Downgrade compensation
 

Hello,

I booked a Business Class ticket on Air France's website, only to find out that one of the segments would be operated in Economy. That aircraft has no Business Cabin - however, there was no mention to this situation on the booking process. On the booking screen and on the booking confirmation, as well as the Electronic Ticket, that flight is mentioned as a Business Cabin. I will be requesting a Downgrade Compensation for that segment, and I could use some help on how to calculate it.

It's an open jaw:
TXL-CDG-LAX-LAS
POA-GIG-CDG-TXL
Total fare: EUR 2068.54 (Base fare 1591 + Taxes 477.54)

POA-GIG was the affected segment. It's an AF flight number, operated by another airline.

There is no fare breakdown per segment. How would the downgrade compensation be calculated?

Many thanks.

First, you will need to get rtazil to join the EU retroactive to the date of ticket issue !:)

Just to save you a lot of wasted time, EC 261/2004 only applies to the operating carrier and by your own statement, the POA-GIG flight is not operated by AF (and although you do not specify the operating carrier, not of the carriers serving the route are EU carriers). Thus, the Regulation would only apply to the operating carrier when departing the EU. As this is a flight between two points outside the EU, no EC 261/2004.

For what it is worth, if you were charged a J fare and seated in Y, you would contractually be due the fare difference between Y & J for the segment. It is far more likely that if POA-GIG was a single class aircraft at the time of ticketing that the fare basis was a Y fare basis and only coded as J to make the connection work.

Hello,

Reference: https://www.internationallawoffice.c...e-EU-territory and https://www.euclaim.co.uk/blog/new-c...side-of-the-eu

"However, the European Court of Justice found it unfair, as the second flight is part of an entire journey starting in the EU. Therefor the ECOJ ruled that flights in one booking should be considered one journey and therefor the Regulation applies for both flights."

It is my understanding that the journey purchased from AF is POA-TXL, and therefore EU 261 is applicable to that sector.

POA-GIG could well be a single class aircraft at the time of purchase, but that is irrelevant. The ticket was showing as Business for that segment too, it is booked on J and at the purchase screen there is no information about it being operated on Economy. If this is to "make the connection work" , it's not my problem it's an internal issue of Air France. They sold me a J ticket, and if I don't fly in J it's a downgrade...

Sorry, but you are traveling in the wrong direction. If you sit down and read the CJEU decision rather than marketing materials of someone trying to get your business, you will see that the issue at hand was a delay, not a downgrade, and that it was on a connection after leaving the EU. In your case, you have what you think may be a downgrade, but downgrades apply per segment, not per ticket. Thus, you still have what may be a downgrade (which remains to be seen) on a segment between two points outside the EU.

If you think you are able to convince whatever carrier it is (why not disclose that?) operating the POA-GIG to pay out a refund it is not required to pay out, all the best of luck. Maybe they will make a mistake and send you something.

Hi,

the carrier operating that flight is G3.

I fail to understand why you believe that there is no refund due, even if it's not under EU 261. Air France sold me a Business Class ticket. It's an AF flight number. It's not a Y fare basis. I travel in Economy. How is that not a downgrade? Should I perhaps initiate a dispute with the Credit Card Company (on the grounds the product/service which I purchased was not delivered - ie. Business Class seat on POA-GIG). Or even sue Air France here in Germany...?

This is how the flight is sold. Even if you try to buy a flight now on Air France's website, it sells as Business and there is no information on this specific flight being on Eco:

https://cimg5.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.fly...64f56f66a7.jpg

https://cimg3.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.fly...94f8317680.jpg

Hmm all this makes me wonder whether I can claim something for this:
https://cimg5.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.fly...304bf6d403.jpg
Flybeez

If you want to sue AF or initiate a dispute with your card issuer before even requesting a refund of the fare difference, that is up to you.

You then face two problems:
1. The ticket may be in error and the fare charged is the Y fare and thus the refund would be EUR 0. Hopefully your time is worth more than that.
2. G3 may simply show an add/collect on the ticket. Nobody at POA will know what you are talking about and you will simply face repaying or at worst not having a ticket.

It seems to me that your first step is to determine what the fare difference is and what you paid.

It used to be the same for CDG-JNB/JNB-CDG connections which are operated by Kulula on a single cabin airplane, on the bright side it meant you still got miles at 175% of the fare (this was before last year's changes), they have since fixed it to Y so now you get crappy 2XP and some small amount of miles.

For the OP, if this is a flight operated with no business class then there isn't even a business class fare, while the website might be misleading I doubt it will be possible to calculate such a fare difference, and even if it was possible is it worth all your effort for maybe couple dozen €?

G3 and AF might just say OK the Y fare is 250 Euros and the J fare is 250.01 Euros - so we owe you a penny, please send a self addressed stamped envelope for that. Our refunds manager is Helen Wait, so go to Helen Wait for that refund.

Not much risk in them offering a J fare for a penny more if they don't offer it on the route. Owing to not actually having an aircraft with J seats. Also GOL seems to be the only airline other than a once daily AV flight that flies POA to GIG and all the GOL aircraft are 737 in all Y versions with only one with "comfort class" which is three across seats with the middle seat blocked. I'm not sure with GOL more or less owning the routes out of POA to get to GIG if I'd go bananas with them online or at the airport, TBH. OK fine, here's your penny AND we are not flying you to GIG, so good luck, buster.

Countless people here over the ages have found one leg, usually a short one, that has no J seats to offer on a larger itinerary which overall is in some version of J. And the price is the price and nobody gets a plugged nickel (or 5 Euro penny coin equivalent) refunded.

I'd be more worried about all the legs on a 6 leg open jaw fare covering over 12,000 miles (leaving out the POA-GIG leg) for less than 2,000 Euros all is legit. If it is all legit the OP should be thrilled with this deal even with one leg for 1:55 hrs in coach due to no ability to provide otherwise.

Second part of that AMS-DXB-SIN journey, namely DXB-SIN. The ruling says you have an AMS-SIN flight and that's what matters (also if AMS-DXB is delayed, but you had a long connection and still made DXB-SIN on time... no comp).

Your case would be the SIN-AMS flight which does not fall under EC261 protection as per the example cited.

In your case you have a flight partially operated by a community carrier (AF), so if the AF flight from Rio was delayed, that would be under the regulation. G3 flight, not.

Not to mention whether the flight actually was not noted as Y only. If you try to book a J connection to a domestic flight in France, for example, you get a following message for some of the service notes:

Comfort and privacy on board https://www.airfrance.fr/FR/common/c...icon_alert.png Service not available for this flight AF7534

More than likely the fare difference is EUR 0. which is why OP ought to expend the effort to figure out the fare difference before he starts worrying about CJEU precedents.