polemi

I recently booked a connecting flight LHR – ATH – CFU on Aegean. A3601 is due to leave London at 12:15 and arrive in Athens at 17:50. My connecting flight to Corfu was due out at 18:30 from Athens – barely enough for the minimum connecting time at Athens, even if an on-time arrival and without luggage. My arrival was 25 minutes late and by the time I disembarked it was almost 18:30, so I missed the connection.

To be fair, Aegean had planned for this and had not only booked me a hotel for the night but had re-ticketed my flight for the first flight the next day. The hotel did have a significant number of stranded Aegean passengers in the same hotel (don’t know if they were off the same flight).

However, they would not entertain any EC261 claim for the delay of 12 hours and 55 minutes to my final destination citing “Air Traffic Control Restrictions”. Personally, I believe it was the slow loading/late closure of the aircraft door that made them miss their slot, but of course, I have no way of proving that so have to accept their decision.

I decided to monitor the performance of A3601 and over the last 19 days it has only made it to Athens “on-time” or “early” on two occasions. Some arrivals were over 30 minutes late, yet they still continue to sell this tight connection. Is it really Heathrow’s fault or should they just not be selling tickets with such an impossible connection?

KATERGOO

Aegean owes you £220. You do not have to prove anything, except that you arrived 12h55 late at destination.
If they refuse to pay, you should put a claim to the civil aviation authority.

https://www.caa.co.uk/passengers/res...ations/delays/

it takes time, but airlines have no choice but to pay ;-)

DELLAS

In fairness kudos to A3 for providing what they did , quite a few airlines would do everything they could to make you rebook yourself and not provide a hotel.

The EU 261 is yours IMHO so write to them and say if you don't get the compensation by return you are lodging a formal complaint to the regulator and proceeding with legal action.
Polite but firm usually works .

KATERGOO

I don't think this is right. Aegean provided only minimum compensation : hotel and rebooking.
This is not in accordance with European law. (although I agree, most European airlines, including Air France behave the same way).

Phoenixtinct

I had the same experience recently - I flew multiple flights in April and May to get to Gold and most (if not all) flights were delayed. So, I started wondering what is happening. I overheard one exchange between a passenger and a flight attendant and indeed, the same reason was provided - airport issues. On one of the flights, we weren't allowed to depart to Athens because of some restrictions imposed. Whether it's Aegean's fault or not, they are certainly aware of the issue and on all of my flights there were passengers who weren't sure they will make their connections. There are multiple ways to handle this - American carriers in such cases "pad" their schedules to allow for any delays. Also, the minimum connection times could be adjusted as well. There are things within the airline's control that could be done and I don't think they are being addressed. Now, being June and the beginning of the busy summer travel season, things are probably worse.

Aegean is probably taking a chance - if things go bad, they'll worry about it then instead of proactively trying to make sure flights depart and arrive on time. Maybe from a business perspective it's better to have such tight and unrealistic connections and deal with the fallout of few people misconnecting than create a bigger problem by padding the schedule and making some connections impossible resulting in less sold tickets. If I remember correctly, last year Heathrow imposed restrictions on the number of flights it can handle - some airlines weren't happy about it at the time - I don't think anything similar will happen in Greece. So, unfortunately, things are the way they are. But lately, flying Aegean - you should always expect a delay and have that in mind when making your travel plans.

Harper50505

In the summer months A3 601, LHR-ATH is delayed almost every day as is almost everything else in the same time frame. LHR is just overstretched, badly managed and hopeless. On the flight I was on last week, the door was closed at 12.10 and pushback was 13.01 with multiple apologies about ATC, winds must have been good because we landed at ATH at 17.59. I see today the average delay is 33 minutes and rising at present so I guess today's flight won't be any better than the ones in recent days.

In summer, I would never book a connection at ATH of less than 1.5 hours if my origin is LHR.

giorginho

Didn't have a connection booked today, but same case, boarding completed and aircraft door just in time for departure and we ended up holding at the gate for over 50min, while the pilot also cited "atc restrictions"! Landing was eventually also about 50min late. Yet no "free flight" e-mail to be seen, I guess I'm one of the few not getting these ​​​​​​.

jumpallover

Yesterday night on the plane while waiting for our slot in MXP I checked the MXP - ATH and they are very consistent: there are some 60/70/80 minutes delays everyday on that route. Luckily also the connection was late so I did not miss it. But they missed my luggage which arrived at destination 11 hours late It's going to be a rough summer! Oh, and I got my free flight email but it seems it is not so easy to redeem, let's see

Xandrios

Airport/departure slot restrictions are in force all over Europe and will indeed delay many flights. This has been the case out of ATH for many years, specifically during summer (and affects all airlines). It does seem more extreme this year though.