Compensation for delayed flights Discussion Area

tasticz

eskbanker said:

Caz3121 said:

Make the claim against Etihad as the operating carrier of the flight that had a technical issue and whose delay caused you to miss your connection. As the flight was departing the UK, the amount should be correct.
Trying to claim against Air Arabia (as a non-EU carrier and a flight departing outside the EU) could result on them ignoring or spending weeks/months and eventually getting told to deal with Etihad
see if iyou can find the process on the airline website for initial claim rather than using resolver

I agree that claiming against Air Arabia is unlikely to be straightforward but conversely don't believe that Etihad are liable to pay compensation, as their flight wasn't delayed by over three hours, even though it ultimately caused a missed connection onto a second flight on the same booking that they'd sold.  Happy to be corrected if I'm wrong, and no harm in trying both, but it wouldn't be a surprise if the traveller was pointed to the other airline by each of them....

so what should I do, go with Etihad or Air Arabia or claim with both?

eskbanker

tasticz said:

eskbanker said:

Caz3121 said:

Make the claim against Etihad as the operating carrier of the flight that had a technical issue and whose delay caused you to miss your connection. As the flight was departing the UK, the amount should be correct.
Trying to claim against Air Arabia (as a non-EU carrier and a flight departing outside the EU) could result on them ignoring or spending weeks/months and eventually getting told to deal with Etihad
see if iyou can find the process on the airline website for initial claim rather than using resolver

I agree that claiming against Air Arabia is unlikely to be straightforward but conversely don't believe that Etihad are liable to pay compensation, as their flight wasn't delayed by over three hours, even though it ultimately caused a missed connection onto a second flight on the same booking that they'd sold.  Happy to be corrected if I'm wrong, and no harm in trying both, but it wouldn't be a surprise if the traveller was pointed to the other airline by each of them....

so what should I do, go with Etihad or Air Arabia or claim with both?

I'm struggling to locate a definitive reference as to which airline would be liable to compensate in this scenario - Etihad were undoubtedly responsible for rearranging the second flight for you (because your booking was arranged through them), but compensation is the responsibility of the operating airline and it was Air Arabia who ultimately delivered you late to your final destination, even though they weren't at fault as such (I don't believe that Etihad's hour delay obliges them to pay out).

hennycare

hennycare said:

hennycare said:

NotoriousREV said:

Back in April our Ryanair flight from Manchester to Rhodes was delayed, landing 3 hours and 50 minutes late. The reason was that the baggage handling agent appointed by Ryanair (Swissair) were understaffed and pretty much every flight out of Manchester that day (01/04) was late. These problems had been going on for days, if not weeks, and had been well documented in the press. 

When we claimed compensation, Ryanair told us that the delay was both unexpected and out of their control. My view is that 1) Ryanair are responsible for baggage handling, even if they outsource this responsibility to a 3rd party and 2) the delays were entirely expected given the ongoing staffing issues. 

My questions are: am I right? And, has anyone successfully claimed via the ADR process for a delay due to a lack of baggage handlers?

Thanks. 

I flew out from Manchester last week (01/06) and landed in Dublin (flight time ~30min) just over 3 hours late. On flights scheduled between 5pm and last flight only 2 departed over 3 hours late (some other airlines had cancelled flights), both were ryanair, one was the one I was on.
After a little bit of back and forth with Ryanair and them giving the same excuses to me as they did you (" handling delays" "delay was unexpected" "beyond Ryanair's control") which I would guess is their template response, I have opened a case with ADR. Yes it is petty for a £20 flight, but Ryanair squeeze passengers for every last penny they can, and the treatment I had from Aer Lingus on the return flight (I missed my flight, but that's another story) just put in perspective how terrible a company Ryanair is to their passengers/customers.
The guy I spoke to from Aer Lingus said they have a hybrid set of ground crew, for their jets they are direct employment and the prop fleet are contract, so they haven't been without issues but have largely got it in hand. He said many have gone to work for supermarkets in the pandemic as they got better pay and conditions, and then why would they come back?

Given that the Average departure delay on the evening I flew out for Ryanair was 110mins and for other airlines 45mins it seems like this is an issue plaguing Ryanair more than other Airlines.

I work in construction, client side, and if we have a contract with a contractor and they subcontract some of that work it is still the responsibility of that main contractor who we have employed to deliver the end result. I may be wrong but I would analogise that with Airlines, my contract is for you to get me from A to B within 3 hours of stated time, if you fail and there aren't exceptional issues outside your reasonable control then you've breached the contract and as set out compensation. You hiring a poor subcontractor is your decision and you can take damages up with them but it does not impact on the contract we have together. Obviously ADR is a way to debate whether they did all they could have, but given there was another Ryanair Dublin flight which was scheduled later and left before my own, this seems unlikely to be able to be justified in my opinion.

