Flight delay and cancellation compensation, Thomas Cook ONLY

JPears

What a ridiculous assesment by CEDR.
Whilst a low risk of losing, I really can't see a court finding in favour of airline, especially if the op asks the right questions of the airline in court eg why 2 flights earlier was so late....

Tyzap

The CAA says a Mandatory Occurrence Report (MOR) should be raised as below.

(9) A lightning strike which resulted in damage to the aircraft or loss or malfunction of any aircraft system.

As the lightning strike only caused a delay of 1hour and 5minutes, I doubt any damaged was caused and it was perhaps suspected rather than actual. Did it really happen? we don't know. Was an MOR reported to the CAA? we don't know that either.

NoviceAngel

I!!!8217;ll come back and give my opinion later, OFF - TOPIC however I!!!8217;ve found that there is a workaround to the forum messing up posts when apostrophes are used. I!!!8217;ve found it only happens if you use quick reply or quick edit - if you go into advanced before you post it seems to post as originally written.

The same text but now posting in Advanced

I’ll come back and give my opinion later, OFF - TOPIC however I’ve found that there is a workaround to the forum messing up posts when apostrophes are used. I’ve found it only happens if you use quick reply or quick edit - if you go into advanced before you post it seems to post as originally written.

Paulcox741

Thanks Tyzap.

Will be issuing the NBA over the weekend.

How much info do I need to include in the initial claim papers? Do I just need reiterate my original thoughts or should I go into how I disagree with the CEDR judgement?

Tyzap

Paulcox741 wrote: »

Thanks Tyzap.

Will be issuing the NBA over the weekend.

How much info do I need to include in the initial claim papers? Do I just need reiterate my original thoughts or should I go into how I disagree with the CEDR judgement?

Hi,

All the information you need can be found in Vaubans Guide, see below here for details.

I wouldn't bother mentioning about CEDR as it's irrelevant to your claim and will hold no sway either way with a judge.

Firstly tho, you need to inform CEDR that you reject their decision.

If the court finds in your favour it will show how out of kilter the CEDR adjudicator was with the EC261 regulations.

PM me if you need any further help once you have read the guide.

Good luck.

NoviceAngel

I have quite a bit to add to Tyzaps post - none of which I disagree with.

I’ve got a gap in work tomorrow morning so will try and add my uneducated thoughts, but I hope they will be helpful. A link to Vaubans guide is in my signature.

My initial advice would be to keep the legal claim as simple as possible for now. When you prepare your court bundle we can add all the detail.

Together with Tyzaps expert knowledge and my uneducated knowledge we can work as a team and win this won* with you. :grouphug:


* blimey I must be tired should say ‘one’ nighty night all.

Paulcox741

Thanks NoviceAngel :-)

Will need all the help I can get, going into new territory here!!

NoviceAngel

Apologies for the delay, but I felt I wanted to have a go at looking at your case, I haven't had the benefit of reading the full adjudicators decision, however Tyzap has posted his thoughts after reading it fully and I completely agree with Tyzaps logical reasoned synopsis.

There are a few statements I'd like to give my thoughts though.. I'm not coming from a legal viewpoint though, these are just my thoughts and nothing more. I'm also going to broaden the arguments a little.

Tyzap wrote: »

Under some circumstances a delay to an earlier flight, caused by an extraordinary circumstance (EC), may also affect later flights by that aircraft, such as possibly..

Acts of terrorism or sabotage
Political or civil unrest
Security risks
Strikes (unrelated to the airline such as, airport staff, ground handlers, or air traffic control)
Weather conditions incompatible with the safe operation of the flight
Hidden manufacturing defects (a manufacturer recall that grounds a fleet of aircraft)

But the merit of each case should be examined on a case by case basis.

I know that this is the considered view at the moment and one that judges appear to be taking, hopefully the Blanche v Easyjet CoA case next year will look at knockons caused by ATC restrictions and hopefully the law will become clear.

