Compensation for delayed flights Discussion Area

richardw

Thanks Ian41 for the heads up.

sweet_caroline

I would be very grateful for some help as I've been getting nowhere with our insurance and the whole thing is making me miserable. My fiance and I treated ourselves to a trip of a lifetime Christmas 2010; BA flights from Glasgow to Heathrow, Heathrow to Mexico City, Mexico City to Acapulco arriving late on the Friday evening to spend some time there before catching a cruise on the Sunday. This was all booked and paid for via a travel agent. Due to bad weather, BA cancelled our flight to Heathrow on the Friday morning and didn't book us on the next service, saying this would not give sufficient transfer time for the connection to Mexico. All they offered us was to move us to flights on the Monday, which would get us to our destination too late to make the cruise ship! They claimed that was all they had to offer us, or could offer us. Our travel agent booked us on later flights to Gatwick, then on Air Mexico flights for the rest of the journey. We arrived approximately 24 hours later than planned, but in time to make the cruise, albeit at a huge cost. Our travel insurance company have offered us something like £25 each for travel delay.

I am trying to rely on this section of our policy:

2. the amountstated in the Schedule for additional travel and accommodation expensesnecessary to reach YOUR booked holiday destination should YOU arrive at YOURinternational departure point too late to commence YOUR TRIP as a result of thefailure of public transport services due to the perils stated above and/or themechanical breakdown of the vehicle in which YOU are travelling to reach YOURinternational departure point.....”

Our insurance company say not applicable and we have to claim from BA who cancelled the flight and are therefore obliged to offer replacement flights or a refund. Well, they did refund the flights, but that didn't cover the cost of the whole new flights, never mind the cost of the cruise we would have missed had we not shelled out for the new flights (which cost less than the cruise, so it seemed better to pay that than lose the whole holiday). Surely someone is responsible and has to pay up???

Many thanks if you take the time to help.

C x

ian41

sweet_caroline wrote: »

I would be very grateful for some help as I've been getting nowhere with our insurance and the whole thing is making me miserable.
C x

sweet_caroline

I will be happy to reply in detail within 24 hours but you need to brace yourself, because my reply will not be good news for you. So let me say that I am very sorry in advance.

sweet_caroline

Thanks Ian ... bracing I'll get a nice bottle of wine in the fridge ready for tomorrow to drown my sorrows!

Raymondo111

ian41 wrote: »

sweet_caroline

I will be happy to reply in detail within 24 hours but you need to brace yourself, because my reply will not be good news for you. So let me say that I am very sorry in advance.

Hi sweet caroline,

In February 2009 we had something similar happen to us, we were due to join a Princess cruise from Fort Lauderdale to the Caribbean, our BA flight from Heathrow developed a fault prior to take off and after sitting on the runway for approx 4 hours we were taken back to the terminal. Not everybody on the flight was due to join the cruise and initially BA said that they would put everybody up in a hotel overnight and then us out the next day. However, this would not have left us enough time to transfer to the ship and they were not going to delay the ship for the 160 people or so due to join the cruise. We eventually were able to get to the US later that night but were only offered New York or Boston flights and would then have to get flights from these 2 cities down to Fort Lauderdale. Suffice to say that in total it took us something like 30 hours to get to the ship, with only a few hours in some grotty hotel in La Guardia to try and get some sleep. As soon as we got back I wrote to Princess who said that it was BA's problem but as they had booked flights/transfers/hotel it came under the Package regulations making Princess responsible for any compensation. It was a long battle but after going to arbitration we were adequately compensated in line with the delayed departure regulations plus non supply of some parts of the holiday. You state that you booked with a Travel Agent but was it a package or something that was put together by you or the agent. This is crucial when it comes to claiming compensation as different rules apply.

Don't let them fob you off, they will always hope that you will go away and not pursue the claim any further but don't go over the top with your claim just stick to what you are entitled for under the EU regs plus any part of the holiday that was not supplied plus any out of pocket expenses that you incurred to get to your final destination.

