paoloake

Hi there,

First of all, this is my first post. Nice to join the community!

I have just came back from a 50h odyssey with Air France.
The return of my round trip ticket had the following flight plan:
AF439 MEX 20.20 08/06 -- CDG 13.55 (terminal 2E) 09/06
AF2002 CDG (terminal 2D) 16.05 09/06 -- TRN 17.30 09/06
I finally got at the finale destination at 22.27 of the 10th of June, with a delay of 29h (delay+denied boarding) with respect to the original schedule.

I have just written to Air France asking for compensation of 600€ following the sentences C-402/07 and C-432/07.
I don't know if a ticket refund instead of the compensation would apply better, and don't know which is the best way to sue Air France in the (likely) case that they are not willing to respect passengers' rights.
I would love to ask for the valuable opinion of the other forum members.
Kind regards,
Paolo

Details about the trip:

June 8th
At 19.40 of June 8th the "the flight has delayed 20 minutes" ballet started.
At 22.30, after having been refused any kind of assistance (drinks, meals, phone calls), the pilot informed that the flight has been delayed until the next day due to "technical reasons" (later on we knew that there was a problem with air conditioning). We were invited to come back at 14.00 of June 9th to get further information and a new boarding pass.
After spending some time at the check-in trying to be provided with a re-routing (denied without explication), and trying to get the new flight plan (also denied), at 23.30 I decided to go back home and get back to the airport on the next day. Got@home at 2am.

June 9th
At 14.00 of June 9th I went to the check-in, to be provided with the new flight plan:
AF439 MEX 19.00 09/06 -- CDG 12.30 10/06
AF2002 CDG 16.05 10/06 -- TRN 17.30 10/06 (24hrs delay with respect to original travel plan)
I also got informed that new announcements would have been given at "16-16.30" at gate 26 of the airport.
I had been given a 13€ voucher to eat (isn't too much for just nearly 24hrs delay?), so I enjoyed a quick meal and passed the security check.
At 17.00, no news at gate 25. So i asked at the information desk to see if AF439 was on the system. Answer was that the gate had been moved (gate 31, at the other side of the terminal).
At 17.30 the announcement: "flight AF439 passengers, we are starting boarding", immediately followed by a "flight AF439 passengers, please wait until further notice". No assistance was provided.
At 19.00 we were informed that the gate had been changed once more (gate 23, again at the other side of the airport).
At 20.00, the pilot spoke (just in French), and said that the problem had not been solved. The air conditioning system would not work until the engine started. This meant that 400 passengers (boeing 747-400, flight almost full) would have to board in a plane at 30-40°C. Boarding took 1h, plus another 40' to leave. As many other passengers, I got sick due to the lack of air.

June 10th
Since the arrival was foreseen at 3pm, I asked several times to the flight attendants to receive assistance for disembarking, passing migration and the security check at Terminal 2D, since I knew that 40 minutes is too little time to perform the above 3 tasks *and* change terminal (2E->2D = 10' medium/high speed run). I was denied any assistance.
As a result, when I got to the gate of flight AF2002, I was denied boarding since the boarding had just closed.
I then got to the nearest customer service, which re-scheduled me to the next flight to Turin, AF2202, leaving at 20.40 and finally arriving at TRN on 22.10 of 10/06. With a delay of 28h40' with respect to the original schedule.
I took the chance to write a complaint to Air France, quite compressed given the very limited space in the paper and the number of things to mention.
Finally, I got to destination at 22.27 of June 10th (would have been to much to ask that at least the last flight were on time, I guess), with a total delay of *28h57'* with respect to the original schedule.

carnarvon

Technical problems do and will happen again.

What is unacceptable is AF and AF staff attitude in such circumstances.

If you could not give all details you are giving here on the complaint form , I would suggest you print out what you have just written here and send to them either by fax or post.

AF is bad, but not THAT bad. They can't ignore something like this, so I would suggest to wait for their answer before looking into further action.

robinh002

i agree this is totaly unaccaptable . please check there should be a leaflet at AMS &CDG
to inform you of your rights, and what help & compensation you are entitled to there
should also be a version available on line , is there a french equivelent of the air transport users council ?

paoloake

I wasn't provided any leaflet. Under my explicit request, I got the following answer several times (at MEX, at CDG, onboard): "You have to claim afterwards".

JC25

see euroclaim.uk, several times I ask them to solve this kind of problems with AF, despite AF negative answers. It worth, if they are successful, they retain 20% of what they get for you.
Don't forget, even they are totaly responsible of this kind of trouble, they will sya no, no, no. It worth for them, for sure, because I guess after they said no, how many customers will go ahead and complain to a court ? Of course only some 2 or 3% ....
Don't let them piss you off !

paoloake

Dear all,

Thanks for your kind and precise answers.
I will keep you informed on AF's answers as well as my following steps.

Regards,
Paolo

raistlin

I suggest you to quote the relevant EC rules, to show that you know you're asking for what is OWED to you and not for a boon.

To cheer you up, I often received refunds over and beyond EC rules by AF.

Voyager2002

I suffered a similar experience, except that my delay was "only" 12 hours.

I have two questions about the process on which we have embarked:

1. When you made a complaint to AF by means of the on-line form, did it give you any kind of confirmation screen? I completed the form and pressed 'submit', and after a moment all that I saw was the blank form again. I don't know whether my complaint was received, or whether I need to type the whole thing again. Or perhaps AF has another technique to stop unwanted complaints

2. I decided to ask for compensation in the form of Flying Blue miles rather than money. Any idea about how many miles they might be willing to give in order to settle a claim for 600 Euro?

Red25

I recently missed connecting flight at cdg due to technical issue with the arriving flight. AF arranged accommodation and alternate flight for the next morning. I received 13K miles compensation from AF.

nicolas75

Has AF significant staff at MEX, or are main operations handled by AM?

paoloake

Hi there,

first of all, for Nicolas: AF has staff @ MEX.

After complaining through the AF online form, asking for the exact cause of the delay, I have been offered "excuses" and 8k miles, without mentioning the actual cause of the problem.
I have told them that I would not accept any miles in compensation for the delay, that the update to the EC regulation following the recent sentences by the European Court entitled me to the 600EUR reimbursement, which is what I am asking from them. I asked again for the exact cause of the delay, telling them that if it was "extraordinary" I would not have sued them.
I got a response which once again did not mention the technical problem and told me that I was not entitled to anything.

I am then forced to sue them in order to have my rights respected.
I have written to the competent regulation authority. 400 passengers shared my fate, so that - at 5k EUR fine per passenger - AF is facing a potential 200kEUR fine. Well, if they are happy with it...

I will also take the chance to sue them for a past cancellation due to unspecified technical reasons last year, on another intercontinental flight.
One thing is for sure: never again Air France.

Will keep you informed.
Kind regards

paoloake

@Voyager2002:

1. A confirmation e-mail will be sent by them within 24hours from your claim;
2. I would have tried to reach an agreement based on miles too. Unfortunately, from my (bad) past experience, they manage the situations with the usual Air France way, that is: we are right and you are wrong, so you are lucky if we give a few thousand miles as "compensation".

Anyway, 600EUR is the price of a low-fare round-trip intercontinental ticket for most AF routes e.g. Europe-US, so in my opinion the equivalent in miles should be at least 70/75.000 (since, when booking a ticket with miles, you still have to pay 200-250 EUR for taxes).

Cheers