Originally Posted by
Lux Flyer
Which I think is fundamentally what people forget when they ask for all this stuff. You pay, in one way or another, for what you ask for. Do people think if you're given a free checked bag, additional legroom, wider seats, a more enjoyable flying experience overall, free changes, IRROPs "duty-to-care" protections in weather events, that airlines are going to keep charging $29 for a OW fare? No, they're going to increase that fare to account for all those "extras" they have to provide. I get that we look at the EU261 regulations and think wow those are great (especially when you benefit from it), and I think there are some good things in it to keep airlines striving to be better on their part, but I also think it goes too far to hold airlines responsible for things out of their control (weather). I'm sure the cost of the airline providing those "beneftis" is baked into the ticket price somewhere.
Airlines are not responsible for things out of their control, like weather, under EC261. The only thing they have to do in that scenario, is provide food&water if the delay is more than 2 hours, which I think is the correct thing to do (as airport food is ridiculously expensive).
EC261 just holds airlines responsible if they mess up (delaying/cancelling flights to either improve load capacity or due to poor maintenance, for example). Can you imagine how fast AA would've budged if EC261 was in play when they were fighting their mechanics (in court)? That stuff would've been solved within days, causing far less customers to experience delays, instead of the situation and results that we've seen.