Flight delay and cancellation compensation, BA ONLY

Hi, hoping someone can give me some advice!

My flight was delayed from male to gatwick by 8hrs, meaning we arrived the following morning rather than the night before. We had booked a hotel for the arrival at nighttime and obviously didnt get use of this.
I put a claim in with BA as the delay was due to the captain "twisting his ankle" whilst walking around male. We know this as we were talking to crew whilst waiting to board at the gate. We had to wait for a captain to be flown out, have day rest and then fly us back.

I've just had a response from BA saying they won't pay out. Please see the response below.

"Your claim for compensation has been refused because flight BA2042 on 08 January 2015 was delayed due to captain reported sick on previous sector which prevented the aircraft operating as scheduled. Under EU legislation, British Airways is not liable for a compensation payment in this situation.

Unfortunately airline operations are subject to circumstances outside the airline's control. British Airways takes all reasonable measures to avoid delaying a flight in such circumstances. Consideration is given to whether there are any operational options available before a decision to delay is made. We are sorry that the delay was necessary in this case."

Can anyone tell me if this is reasonable for them to not pay outing this situation?! I am aware you some times need to fight the case to get some thing, but I wasn't expecting to get shut down so quickly!

Very good point from JP re pilot rest hours.

I think whether it's extraordinary would depend partly on when it happened. If the pilot twisted his/her ankle just before take off, I can see many courts accepting this. But the longer the gap between incident and eventual flight, the harder it is for the airline to show they took every effort to minimise the disruption.

123rachel123 wrote: »

Hi, hoping someone can give me some advice!

My flight was delayed from male to gatwick by 8hrs, meaning we arrived the following morning rather than the night before. We had booked a hotel for the arrival at nighttime and obviously didnt get use of this.
I put a claim in with BA as the delay was due to the captain "twisting his ankle" whilst walking around male. We know this as we were talking to crew whilst waiting to board at the gate. We had to wait for a captain to be flown out, have day rest and then fly us back.

I've just had a response from BA saying they won't pay out. Please see the response below.

"Your claim for compensation has been refused because flight BA2042 on 08 January 2015 was delayed due to captain reported sick on previous sector which prevented the aircraft operating as scheduled. Under EU legislation, British Airways is not liable for a compensation payment in this situation.

Unfortunately airline operations are subject to circumstances outside the airline's control. British Airways takes all reasonable measures to avoid delaying a flight in such circumstances. Consideration is given to whether there are any operational options available before a decision to delay is made. We are sorry that the delay was necessary in this case."

Can anyone tell me if this is reasonable for them to not pay outing this situation?! I am aware you some times need to fight the case to get some thing, but I wasn't expecting to get shut down so quickly!

I was on the same flight, plus the first leg from Colombo, and also put in a claim, also denied. Email from BA below. Medical issues seem to be a grey area - some airlines have paid out, and some say they are extraordinary circumstances. I was annoyed because I had specifically booked a daytime flight as I can't sleep on night flights, and ended up losing the whole of the next day to lack of sleep/jet lag. Think the worst part was that they didn't change the meal service from day/evening flight to night flight, and I was served cheesy ravioli at 4am. :eek:

Thank you for your email dated 10 January about your claim for compensation under EU legislation. I am sorry to learn that your flight was delayed on 08 January 2015 on your way to London Gatwick . I can understand how disappointing it must have been for you. Please accept our sincere apologies for the inconvenience caused.

We recognise that the punctuality of our flights is extremely important to our customers and that you expect us to fly as scheduled. Although punctuality is improving, we would never be complacent about it. An investigation is carried out into each delay and your experience shows us there is still work to be done. We benchmark our performance each month with our partners and competitors and each department is measured on the contribution it makes to achieving our challenging targets.

We recognise that the punctuality of our flights is extremely important to our customers and that you expect us to fly as scheduled. Although punctuality is improving, we would never be complacent about it. An investigation is carried out into each delay and your experience shows us there is still work to be done. We benchmark our performance each month with our partners and competitors and each department is measured on the contribution it makes to achieving our challenging targets.

Your claim for compensation has been refused because flight BA2042 on 08 January 2015 was delayed due to captain reported sick on previous sector which prevented the aircraft operating as scheduled. Under EU legislation, British Airways is not liable for a compensation payment in this situation.

Unfortunately airline operations are subject to circumstances outside the airline's control. British Airways takes all reasonable measures to avoid delaying a flight in such circumstances. Consideration is given to whether there are any operational options available before a decision to delay is made. We are sorry that the delay was necessary in this case.

Thank you once again for following this up with us and we look forward to welcome you on board again soon.