I have already posted this on the Etihad thread but am reposting this here for the benefit of those who may have missed the original thread. This is a landmark judgment that could benefit many OCI card holders who have been denied boarding by airlines on similar grounds.

My wife was denied boarding on an India bound flight with Etihad Airways from Manchester in April 2015 on the basis that she did not possess her expired passport that contained the 'U' visa. Changes introduced in January 2015 had removed the requirement from OCI card holders to carry separate visas but Etihad check in staff were clearly unaware of these changes. My 4 year old and I were forced to travel alone on the understanding that my wife will join us later, after the staff threatened to cancel all 3 tickets if we chose not to travel. Although I made a formal complaint, both verbally and in writing, to Etihad immediately upon arrival in India citing documentary proof of the relevant changes, Etihad refused to accept any responsibility for its actions or rebook my wife’s ticket, which eventually forced her to abandon the trip.

After several written complaints to Etihad Customer Services in subsequent months elicited no response, we eventually raised a claim through Small Claims against the airline in June 2015 seeking compensation under EC261/2004 for denied boarding. In its defence, Etihad cited an excerpt from the TIM manual (produced by the IATA) from April 2015 that acknowledged the changes introduced in January 2015 yet maintained that OCI card holders had to carry expired passports. At the initial hearing in September 2015, the airline’s counsel produced some undated guidance from some obscure Government of India website to challenge the changes in January 2015 besides contesting the very basis of the claim both under EC261/2004 as well as relevant clauses in Etihad’s Conditions of Carriage.

To cut a long story short, during the course of 3 subsequent hearings, I was able to produce evidence from various sources, including the IATA itself, that confirmed the changes in January 2015 following which Etihad changed tack and claimed that EC261/2004 gave airlines latitude to refuse boarding to passengers on the basis of check in staff’s ‘objectively reasonable belief’ about health, security concerns or inadequate travel documents. They also invoked clauses in the conditions of carriage which said things to this effect i.e. the airline reserved the right to refuse carriage if, in their opinion, the customer was a health/security risk or lacked appropriate documentation.

The court comprehensively dismissed Etihad’s defence and held that ‘objectively reasonable belief’ of check in staff was not adequate grounds to refuse passengers boarding for health, security or documentation reasons unless this can be empirically proven to be the case i.e. in my wife’s case it was evident, with the benefit of hindsight, that the documents in her possession at the time were adequate for entry to India irrespective of the ambivalent wording of the IATA guidance and she was therefore entitled to compensation under EC 261/2004. For the sake of clarity, the judge also listed specific circumstances which, in his view, would constitute reasonable grounds for airlines to deny boarding to passengers for health and security reasons.

More importantly, the judge also upheld my argument that entire sections of Etihad’s Terms & Conditions were incompatible with UK law and allowed recovery of some heads of costs under breach of contract.

From my conversations with Etihad’s legal team, this is the first instance of a claim being made under EC 261/2004 for denied boarding outside of the usual grounds such as delays, technical faults, cancellations, overbookings etc and has therefore significantly broadened the scope of the regulation. By declaring sections of Etihad’s Conditions of Carriage illegal, the ruling has also opened up the possibility of other claims being brought against Etihad for compensation under contract law on a variety of grounds.

What shocked me through the entire experience was the utter callousness and contempt with which Etihad appeared to treat us as customers. Not only did it refuse us any redress (way back in April, we had not demanded any compensation and had only demanded that Etihad book my wife on to the next flight) they continued contesting our modest claim, eventually spending around £20000 in legal fees, despite it being patently obvious that the check in staff had got it wrong. As we were representing ourselves, Etihad also used a combination of legal technicalities and threats to persuade us to drop the claim and even stooped to the level of contesting a claim of £ 86 towards my wife’s return rail fare from Manchester after being denied boarding.

The ruling was only delivered last week so I will update this post as soon as a transcript becomes available in the public domain. Although the financial award was not worth the hassle, I am satisfied that I have delivered the airline a potential kick in the teeth by holding it to account for its actions and exposing it to further compensation claims.