I would also be interested to know if others have had success or not in these types of claims. I will update when mine is resolved as I expect these issues will progress well into the summer.

An update if it helps anyone in a similar situation.
I appealed my case through ADR, which they accepted and on the last day available to them I received Ryanair's response. It is a significant document with a lot of legal speak. Effectively their argument is that the delay to the arrival and baggage handling caused the delay and these are out of their control.
Given they knew the inbound flight would be >2 hours late no mitigation was made. On the schedule of the aircrafts movements for its' previous flight its' Stated time of Arrival into Manchester (the airport I was flying from) was 10 minutes after my Stated time of Departure. Nowhere in their defence did they state that they changed the schedule to try and mitigate. (Or even say what they tried, just that it's hard keeping flights on time)

Furthermore:
They also got the time wrong, stating it as UTC, rather than UTC+1 (or changed time) due to being in summer time.
They include a bunch of stuff about caselaw relating to bird strikes being extraordinary events, without stating that was a reason for the delay anywhere, and using it as justification for extraordinary events.
I cataloguing my response I found other case law
- showing that the burden of proof is on the Airline to show that the delay "could not have been avoided even if all reasonable measures had been taken",  "That air carrier must establish that, even if it had deployed all its resources in terms of staff or equipment and the financial means at its disposal, it would clearly not have been able, unless it had made intolerable sacrifices"(Case C-315/15 Point 28, 29, & 30)
- that unexpected events should be expected because things do go wrong at times and this should be expected once in a while. The case relates to a fuel pump, the rationale being that "in the course of the activities of an air carrier, that unexpected event is

inherent in the normal exercise of an air carrier’s activity, as air carriers are confronted as a matter of course with unexpected technical problems" (Case C-257/14 Point 42). This explicitly is an unexpected event if there is a recall on parts which are in serve though.  

-Furthermore within the legal precedent the airline can claim from 3rd parties for costs relating to delays, therefore I find it odd that they are fighting this if they should be able to claim from their baggage handlers (Article 13 of the regulation).

I have filled in my comments refuting their defence and now I wait up to 90 days for the final Determination. I would be interested from others their experience of how long it took for the ADR to return a decision.

And the finale if it helps others, although I am still perplexed to the final determination reasoning.
After chasing the adjudicators as it was a while over the 90 days they were due to deliver a response in I finally got an outcome, which was to side with the airline.
The reasoning is that a flight which is delayed due to an earlier flight delay is extraordinary circumstance?!

Further odd is that the Airline's case was based on the handling delays:
"3. AIRLINE’S CASE: 3.1 The Airline rejects the compensation claim. They say that the Flight was delayed by more than three hours due to handling delays at Manchester Airport which caused delays for a significant number of flights. 3.2 The Airline that there were no reasonable measures that they could have taken to limit or avoid the delay to the Flight."

But the adjudicator was ruling based on the previous delays to the airplane. None of the points I raised seemed to be addressed by the Adjudicator, such as it was already late when the aircraft set off from its' previous destination and they could likely have changed which aircraft was being used for other flights ie "Article 7 also states that where the delay is caused by an event that is classed as “extraordinary circumstances” that the operating carrier will only be able to rely on this if there were no reasonable measures that could have been taken to reduce or avoid the delay." Whether this is a reasonable measure or not etc.

Anyway it seems odd to me that a delay to the inbound flight caused by something which is within their control becomes an extraordinary circumstance.
I think more likely is that the adjudicator is overworked and under paid and was already outside the SLA so just delivered a verdict?

alig1

Does anyone know if/where, as a member of the public,  you can get access to full flight data as on the LennoxFlight Intelligence database available to people in the travel/travel insurance business.   I'm claiming in court for a flight delay where the airline defence is heavy rain on the runway when there was absolutely NO RAIN.   Don't want to give too many details but I believe the real reason was refuelling as the flight was fully booked  and I'm sure the true reason must be logged somewhere.

alig1

Does anyone know if/where, as a member of the public,  you can get access to full flight data as on the LennoxFlight Intelligence database available to people in the travel/travel insurance business.   I'm claiming in court for a flight delay where the airline defence is heavy rain on the runway when there was absolutely NO RAIN.   Don't want to give too many details but I believe the real reason was refuelling as the flight was fully booked  and I'm sure the true reason must be logged somewhere.

