EasyJet rejected claim - 'severe weather'

Oasis1

Hello all - hoping someone can offer advice regarding a rejected claim.

EasyJet state that my flight was cancelled due to "strong gusting winds" causing a hard landing, and this counts as "extroadinary circumstances" because this includes "severe weather conditions". You can find their full response quoted below.

I don't recall the weather being severe or extroadinary. So this leaves me with a few questions:

• Do strong gusting winds count as "extroadinary circumstances"/"severe weather conditions"? How strong do they need to be? How can they prove that this was the case?
  
• If there were strong gusts, how can they prove that the airline/pilot responded appropriately to ensure a smooth landing and that there wasn't human error in the hard landing?
  

Ultimately - is this worth contesting with ADR, and if so, how best to go about this?

Thanks so much in advance, really need some expertise on this one as the 13 hour delay was horrendous and resulted in having to take time off work.

Flight Number: 8602
Flight Date: 01/10/2023
Scheduled Departure Airport: Dubrovnik (DBV)
Scheduled Arrival Airport: London Gatwick (LGW)
Claim decision: Declined

Decision summary: We’re sorry that your flight was delayed. Our assessment and legal team has carefully reviewed your claim and the circumstances around your flight and have confirmed that your compensation claim is not eligible for compensation payment under the applicable Regulation. Please note that this may not match with the information you were given on the day of travel, as our staff in airports, and on-board, may not have had all the information concerning your delayed flight.

Dear XXX

We are sorry for the disruption to your flight. Our assessment and legal team have carefully reviewed your claim, including the circumstances around your flight and have confirmed that your compensation claim is not eligible for compensation payment under Regulation 261/2004. Please note that this may not match with the information you were given on the day of travel, as our staff in airports, and on-board, may not have had all the information concerning your cancelled flight.

Our assessment of your claim
To further explain what happened on the day; As a result of strong gusting winds at Dubrovnik airport, your plane made a heavy landing on the runway at Dubrovnik airport. This resulted in the aircraft being taken out of service for several days as it required specific mandatory inspections to be carried out. Your flight was due to operate on one of our larger A321 aircraft and our Network Control team arranged for the next available plane of the same type and capacity to fly to Dubrovnik to operate your flight. This ensured that all customers were able to travel. We do take reasonable measures to avoid delays and cancellations to our flights by having replacement crews and spare aircraft available in our network. In the circumstances described above, a replacement plane and crew were provided at the earliest opportunity.

The Regulation
When we must disrupt a flight due to circumstances outside of our control, the flight is classified under the regulation as being affected by “extraordinary circumstances”. An example of disruption outside of our control would be that primarily caused by air traffic control restrictions, industrial action, severe weather conditions or a runway closure.

Compensation is only payable when a flight is delayed by 3 or more hours after the scheduled arrival time, or the flight is cancelled and the reason for the delay or cancellation was within our control. This type of disruption is classified the regulation as “non-extraordinary circumstances”. Examples of this include most aircraft technical faults or when we haven’t taken reasonable measures to prevent or minimize disruption.

A copy of the regulation can be found at https://www.legislation.gov.uk/browse/eu

Expenses
Even if your compensation claim has been declined, you may be eligible for reimbursement of reasonable expenses incurred as result of the disruption. If you have not already done so, you may submit an expenses claim on our website at https://www.easyjet.com/en/help/boarding-and-flying/delays-and-cancellations

Please read this carefully before submitting a claim as this explains how we assess expenses. The only way to make a claim is via our expenses webform, we are unable to process claims submitted by email or over the phone.

We hope this letter clearly explains why your flight was disrupted. Our assessment team have thoroughly investigated all the available information, and this is the decision we have arrived at.

Our Customer Services team will not be able to access any more information than we’ve provided here. Please read our “Who is entitled to compensation” section on the following link which will hopefully answer any further questions you may have.
https://www.easyjet.com/en/help/boarding-and-flying/delays-and-cancellations

Once again, we are sorry for the disruption to your flight and hope to welcome you on board again soon.

Kind regards,

Aarsh
easyJet Customer Services

eskbanker

Personally I wouldn't see that as extraordinary circumstances - if the wind was strong enough to have to divert elsewhere then that would have been different, but the fact that the landing went ahead and happened to be a hard one means that conditions weren't that bad.  It's the flight crew's decision to proceed with the landing in full sight of carefully-monitored weather conditions, so if there was ultimately damage arising from that decision then that was within their control.

If that's their initial response then you can challenge it with them up to the point at which they confirm a final response, and if you're still unsatisfied then you can open a case at Aviation ADR.

Oasis1

Thanks eskbanker, that feels like a reasonable challenge.

Does anyone know how you follow up a rejected claim with EasyJet? The rejection has been sent from a noreply e-mail address. Tempted to just forward on to customer.support@easyjet.com rather than use their long-winded form again?

Oasis1

Also, is there a time limit for them to provide a final response that I can reference? Thanks again in advance!

eskbanker

Oasis1 said:

Also, is there a time limit for them to provide a final response that I can reference? Thanks again in advance!

https://www.aviationadr.org.uk/aviationadr-faq-2/#1557846429194-f23db84e-e480

What to do before I make a complaint using AviationADR?

To be eligible to make a complaint against an airline/airport you must have already complained to that airline/airport directly in writing and either received a final written response (otherwise known as a ‘deadlock letter’) or given the airline/airport eight (8) weeks to respond to your dispute.

(I don't know the answer to your other question about where to send a rebuttal message to EasyJet)

Oasis1

8 weeks!! I went with 14 days in my message and submitted it here: https://www.easyjet.com/en/help/contact/contact-us, for those who might be curious.

Thanks again eskbanker, wish me luck...

eskbanker

Oasis1 said:

8 weeks!!

If you think that's a long time, wait until you find out about Aviation ADR's own timescales....

Oasis1

A speedier than expected response, but they rejected my claim again, so now going through ADR. Fingers crossed.

Oasis1

Wow, easyJet comes back with a long defence document. I now have 7 days to make my final comments before ADR makes the decision. 

I'm still not sure it addresses the point around taking the decision to take the risk of landing in adverse weather conditions rather than divert, which I made based on your advice, eskbaker...

my_mate_andy

Hi! 
 
We were on the same flight, it was horrendous as it was our first flight away from the kids (age 3 & 6), so instead of getting back at lunch time, bathing the kids and getting them ready for school the next day we were due to get home around 2.30am.  To make things worse we couldn't extend our childcare so i had to ask my father over to stay the night, which in turn created issues as he had an early morning funeral the next day - horrendous!

Wind speed that morning was 7-8 mph in Dubrovnik, hardly enough to contribute to a hard landing!

Did you ever get anywhere with the ADR?  

Oasis1

So sorry to hear about your experience. ADR sided with easyJet, thought I forgot to make final comments by the deadline after easyJet submitted their mammoth defence!