Regards,

Raymondo111

ian41

sweet_caroline wrote: »

Thanks Ian ... bracing I'll get a nice bottle of wine in the fridge ready for tomorrow to drown my sorrows!

In answering your post, I am making a number of assumptions about your trip and how it was organised. These assumptions include:

1. That this was not an organised tour package sold by one cruise company which included all UK, transatlantic and Mexican flights, cruise, hotels and all transfers and stopovers.

2. That it was an independent package put together by your travel agent that included the cruise and then a series of flights and hotel(s) to get to and from the cruise departure and arrival points.

3. That the travel agent is a member of ABTA.

4. That apart from possible contact with BA at Glasgow Airport on that Friday morning or possible earlier contact telling you of the cancellation, you had no further discussions with BA regarding alternative flights and that your travel agent was responsible for all rebooking, rescheduling of alternative flights, refunds of your original flights and all discussions with BA.

5. That all the original flights from Glasgow to Acapulco were originally ticketed by BA under one 6 digit booking reference/PRN and all were cancelled/refunded by BA. If the Mexico City to Acapulco was separately ticketed and you used that flight then that is fine.

I should also say that Raymundo111’s circumstances as reported are different in a number of important ways, so I will concentrate on giving you my view of your scenario – rather than confuse the issue.

Having dampened your expectations earlier, there is a “faint glimmer of hope” for some recovery but it will not be simple or straightforward. Before we look at that, let’s go through the various parties and their involvement in this problem. I will try to keep it simple and go through step-by-step so that I can understand it! This is how I would look at it as a layman.

Clearly you feel that your travel insurer is being difficult and is at fault. I have not seen the full details of your policy but I am 99.9% sure that this will not be the case. The policy will cover you for any losses on items pre-paid and unrecoverable following cancellation. You have said that BA refunded the cost of your flights so you did not lose money there. Your cruise was unaffected so you did not suffer any loss there.

Indeed, although you do not quote any figures, I am again 99.9% certain that the “loss” that you wish to recover is due to the fact that your new flights were more expensive than your original BA flights. That is nothing to do with your insurer because that event took place after your BA cancellation on which you did not lose any money. Now if your travel agent had been unable to arrange alternative flights and your whole trip had been cancelled, then your insurers would have paid for all items pre-paid and unrecoverable (cruise, flights, hotel etc) less any excesses deductible under the policy

The insurer will offer to compensate for any delay in departure which is correct. Your beef with the travel insurers has been misdirected I am sorry to say because you wanted someone to cover the excess expenditure on the cost of replacement flights even though those flights were used and not cancelled. So in my view, the travel insurer is totally off the hook.

Let’s now look at BA. The weather conditions in December 2010 were atrocious and there were a huge number of flight cancellations (e.g. our US flights were cancelled and there were no replacements!). However, under EC Reg 261/2004 Article 8 regardless of the reason for flight cancellation, BA were responsible for offering you the choice of either re-routing under comparable circumstances or a refund. It was your choice.

Now I am hoping that BA did not ask you that question directly and I am hoping that you were asked the question (at best) by your travel agent. The fact remains that from BA’s viewpoint, a refund of your original fare was requested and once that was requested and agreed, BA’s contract with you ended. So to all intents and purposes, and even though they will not have directed your attention to that EC Reg and in particular Article 14.2, BA will be off the hook.

Now it is very unlikely that you would have been aware of Article 8 at the time your flight was cancelled. “Your faint glimmer of hope” will be if BA dealt with your Travel Agent directly regarding the cancellation, re-routing and refund request.

The argument that will have to be used will be that the Travel Agent should have had the expertise to know that under EC Reg 261/2004, you could have insisted on a re-routing with BA or another airline regardless of the fare – and not accepted a refund. You should be able to argue that there is no reason why you should have known the intricacies of EU regulations but you had a right to expect that your travel agent would.

Now if your Travel Agent is ABTA registered they do have a formal complaints procedure. You could then list and total your additional expenditure following your re-routing and claim that through your ABTA travel agent. If your Travel Agent is not ABTA registered then you would need to consider a claim through Consumer Direct and possibly, subsequent legal action.

