4 hours 10mins delay/ Easyjet / EU Regulation 261/2004 ? ? ?

jonnyd85

I recently had a flight to and from London Luton to Faro.

The return flight was delayed by 4 hours and 10 minutes. When i turned up at the airport their was a A4 sheet of paper at the desk saying the flight was delayed by 3 hours. My flight was at 20:55, the desk A4 sheet said 23:55. This was at 17:30 we heard about the delay. The delay ended up been 4hour 10minutes.

I wrote to Easyjet with the template from this website and have had 2 responses so far:

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24th July 2013

Dear *****

I am very sorry to hear about the cancellation of your flight. We work hard to provide our passengers with a punctual and reliable service.

In your case, unfortunately we had to cancel your flight for technical reasons. A situation like that is considered, under our Carrier's Regulations and European Law, to be outside our reasonable control. For this reason, I'm afraid we cannot offer you any compensation.

Yours sincerely


and

Dear *******

Thank you for your e-mail to *******, I have been asked to reply on her behalf.
Firstly, I would like to apologise that you suffered a lengthy delay to your flight on the 16 July, we do appreciate the frustration and inconvenience a delay situation causes to passengers and always make every effort to minimise the disruption.
Having checked our records I can see that the reason for the delay was as a result of a bird strike. This was a situation outside of easyJet's control and under EU Regulation 261/2004 has been classified as an extraordinary circumstance. I must let you know that compensation is not payable in this situation.
Once again, I am genuinely sorry you had a bad experience whilst choosing to fly with easyJet and hope that this will not prevent you from giving us another try sometime in the near future.
With very best regards

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Now i understand they would prefer not to pay us compensation, but do i have these valid points by law?

- If its a bird strike it has to be on the planes trip to pick you up that the bird strike happens? The flight to pick us up took 2hours and 40mins, i tracked it on flight tracker and while we was waiting for our plane, it had not even taken off, bearing in mind we were told the plane was delayed 2hours before this, so the delay could not have been a bird strike if the plane hadn't even taken off?

- I have had 1 email and 1 txt message saying that they were sorry for our delay due to maintenance problems

- I took a photo of the A4 board at the checking saying we had 3 hour delay. The photo was taken at 17:30, the flight to pick us up didn't set off from Luton until 22:00, so how could the plane have been delayed by a bird strike even before it had taken off?

- When we got on the plane, the pilot stated, he was sorry for the delay, the plane had been to Greece and got stuck due to a strike earlier in the day, then to Luton, then Luton to Faro to pick us up. Then said the plane they had on hand as a spare plane for us had a maintenance issue, so that was because of the delay.


Do i have valid points and am i entitle to my compensation for 4 hours and 10mins delay?

Would be great to hear some feedback on this and very much appreciated.

Thank you,

Jonny

richardw

Perhaps remove identifying details from your post, they do read this forum.

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/4552743

Mark2spark

jonnyd85 wrote: »

I recently had a flight to and from London Luton to Faro.

...so how could the plane have been delayed by a bird strike even before it had taken off?

Do i have valid points and am i entitle to my compensation for 4 hours and 10mins delay?

Would be great to hear some feedback on this and very much appreciated.

Thank you,

Jonny

Yes, it seems you have a genuine and valid claim. Write back and say that the reason they have given does not pertain to the flight concerned, ie >insert your flight number< , and that you urge them to reconsider, and that failing that reconsideration within 14/21 days, you will be at liberty to commence court action without giving them further notice

etc etc all as per the NBA template in the FAQ's.