Flight delay and cancellation compensation, Virgin Atlantic ONLY

Psaila

Hi all, I posted recently after recieving my date for mediation, however I have recieved a letter today 'notice of transfer of proceedings'
Saying that my case has been passed to my local court. Is this standard procedure even though I have mediation in 10 days? Or does this mean that mediation will be cancelled?
Many thanks
Daz

Chunk64

I have read a lot of the comments on this thread but admit I haven't read them all! I was just looking for a bit of advice about my rejected claim by Virgin. I submitted 3 claim forms for our flight which was 'delayed' by over 24 hours but Virgin rejected it using EC no. 25. Their reason was that it was "due to an unexpected technical issue only coming to light shortly before we were due to depart Gatwick. The aircraft would have turned in Orlando and operated your VS28 service back to the UK. As the plane was being readied for its departure, our engineers were alerted to a problem with the left thrust reverser on the number 1 engine. After further investigation, it was found that a new part was needed in order to declare the plane as serviceable. Whilst we had a spare part at our hangar in London Heathrow, the issue would have taken quite some time to fully rectify plus additional time needed for further checks and safety tests." I have done some research as Virgin operate two flights daily to Orlando and two flights daily back to the UK. The other later flight operated as normal on the 9 January so assume all the passengers from the non-flying VS27 flight were put on the other later flight to Orlando but have no way of finding this out. The strange thing is that on the records for the 10 January, the outward flight from Gatwick (VS27) operated as planned and this would have then formed the VS28 return flight to Gatwick, however records show there was no VS28 on the 10 January, and our flight number was changed to VS128 but there are no records for this flight! I believe we returned home on the plane that had just come in as VS27. The cynic in me thinks that Virgin may have had lots of empty seats on some flights and were trying to combine them which worked ok for the two outward flights on the 9 January but there were too many passengers to combine the two inbound flights and so one flight had to wait over 24 hours in order to combine it with the 10 January flight!! Is it worth asking the CAA to review it or does anyone think I should do an NBA or just go straight to MCOL? Any help/ advice would be appreciated. For further info, we were advised of the 24 hour delay at about 10.00am and our flight should have been about 6.00 pm. We were given food vouchers and put up in the hotel at the airport and given air miles (which we can never seem to use for any flights we want to take). Thank you.

David_e

Chunk64 wrote: »

Is it worth asking the CAA to review it or does anyone think I should do an NBA or just go straight to MCOL?

CAA - no

You can't make a claim without having first sent NBA so I would crack on with that. It's just a non-EC technical issue and a 24 hour delay demonstrates that they didn't make any great effort to mitigate the impact.

kerry13238

hiya i got a cheque for my outgoing flight with virgin on the 28th oct 2008 they claimed due to corrosion the flight was delayed over 5 h £3453 for 4 people virgin wrote after 28 days saying they dont agree but will pay yay xxxx

on our return flight on 10th nov 2008 flight number vs16 we were delayed the same over 5 h but virgin are saying the flight was not delayed.

i know it was how can i prove this flight stats says 156m late but i know it was over 5 h. i am very greatful for winning my first court but would like the second one to be sucessful to as im not happy they are lying about it thank you xxxx

David_e

kerry13238 wrote: »

on our return flight on 10th nov 2008 flight number vs16 we were delayed the same over 5 h but virgin are saying the flight was not delayed.

Very odd. What are they saying? If there were 4 of you then you will have 4 witness statements saying the delay was >5 hours. I'm not sure what other sources there are. Have you checked the FAQs?

You know what the delay was so you may as well join the rest of us and issue a NBA and then to court.

flor2012

Just wondering if anyone has had any success with the 25hr delay MCOL to Manchester June 8th 2013 - pilot sickness or if any court cases are due soon. Got mine coming up soon !

David_e

flor2012 wrote: »

Just wondering if anyone has had any success with the 25hr delay MCOL to Manchester June 8th 2013 - pilot sickness or if any court cases are due soon. Got mine coming up soon !

I've seen quite a few references to "pilot sickness" on the Virgin thread. No idea which flights - have a search on "pilot sickness" and see what comes up.

kmc1984

Hi, i'm usually rubbish with all this legal stuff but i am looking for some advice and pointers having just had a response from Virgin

Flight from Las Vegas to Gatwick August 2012, delayed for 23 hours.

I sent off to virgin and there response was 'Unexpected flight safety shortcomings.' With the explanation of 'after a walk around check after the aircraft had landed the wing landing gear door was damaged by the door fairing and the door fairing had unexpectedly become unaligned as a result of airflow.

We can confirm that the damage was not identified on an earlier service and that the problem was due to unforeseen damage, not a faulty component.

Point 1 - Do they have grounds on this?

Point 2 - Soon after i arrived home from this flight i send virgin an email for compensation of my train tickets which i missed and my incurred additional child care costs for the extra day delayed.

To which i got this response
'The aircraft that operated your flight encountered an unforeseen technical problem in London. Our engineers worked proactively to repair the problem as quickly and efficiently as possible, in order to minimise any disruption to your flight. However, the fix proved to be quite complex and took longer than expected to resolve.

At the point of repair, our flight crew would have unfortunately exceeded their legal duty hours in they had preceded with the flight. Therefore, in order to satisfy the legalities of crew working hours and minimum rest periods, we had no choice but to delay the inbound flight over night, which resulted in a reactionary delay to your flight'

So basically blaming the flight crew hours for the delay.

So what i am asking is, its their 1st point valid, if not what should my response be. Also should i include the flight crew reference in point 2 in my response to them.

Thanks in advance

KMC

David_e

kmc1984 wrote: »

We can confirm that the damage was not identified on an earlier service and that the problem was due to unforeseen damage, not a faulty component.

Point 1 - Do they have grounds on this?

Hm! Claiming a negligent service as an Extraordinary Circumstance. That's a new one!

No, it is absolutely not a defence.

kmc1984 wrote: »

So basically blaming the flight crew hours for the delay.

So what i am asking is, its their 1st point valid, if not what should my response be.

Crew hours isn't a defence either. Most certainly not when it relates to a flight from one of the main UK airports!

kmc1984 wrote: »

Point 2 - Soon after i arrived home from this flight i send virgin an email for compensation of my train tickets which i missed and my incurred additional child care costs for the extra day delayed.

The only compensation you are entitled to is that set out in the Regulation - all the more reason for making sure you get it!

kmc1984 wrote: »

Also should i include the flight crew reference in point 2 in my response to them.

Your response whould be along the lines of "Pay the compensation that I am entitled to within 14 days or I'll take legal action". Read the FAQs for further details!

Good luck!

haslehurst

David_e wrote: »

Hm! Claiming a negligent service as an Extraordinary Circumstance. That's a new one!

No, it is absolutely not a defence.



Crew hours isn't a defence either. Most certainly not when it relates to a flight from one of the main UK airports!



The only compensation you are entitled to is that set out in the Regulation - all the more reason for making sure you get it!



Your response whould be along the lines of "Pay the compensation that I am entitled to within 14 days or I'll take legal action". Read the FAQs for further details!

Good luck!

I think your Train Ticket and extra costs should be paid if you have a receipt, essentially you are entitled to out of pocket expenses as well and this is separate entitlement to EU261/2004.

Send letter for out of pocket expenses and send your NBA. I've had my Out of Pocket expenses paid, including additional costs of parking incurred because of delay in Orlando earlier this year - just waiting on court in January.