Now before we go any further, do you have any legal expenses cover under a household policy? If the answer is yes, and assuming your insurers agree, you could then get a competent solicitor to act on your behalf and establish exactly what legal claims you might have and how they might be processed.

If not, you might say - well that seems straightforward, I’ll do what is suggested. You should be aware that there are some obstacles and your case is not the strongest. For example, the Travel Agent could say that his/her staff were aware of the EU regulations but that you/your partner did not like the BA suggested re-routing, and were most anxious to make fixed alternative arrangements before all other flights were fully booked.

They could then say that BA could not and would not give satisfactory alternative re-bookings for your party due to the risk of further “weather” cancellations and this is likely to be true. They suggested to you that you should accept a refund from BA and to book alternative flights. Can you remember who said what to whom and when it was said?

If you would like to consider the above and recheck my assumptions, then post back with your views.

If you still wish to proceed, you can PM me the name/address of the Travel Agent, the exact dates, a schedule of your claim and I will compose a letter of complaint to them on your behalf.

Hope that helps. Please acknowledge that you have read this post by posting or thanking..

sweet_caroline

Ian, thank you so much for your time and trouble. I'll pm you ....

ih8modem

My wife recently booked on flight BA57 to Johannesburg. the flight was scheduled for 20:45 but eventually took off at 22:47. Shortly after takeoff there was an engine failure on the aircraft, and it returned to LHR after an hour of dumping fuel.

The BA staff transferred the passengers to the Sofitel hotel where they were put up for the night, and were collected to make the fill-in flight on another aircraft. they were given a departure time of 09:45, with the plane eventually leaving the tarmac a little past 11:00am.

The flight landed in Johannesburg at 00:05 on Friday morning, so in total a little over 14.5 hours late. To make matters worse the car hire company had then cancelled her hire car booking - despite the fact that I had called them and explained the situation - as she had not pitched before 00:00 on the day of booking (car hire guy explained that this was an automatic process.) A little after 02:00 however she had managed to secure a car and was on her way to her sister.

So now my question is : What sort of compensation is she entitled to ?

We have travel insurance of course, which offers £30 compensation for every 12 hour period that she was delayed. If I understand this article correctly, she should also be entitled to claim €600 from BA.

Thanks for reading

rich987652

My situation in brief:

Wife Booked on US Airways flight from Gatwick to Charlotte, with further onward connection to Baton Rouge on Sunday 26th Feb 2012.
Boarded plane, taxied to runway, but didnt take off due to engine fault. Returned to gate, airline after investigating needed a part to repair plane. Eventually, flight cancelled about 4 hours later.
Airline put wife up in hotel and paid for food etc, booked her on same flight next day.
Arrival 24 hours late. (I have a screenshot from airline website saying flight cancelled due to 'maintenance')
Other information:
Booked via website : Travel up Ltd (travelup.co.uk) - flight only
Payment method: Debit Card

Reading through this thread, I think we have a right to compensation for 1st flight only (from UK to US) and not connecting flight in the US - is that correct?
Is the imminent case only applicable to delay and not cancellations?
Do I submit a claim to the airline (I have an e-ticket from them) or the agent?

stickyfingers85

Hello, i'm trying to work out if my flight would be classed as delayed or cancelled. My situation is this:

Flight CX252 with Cathay Pacific from London Heathrow to Hong Kong

I checked in, boarded the flight and on taxi to the runway the captain announced that there was a fuel leak.

We taxied back to the gate and had to sit on the plane for almost 6 hours why they attempted to fix the problem.

Eventually the captain announced that the flight would now leave tomorrow and that they would put us all in a hotel over night.

I stayed in the hotel and took the flight the next day, which was now called CX252D

Would this be classed as a cancellation or a delay? I think its a cancellation as the original flight failed to take off, but im worried it will only be classed as a delay because its the same flight number - "D" for delayed

Any ideas?

I also can't find out how i claim the compensation. I contacted Cathay at Heathrow and they said i have to do it online, but on the website there is only a feedback form

Thanks in advance