please help! I was given wrong boarding pass, not told about it and was 10 hours late

smileychocolateface

I wonder if anyone can help, I've tried complaining to the airline (unsuccessful), have gone through CAA (unsuccessful after months of waiting) and was about to contact my MP - but I think this forum seems to know better than anyone about delayed flights and so I'm hoping someone can help!

I will try an NBA (I've read the guide) but I need help with what I'm complaining about as it's a situation brought about by the airline which made us late (they say it was unforseen circumstances of someone being ill on the preceding flight which I do believe) -but I think they made one whopping mistake. In a nutshell - Emirates gave us boarding passes at the airport for a flight we didn't book; and didn't tell me that they'd done this or I would have changed our flight to the next day.

I was going to describe the delay but instead here's the letter I wrote (which I now know I should have sent to Qantas as it was a codeshare...!). I filled in the blanks on a template which makes for quite difficult reading but here goes...

Emirates Airline
Customer.affairsUK@emirates.com

Dear Sir or Madam,

Re: Compensation claim for flight
Booking reference:

I am writing regarding flight QF8028 on 8 December 2013 from Glasgow to Dubai with the scheduled departure time of 13:05 and our connecting flight QF8414 to Sydney with a scheduled departure time of 01:50 hours on 9 December 2013. We ran though the airport to make our connection, the pilot had announced all connections were guaranteed, the departures boards and gate reported "final call". We were refused entry onto our confirmed flight. The Emirates check-in staff at Glasgow airport had given us boarding passes for QF8418 the 09:05 flight to Sydney without mentioning the change, which stopped for an additional 1 hour and 25 minutes in Bangkok. It finally arrived at 08:45 in Sydney or 10 hours and 15 minutes late.

The judgment of the Court of Justice of the European Union in Tui & others v CAA confirmed the applicability of compensation for delay as set out in the Sturgeon case. As such, I am seeking compensation under EC Regulation 261/2004 for this delayed flight.

The passengers in the party were (our names).

As the flight left from the EU and the scheduled flight length was 35680km, I therefore am seeking €600 per delayed passenger in my party. The total claim is €1800 for all passengers.

During the delay my young sons and myself were put in the lounge at Dubai Airport on an armchair and eventually a blanket and provided with food, but not with hotel accommodation despite Emirates having a hotel in the airport. We paid for a hotel in Sydney which we were too late to use which cost £125.57. The hotel room that you should have provided for us in the airport cost (best price on Booking.com) AED800 per night - your website said you could add in an additional bed for an additional charge but doesn't mention how much. This is something that you should have provided as our delay was overnight.

The total compensation sought:
€1800
£125.57
AED800
(£1744.93 at today's conversion rates).

As you were operating the flights (on a codeshare with Qantas) and provided the staff which made the decisions and mistakes about our flights and our treatment, I understand it is you who will make this compensation.

I am also sending a copy of this letter to Trailfinders and the Civil Aviation Authority.

I look forward to a full response to this letter within 14 days. If I do not receive a satisfactory response I intend to pursue my complaint further, which could mean taking it to court.

Yours faithfully,


I enclose copies of boarding passes for the flights we took and the confirmed etickets from Trailfinders, a printout of our hotel costs in Australia and a quote from Booking.com for the cost of a room in Dubai airport.

As additional information:
There was another Emirates flight which arrived into Sydney at 06:55 which would have reduced our delay by nearly 2 hours and would have meant us not disembarking in Bangkok, walking 2km through the airport with my 2 young children, one of which hadn't slept for 24 hours, to go through 2 additional searches before retaking our original seats on the same plane.

The actual flight timings for our confirmed flights:
Glasgow --> Dubai
Departed 2:50pm --> Arrived 1:36am
Dubai--> Sydney
Departed 2:47am-->Arrived 10:22pm
1 hour and 13 minutes between landing in Dubai and the connecting Sydney flight departing.


Thank you for reading this - I appreciate it's hard to follow and it makes no sense to put people on a flight that they didn't book. I did phone CAB and they told me I should have checked my boarding passes - is this really just my fault? Could I not reasonably expect to be given a seat on a plane for which I had a confirmed ticket? Surely the airline's booking system would have flashed up that they were putting us on a different flight?

Anyway, thank you in advance....:)

Caz3121

Looking at the timelines, this is my guess
before you checked in, it was known that your flight departing Glasgow was going to be delayed. As you originally only had 1 hour and 20 mins between flights, the system knew that you would not make your connecting flight so proactively booked you on the later flight. (the checkin would not have been able to select a different flight to check you into other than the one the booking showed so the booking must have been changed in advance)
Flightstats showed you landed 4 minutes before the scheduled departure of the SYD flight
It is very unusual for aircraft to be held for connecting passengers, there are air traffic slots and passengers on flight that will have had connections to make at the other end
The original SYD flight was delayed which meant you may have been able to make it but bags etc would have been tagged for the other flight. This fact is a bit of a red herring though as, if it had left as scheduled, you would have ended up in the same situation.

2 thoughts. Find out when your flight was changed to the later SYD flight (to confirm this was not done weeks in advance but the agent had failed to inform you)
If the flight was only changed on the day you should be able to claim compensation based on the delay to your original arrival time caused by the delay from Glasgow. This assumes that the delay from Glasgow was not caused by weather or ATC (in which case compensation would not apply)
The airline is not responsible for the hotel in Sydney you could not use, this is a consequential loss so you should look to your travel insurance
I agree the hotel whilst you were waiting and meals should be covered under duty of care
If your onward flight was changed in advance then you should take a complaint up with Trailfinders for not advising you

richardw

Smileychocolateface, please edit out the identifying details from your post, they do read this.

smileychocolateface

Hi Caz,
Thanks for your reply.
I've checked with trailfinders and they have said they hadn't changed my flight.
So does this mean it was done before I got to the check-in queue? I've read that if they change your flight they have to agree it with you - I would not have agreed to this change.
I was already taking a 6 and an 8 year old to Australia on my own, I would not have willingly chosen to wait overnight on a seat with announcements blaring all through the night and then choose to take a detour via Bangkok so it would take even longer. If anyone had checked with us I would have said no, we'll go the next day.
I think the original delay was due to ATC (I was told someone was ill - can I check this?) but I was told everything was fine for our connections at check-in which it absolutely wasn't.
Thanks again.