Originally Posted by bisonrav

OK, and the major problem somewhere when it's weather is coming from where exactly? Or when the major problem is ATC restrictions? Unconditional compensation for short delays would push fares up - the money has to come from somewhere - and is penalizing the wrong organisations probably in the wrong countries anyway,. The only thing an airline can do to mitigate weather and ATC risks is massively increase block times, which cuts aircraft utilisation, and will also reduce capacity. You won't get delays because you'll have 2h30m flight schedules from NCL to LHR, and they'll cost double what they do now. Low cost carriers would probably elect not to serve the UK to anything like the extent they do now. Beware of the rule of unintended consequences. We have already seen MCT increasing at Heathrow, this is not theoretical.

This isn't just a BA problem either. It affects all airlines. I was on U2 yesterday morning and BA yesterday evening. Both suffered from ATC slot restrictions. It is intensely frustrating to have boarded more or less on time and hear you have a 60 minute delay because of European airspace restrictions, and more so when the delay takes arrival past the point where public transport is no longer available (which happened to me last night too). But a scattergun delay repay system doesn't help with that, it's just an expensive sticking plaster.