Horror flight that made the news.

jimlfc6

Hi, I’m new to the forum, but after some advice if anybody would be kind enough to read through this.

The flight in question is if you google, praying man downs plane.

The original flight home was due to leave Paphos to Manchester at 01:55 on Monday 15th August, however Tui cancelled the flight and left us stranded at Paphos Airport for 3 hours until they could find a hotel, which I had to pay a taxi for (kept receipt) They then rearranged the flight for 17:20 on Monday 15th August, which got further delays until 23:20 on Monday 15th August. They have offered us £350 per person, but is this right considering the length of delay?

What happened after it, was everyone’s worst nightmare, as the newspaper article suggests, the plane was downed halfway home due to the idiot onboard, we were then left stranded in Zagreb, without food or water for 7 hours, with no real form of communications, until they gave us some tokens for food, we were then picked up at 12pm to go to a hotel for two hours having been left to sleep on an airport floor for 12 hours. 

The rearranged flight eventually left at 19:40 on Tuesday 16th August, we were offered more food vouchers that we didn’t receive as there had been further mix ups at the airport. 

Tui’s comminations and treatment of their customers was terrible, they honestly didn’t care. There was people with disabilities left to rot. £350 seems really poor, I know they may say it was an act of terror and not their fault, but they boarded a man visibly intoxicated at Paphos Airport, so much so he couldn’t even climb the stairs to the plane, the man in question was also causing problems whilst in the airport. 

I therefore wanted all my money back for the holiday, as it completely ruined it, and I’m not sure we will want to get on a plane again.

Thanks for your help.

eskbanker

jimlfc6 said:

The original flight home was due to leave Paphos to Manchester at 01:55 on Monday 15th August, however Tui cancelled the flight and left us stranded at Paphos Airport for 3 hours until they could find a hotel, which I had to pay a taxi for (kept receipt) They then rearranged the flight for 17:20 on Monday 15th August, which got further delays until 23:20 on Monday 15th August. They have offered us £350 per person, but is this right considering the length of delay?

Was the flight cancelled or rearranged?  If the original flight was cancelled and then another flight was operated (with a different flight number) but delayed, then this could give rise to two compensation payments (of £350 each), unless either was deemed to be extraordinary circumstances beyond the airline's control.

jimlfc6 said:

I therefore wanted all my money back for the holiday, as it completely ruined it, and I’m not sure we will want to get on a plane again.

No harm in pursuing TUI for some recognition of errors they made but it's extremely unlikely that you'd actually have any legal or contractual entitlement to a full refund for an entire holiday because of this, but if you're out of pocket for food and drink then the airline should reimburse these.

bagand96

"Plane downed half way home"  Non tabloid translation: Idiot passenger causes disturbance so crew take appropriate action and elect to divert, executing a safe landing so that idiot can be dealt with on the ground.

In terms of your first cancellation, £350 per passenger is the correct amount of compensation. You are also entitled to reasonable expenses such as your taxi journey.

For the second flight TUI are probably not liable or compensation as it would be an extraordinary circumstance outside of their control.  However again they are liable for reasonable expenses, so if the food vouchers didn't arrive any food your purchased and have receipts for etc.

The situation indeed sounds like a nightmare journey home.  Whilst often it seems like a company "don't care" or are "doing nothing" an unplanned diversion is never an easy situation.  They didn't expect your flight to land in Zagreb and arranging refreshments, accommodation and a replacement flight for 200 people at zero notice in an unplanned destination will take time and it may just be there was no communication because for a large part of it there was nothing to tell you.

There's a larger debate about alcohol induced disturbances on-board aircraft.  Availability of alcohol at airports (very profitable for airport operators), lack of motivation from often poorly paid ground staff to deal with intoxicated pax, same from the airline crew, not wanting to escalate an already difficult situation etc.  There's no easy answer.  If you were so motivated you could try and claim compensation for your second flight delay arguing that it was TUIs fault because they elected to carry said passenger, but I'm not sure how successful you'll be.

jimlfc6

Thanks for the reply. To my knowledge the flight was the same flight number so they will say it was delayed 21 hours rather than cancelled. Why is it only £350 and not the maximum £530 though? Sorry if I’ve misunderstood the rules. 

eskbanker

jimlfc6 said:

Why is it only £350 and not the maximum £530 though?

The compensation rules are based on distance, so £350 is up to 3500km and Paphos to Manchester is less than that.  I don't believe that even if an unplanned diversion took the actual distance flown above that, it would trigger the higher payment, but could be wrong....

jimlfc6

Thanks for clearing it up.