ptkloon

My flight on Sunday was diverted from Aberdeen airport to Edinburgh airport - the initial delay was due to a technical fault with the plane, they couldn't get a door open.  The diversion was because of weather in Aberdeen, but if the initial delay hadn't happened we would have been able to land fine as there were other flights that arrived at the scheduled time in Aberdeen.
Am I eligible to claim compensation as I didn't arrive at my scheduled airport until 5 hours after its due time

eskbanker

ptkloon said:

My flight on Sunday was diverted from Aberdeen airport to Edinburgh airport - the initial delay was due to a technical fault with the plane, they couldn't get a door open.  The diversion was because of weather in Aberdeen, but if the initial delay hadn't happened we would have been able to land fine as there were other flights that arrived at the scheduled time in Aberdeen.
Am I eligible to claim compensation as I didn't arrive at my scheduled airport until 5 hours after its due time

My understanding is that if the airline is responsible for less than three hours of a delay and it was taken over the three hours by extraordinary circumstances then that effectively negates a claim, even if the latter only came into play because of the former, but I'm not sure it's completely as cut and dried as that so no harm in submitting a claim anyway.

If it's any consolation, it could have been worse - talking yesterday to someone who made it in before the weather closed in, I believe that at least one flight turned round and went all the way back to London!

martinjohn

hi

Making a claim for compensation for a recently cancelled fight (cancalled with less than 24hours notice) with Aer Lingus from Cardiff (Wales) to Belfast (N. Ireland), for a British citizen. 

Do i, need to,

claim via their form using template information or use resolver?

in this instance, which law is relevant to the compensation, UK or EU?

Do i need to, find the exact reason for the cancellation? (they have stated, due to, "Operational requirements").

i have not contacted the airline directly with regards to this, apart from changing the flight online system, is this relevant?

thank you

eskbanker

martinjohn said:

Making a claim for compensation for a recently cancelled fight (cancalled with less than 24hours notice) with Aer Lingus from Cardiff (Wales) to Belfast (N. Ireland), for a British citizen. 

Do i, need to,

claim via their form using template information or use resolver?
Use the form, Resolver is just an unnecessary added layer of complexity.

in this instance, which law is relevant to the compensation, UK or EU?
UK, as the journey is wholly outside the EU.

Do i need to, find the exact reason for the cancellation? (they have stated, due to, "Operational requirements").
It seems unlikely that you'd be able to find out any more than that anyway - this reason should preclude the (mis)use of 'extraordinary circumstances' as a reason to deny a compensation claim, but airlines have been known to change their stories, so if you have 'operational requirements' in writing then that should help.

i have not contacted the airline directly with regards to this, apart from changing the flight online system, is this relevant?
Not sure what you mean by relevance here, but if you mean that you used their system to rebook a replacement flight then that takes care of their responsibilities under article 8 (refund or rerouting), but a compensation claim under article 7 sounds valid.

Comments inline above....

martinjohn

eskbanker said:

martinjohn said:

Making a claim for compensation for a recently cancelled fight (cancalled with less than 24hours notice) with Aer Lingus from Cardiff (Wales) to Belfast (N. Ireland), for a British citizen. 

Do i, need to,

claim via their form using template information or use resolver?
Use the form, Resolver is just an unnecessary added layer of complexity.

in this instance, which law is relevant to the compensation, UK or EU?
UK, as the journey is wholly outside the EU.

Do i need to, find the exact reason for the cancellation? (they have stated, due to, "Operational requirements").
It seems unlikely that you'd be able to find out any more than that anyway - this reason should preclude the (mis)use of 'extraordinary circumstances' as a reason to deny a compensation claim, but airlines have been known to change their stories, so if you have 'operational requirements' in writing then that should help.

i have not contacted the airline directly with regards to this, apart from changing the flight online system, is this relevant?
Not sure what you mean by relevance here, but if you mean that you used their system to rebook a replacement flight then that takes care of their responsibilities under article 8 (refund or rerouting), but a compensation claim under article 7 sounds valid.

Comments inline above....

with regards to contacting the airline, the argument could always be made that i could of sort alternative flights, even tho we were certain none where available from the original airport / and no others would of been approriate ? (I guess i answered my own question? ) - not even relevant?

bottom line,  by not having contacted them to seek alternative flgihts with other airlines lets say, have i waived my rights to compensation for cancellation? or is it automatic regardless

just read on the CAA website that "If you received less than seven days’ notice of the cancellation, you can claim compensation based on the timings of the alternative flight", so it seems an alternative should of been sort by ringing them?

FYI i changed the flight on their system to the next available flight (from same airline/airport) which was 24hrs later