crew to decide whether to tell you that something has gone wrong. Captain Jay says it's more about safety.
 
And if you're worried about the air quality on that plane, breathe easy.
 
"To some extent it is. If you're concerned about air quality, open that nozzle fully, even if you don't point it directly in your face," said Rollins.
 
Bottom line, if you want to keep your enjoyment level up this holiday season, keep your stress level down. And you can do that by looking up the rules and checking them out before you check in.