Airline - Duty of Care during 4.5 hour delay

wotnott

During a recent trip to the EU my outgoing flight was delayed by about 4.5 hours at Gatwick. Well-known UK budget carrier. No information directly from airline but we were sent back from the gate to departures. The person at the Information desk advised passengers to buy food and claim it back later. I spent about £11 on a burrito + wedges.

In my view this is reasonable and consistent with the Article 9 of EU Reg 261 which requires airlines to provide passengers with a level of “care and assistance” during the delay, including:

Food and drink in reasonable relation to waiting time

I submitted a claim, of which £6 was paid. Airline said:

Please note, the amount you have claimed for is not paid in full but as per the reasonable limits set out on [airline] website.

I have contacted airline to question this and am told that it is their policy and there is nothing they, in Customer Services, can do about it.

The wording on the website doesn't actually mention £6 as far as I can see. It specifies £3, which makes even less sense. It is not possible, I'm sure, to buy a cup of coffee at Gatwick for £3. (Plus £3 hasn't been anywhere near equivalent to €4.50 for years.)

Depending on your delay, we will provide you with a refreshment voucher to the value of £3 or €4.50.
If your flight is delayed by 2 hours (flights up to 1500km, e.g London to Zurich) you are entitled to vouchers. If your flight is delayed by 3 hours (flights over 1500km, e.g London to Dubrovnik) you are entitled to vouchers. If for any reason we are unable to provide you with vouchers, we will reimburse you up to the same amount if you provide appropriate receipts.

To aggravate this problem, airline policy RE: communication seems very flawed. They tell me to contact them via the webform and will only respond to the email address that made the booking. I have that in writing, and experience bears it out.

I was travelling for work, so the person who made the booking is not me. Many passengers presumably book flights through travel agents... so how can those passengers ever be expected to communicate with, or complain to, the airline if the airline will not respond to them?

I have the following questions:

1. Am I right in thinking that a subsistence claim for £11 relating to a 4.5 hour delay is reasonable and should be paid, per EU Regulations?

2. If so, and other than the "food and drink in reasonable relation to waiting time" above, is there anything I can quote to prove the point?

3. If I contact them and they respond to a third party who made the booking, knowing that they are not me, does this contravene any rules (other than common sense)? GDPR perhaps?

4. No compensation was paid for the delay. On the flight we were initially told that this delay was due to air crew running out of hours, so I expected that compensation would be due. However, when I claimed, the airline said that it was due to factors outside their control and no compensation was payable. They are clearly not impartial and have a large financial incentive to find that the delay was beyond their control. So - not specific to this case, but in general - rather than taking the airline's word for this, is there an independent source to check with?

DullGreyGuy

More likely UK regulations will apply given you were leaving from the UK, not that they are material different yet.

What time was your flight supposed to leave at?
What was your flight duration?
Presumably being on a budget flight there was no food inc in the flight?

Unfortunately, as you have found, no where really has guidance on what "reasonable" would look like and some do say it kind of depends on the circumstances. What you ordered, rather than its price, does sound more like a substantive meal rather than a light snack to tide you over (you've described my lunch a couple of times a week but the wedges only if extra hungry).  

Each airline will have its own policy regarding bookers -v- passengers and it will also depend if you have formally set them up as an authorised person, they are a professional agent or just happened to do the booking for you. In most cases it will be clear that you have given them some agency, if not total.

Grumpy_chap

wotnott said:

I was travelling for work, so the person who made the booking is not me. 

If this was a work trip, why not just claim the meal expenses via the normal process with your work and let the company recover what they can via the airline?

DullGreyGuy

Grumpy_chap said:

wotnott said:

I was travelling for work, so the person who made the booking is not me. 

If this was a work trip, why not just claim the meal expenses via the normal process with your work and let the company recover what they can via the airline?

The company are unlikely to be able to as they are too remote... but then most companies wont care about £5

Its the same with car accidents, employer has to pay the person sick pay but are unable to recover that money from the at fault driver as too remove 

wotnott

Scheduled departure was 17:40. Scheduled flight time 01:55. Distance about 1000 km. Correct, no food included with the flight.

It's not entirely clear to me that I would have given agency to the person who booked the ticket; maybe I did. There is a single, brief, reference to travel in my contract, which states that the company will arrange travel. I guess that represents agreement from my side (in very general terms) for bookings to be made. I didn't request that a flight be booked for me, although I understood that one would be.

wotnott

Grumpy_chap said:

wotnott said:

I was travelling for work, so the person who made the booking is not me. 

If this was a work trip, why not just claim the meal expenses via the normal process with your work and let the company recover what they can via the airline?

Because it shouldn't be their expense. I consider subsistence expenses during a delay to be the responsibility of the airline. I was told by staff at the airport to buy food and claim if from the airline.

It wouldn't make sense for the company to chase £5 (and it doesn't for me either, of course, in purely financial terms... but it's the principle). I would presume that the airline's Duty of Care is to me, the passenger, and the company wouldn't have a claim anyway.

born_again

Not really a consumer rights issue. Should be in this section
https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/categories/flight-delay-compensation

Where people have more knowledge. have reported, but maybe OP should ask one of the board ambassadors to move it.

wotnott

Thanks - yes, I have. I realised five minutes after posting that there was a more appropriate section, and I sent an email to Admin to request that it be moved.

EDIT: I see that it has now been moved. Thanks. :-)