Originally Posted by corporate-wage-slave

Thank you for putting all the relevant times in. The Regulation as worded says that the benchmark for cancellation compensation relates to scheduled time. Confusingly BA doesn't (yet) recognise Azurair, and sticks to actual time if it's BA metal. The first factor runs in BA's financial favour, the second factor can run adversely financially for BA. Now sticking to the words of the Regulation, you were offered a service which left more than one hour early - thus triggering compensation, and would have arrived early too and thus covered by Azurair, the full amount payable. But let's say the it should be based on actuals. In which case you were within the no-compensation area, less than an hour early, less than 2 hours late, other than that in reality you presumably needed be at the airport for the original time. And I think that's your hook here: if you look at the wording for Azurair, it's all about how early departures, at a certain point, get inconvenient, and the line is judged to be 1 hour early. More than that, the early departure creates inconvenience to you. I guess if BA communicated with you on the day of delayed departure such that in reality you arrived less than an hour early then it's more complicated, but I'm guessing that didn't happen here.

It's OK to accept the 50% amount and still go to CEDR. Sometimes BA issues a note about how going to CEDR will risk removing settlement offers, but when it comes to EC261 it can't actually do that. It's not a discretionary process.

t's not the early departure, incidentally, that triggers the 50% reduction, it's the early arrival, but that's a pedantic point.