Flight delay and cancellation compensation, Ryanair ONLY

housebuyer7

Thank you :-) I’ve submitted my claim to ADR so will wait to see the outcome of this, I hear it will take a long time.

housebuyer7

Update - I put in a claim for compensation separate to my expenses claim and have been awarded £439.20 from Ryanair, so that’s good at least. I await the outcome of my expenses claim from the ADR.

JPears

They will take as long as you let them. Time to go to ADR as that will take a while too.

CKhalvashi

You should have contacted the live chat team at the airport but that you didn't isn't necessarily a problem.

I would.also advise forwarding to the ADR if you have heard nothing back, as hopefully this will resolve in the meantime.

JPears

ATC issues the day before your flight wouldn't normally be an EC so get your compensation claim in too.

CKhalvashi

c'est_moi said:

Well, one hour later and I'm not sure I am any further forward. My claim for expenses has now been 'escalated' and I was advised to fill in a complaints form about my being prevented from filling in the compensation form.

I am never flying with Ryanair again. To be left stranded in France was bad enough, but to dodge and weave around paying for my return flights is shameful. I thought I would make this an easier process by booking my rerouted flights with Ryanair. All I seem to have done is hand over yet more money to them.

I am giving them a couple of days and then I am going to submit an ADR.

In fairness to Ryanair this year from experience as a frequent business traveller, they've been the most resilient of all airlines this year, including when they cancelled Ukrainian operations actually bent over backwards to help (I was offered refund which came very quickly or move to Lublin/Rzeszow without limits in dates, I managed to self-book something a bit more suitable to Wroclaw where my contacts had re-based themselves). I've had to use them this year due to being the only realistic option for self-connections to another airline in some cases.

Unfortunately cancellations happen, however my experience and that of at least a few others here has not been the same as yours. Ryanair carried 100+ million passengers a year (that's 300,000 a day) before the pandemic (and are probably around there this year again), it's inevitable that a few of those will have problems.

Once again, if you don't get anywhere, this is going to be a case for the ADR. Your rights are set out in legislation and Ryanair are very good at offering the minimum allowed contractually and in law, meaning you should get exactly what you are owed, which includes a reasonable re-routing on the same terms.

JPears

c'est_moi - I think you have worked out very quickly all there is to know about the airlines' attitude to EC261/2004. And how to deal with it!

Well done.

MrChips

Hi all, I'm hoping I can get some assistance from the good folk here!

I travelled with two family members via Ryanair last night from Budapest to Stansted.  The scheduled flight time was departure at 20:20 and arrival at 21:50 (local times).

In the end we departed (took off) at 23:13 and landed at 00:21.  However, there was then a delay before the airport could accommodate the plane so we didn't stop taxiing until 00:47 and the doors were finally opened at 00:50 with passengers starting to disembark at 00:51.  Looking at the flight code on google last night, it had the arrival time showing as 00:47.

I was aware that compensation is due if the flight "arrives" at least three hours late, with the timing (as I understand it) measured by when passengers are able to disembark (i.e. doors opened with stairs outside).  So, knowing we were right against the 3 hour limit I filmed the disembarkation process and therefore have proof passengers weren't able to leave until after 00:50, albeit only a matter of seconds after the cutoff.

With that in mind - is anyone on here able to confirm:
 - given these timings, am I right that I am able to claim under the 3 hour flight delay rule (subject to the delay not being due to exceptional circumstances)?
 - should I expect Ryanair to put up a fight?

Separately, the materially delayed arrival (not to mention a subsequent 1.5 hour wait to go through passport control) meant we could not get a train home and had to order a taxi at a cost of £95.  Is this something I can also claim from Ryanair?  Or is that one for travel insurance?

Many thanks in advance!

eskbanker

MrChips said:

 - given these timings, am I right that I am able to claim under the 3 hour flight delay rule (subject to the delay not being due to exceptional circumstances)?

It's the time the first door is opened that counts, rather than actual disembarkation, but the 2009 Sturgeon ruling clearly kicks in exactly at (rather than above) three hours:

...the right to compensation laid down in Article 7 of the regulation where they suffer, on account of a flight delay, a loss of time equal to or in excess of three hours, that is, where they reach their final destination three hours or more after the arrival time originally scheduled by the air carrier

MrChips said:

 - should I expect Ryanair to put up a fight?

I think we all know the answer to that!  However, as you say, "there was then a delay before the airport could accommodate the plane", so if the aircraft landed at 00:21 but didn't stop taxiing until 00:47, Ryanair are likely to be able to claim that they weren't responsible for three hours of delay and reject accordingly.

MrChips said:

Separately, the materially delayed arrival (not to mention a subsequent 1.5 hour wait to go through passport control) meant we could not get a train home and had to order a taxi at a cost of £95.  Is this something I can also claim from Ryanair?  Or is that one for travel insurance?

That's one for travel insurance.

MrChips

Thanks for such a quick and comprehensive reply.  As I was seated in row 18, my video doesn't show the actual doors at the front (just a lot of people standing up).  However, I'm zoomed in on the front of the plane and you can see people only start to move forward at around 00:51, and that coincides with an announcement over the public address from a stewardess saying people can now disembark.

Re taxiing, there was a certain amount of delay, but I thought this was relatively normal.  From what I was reading online, airlines add several minutes to the flight schedule as an allowance for the fact that they usually take some time from hitting the runway to reaching the gate.  I certainly wouldn't regard that as exceptional circumstances myself!  Are you saying that this would be sufficient to allow Ryanair to put up a legitimate defence?

Thank you.