Or we can just let a kid on a plane and their parents have no idea what flight or time the plane will land. I bet most instances, the family isn't flying also, as in the child is going to visit a grand parent. AGain, my kid won't be flying at that age alone, so no worries on my part. You all feel free to do with your kids as you wish, I won't be doing this with mine.
And it is fine that your child will not be flying--good actually since you seem to expect far more from an airline than they should be doing for a teen who is not flying as an unaccompanied minor.
People who send a teen to fly on their own SHOULD and mostly do trust that teen to make the right decisions. In this day and age most of the teens would also have cell phones--THEY (the teen) can call the parents and either speak to them or leave them a message telling them what flight they have been rebooked on, just like anyone else would do if they needed to tell the people on the other end of a change in plans.
In our scenario--you are suggesting that my 15 year old should have been forced to stay at the airport (overnight probably, there are only a few flights a day to Frankfurt from any one city) if there had been a change in flight---since we could not be gotten a hold of to "allow" the rebooking
MY teen, who I had prepared with credit cards, cash, cell phone, keys to the house (she could take the train home if we got delayed--we had that all figured out) would have been stranded. In such a situation I would be LIVID if the airlines took it upon themselves to detain my teenager who had done nothing wrong.
We EXPECT problems to crop up when we fly. And I allow mykids to fly alone knowing THEY can handle those issues.
Actually, ironically enough, the ONLY time there was an issue at all when one of mine flew alone was when my summer came home from summer camp in London when he was 12. At that time he looked much younger than his age (people guessed him at 9 or 10) and even after showing ID and explaining that he flew in alone, etc the ground agent at Heathrow insisted on treated him like an unaccompanied Minor and escorting him to a locked waiting area with other UMs. There were no snacks and he had not eaten yet--he had money and had planned on eating lunch in the airport while he waited for his flight. They refused to allow him to leave the area to get food and he was pretty miserable.
I was angry that he was treated that way. He did try to standup for himself and say no to the UM thing but he also (wisely probably) did not want to make a big fuss at an airport over a non essential issue. But, he was upset and hungry and not keen on flying without his sister (who looks older than her age) until his big growth spurt this past spring which now makes him look old enough to not be questioned.
I actually wrote Lufthansa a letter expressing my displeasure that their own policy was not followed in this case and they were very apologetic and confirmed that he should not have been told to go with the agent.
again, my kids in a strange city in a hotel alone. My kids won't be doing this. Oh and if no one is available, as everyone seems to have an example of, how in the world is a parent supposed to see if a plane is delayed, they won't know which one you are on? Again, my kids won't be doing this at 13.
Sadly, in the US I do not think a parent calling would get a kid into a hotel these days. If one of our kids gets stranded we will try--they know that--but they also know odds are the hotels will not take anyone under 18 for liability reasons and that they may get stuck staying in the terminal all night. I am more comfortable with them flying/connecting in Europe for that very reason (even when those connections are in countries where they do not speak the language).
(BTW--I spent a night alone, waiting for a rescheduled flight, in a hotel in Madrid when I was 16--it was a non issue for me).
I am 100% confident (as the daughter of a 30+ year customer service agent, and having worked for an airline dealing with UMs while in college) that oday, the vast, enormous majority of customer service agents would make no effort at all to contact the parents of a teenager travelling alone, assuming that they were not travelling as official UMs.
A 12 year old UM is a completely different story, but on most airlines, a 13 year old does not have to pay the UM fee, and is not treated any differently from the other passengers. If the kid needs to be rebooked, the airline will rebook them without consulting anyone other than the passenger standing in front of them.
I dont' think people are encouraging teenagers to run around rebooking on random flights and never telling anyone. The point is that it's the teenager's responsibility to contact her parents, just as it's the responsibility of every other passenger on the airplane to contact those waiting for them or expecting them to arrive. I don't think that's an unreasonable expectation of a teenager, who almost certainly has her cellphone glued to her 24 hours a day anyway.