My view is much stronger, I do not believe that a knock on delay of any kind however caused EC or non EC should be able to have a knock on effect to follow on flights, I mean where do you draw the line ? That's open for the airlines abuse, that's like me saying 'I'm late for work today, sorry but I had a late night two days ago and I still haven't caught up with my sleep yet ' - Seriously ?

I think it's fair to say I'm not the only one with this view: Over to you JP

JPears wrote: »

I still don't get the " knock on delay due to weather maybe an EC"
Reg. 261/2004 is quite clear about this in preamble paragraph 14 -

"(14) As under the Montreal Convention, obligations on operating air carriers should be limited or excluded in cases where an event has been caused by extraordinary circumstances which could not have been avoided even if all reasonable measures had been taken. Such circumstances may, in particular, occur in cases of political instability, meteorological conditions incompatible with the operation of the flight concerned, security risks, unexpected flight safety shortcomings and strikes that affect the operation of an operating air carrier."
Two aspects of this paragraph.
1. "may" the preamble use of may is ambiguous, it doesn't state that weather affecting an aircraft is always in EC, leaving the door open to Bott's interpretation.
2. The flight concerned. This is not ambiguous. It concerns the flight, not the aircraft concerned, which is how the airlines want to interpret this.

I completely agree with this it does say the flight concerned - end of.

The_adjudicator wrote:

I find that this is akin to a bird strike and that it must be deemed an extraordinary circumstances as it is outside the normal activity of the air carrier and outside its actual control-

This is nonsense, whether it's akin to a bird strike or not has no relevance - it was a previous flight :mad:

"A given extraordinary circumstance can produce more than one cancellation or delay at final destination, such as in the case of an Air Traffic Management decision as referred to in Recital 15 of the Regulation. As derogation from the normal rule, i.e. the payment of compensation, which reflects the objective of consumer protection, it must be interpreted strictly."

This is the bit I think IS a bit sticky. That's why your getting in my view wrong decisions being made not only by CEDR but judges up and down the country, the difference here though is they use the example of an ATC decision as being a genuine EC, so therefore all EC's are equal ? So knock on delays that are caused by any EC can produce more than one delayed flight ? That's of course if you do accept the premise, that ATC restrictions to a previous flight are allowed to have a genuine EC for further flights in the first place. Rubbish nonsense, the intended meaning is quite clear - it's how some lawyers and judges interpret that as a get out of jail free card for the airline which is wrong in my view.

Tyzap wrote: »

I believe that this case would succeed in the small claims track (MCOL), especially if allocated to one of the specialist flight delay courts.

Exactly, but as you rightly point out with a flight delay specialist court, such as Liverpool. There are quite frankly bonkers decisions going on up and down the county because the regulations are not fully understood. I've been on here for years helping others and half the time it's difficult for me to understand some parts of EC261/2004 so often a judge does make a wrong decision and that's the danger here, yes you can appeal but if you do so and subsequently lose then you could be hit financially as the airline may be ordered costs against you for appealing.

One of the great benefits of CEDR is the uncomplicated fashion you can put your case forward without having to understand the court system. CEDR need to FULLY understand EC261/2004 and there's no excuse for wrong decisions, there should be an appeals process and only then will I recommend this path.

I wish Paul all the luck in the world with his court case and hope that his case can be heard at Liverpool, if so it will be another day out for me.It could be a long journey from all prospectives, let's just hope common sense prevails for once.

Thank you for reading my ramblings.

Cheers

NoviceAngel

EDIT - I've just added the Judment in the Blanche case to do with knock ons caused by ATC over in the Easyjet thread https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/4384709/flight-delay-and-cancellation-compensation-easyjet-only&page=147

Paulcox741

Thanks so much, for the comprehensive response NoviceAngel!!

Will get the NBA issued and then be back in touch to pull the right info together for MCOL.

daddymilner

Hello
We just returned home from salou yesterday ....
we were due to fly at 10.15am however we did not fly until 3.40pm . (Tcx1057)
We were told by captain this was due to technical difficulties to two air crafts?!
I have submitted a claim via the Thomas cook claim page . Just wondering what happens next , a lot of the other flyers in departure lounge said we can not claim to to it being technical difficulties?!