hb133

I tried pushing a second time and was told explicitly that this limit was there 'for fairness of all passengers' and they wouldn't budge - even after I argued that they'd neglected their duty of care.

More frustrating is that when checking out of the hotel the next morning, i saw another passenger from the cancelled flight (those yellow hand baggage tags have their uses!) and she had been sent to (or back to) the same hotel by the airport staff... But no idea of their arrangements.

The argument is about £80 which in the grand scheme, given we've got the EU 261 on top is nothing, BUT it's the principle at stake here.

hb133

P.S. I even did BA a favour in keeping costs down by sharing a room with my wife :-)

corporate-wage-slave

Funnily enough, BA don't require you to share a room with your wife, so you could have downscaled and presented two bills for a higher total amount and all would have been fine.

OK, if you've rung up you're only going to get further by the MCOL route. I don't normally say this but unless this was the Hôtel Plaza Athénée Paris, I think you would be paid, eventually (may be your insurance would help?). There's nothing in the Regulation which limits the cost of this, merely that the airline is responsible for accommodation, it just may be impacted by what a District Judge would feel is reasonable.

hb133

Apparently that isn't actually the case - if there are two of you on one booking, they expect you to share a room. At least according to the agent I spoke with earlier.

It's not worth the hassle for £80 and I've turned it over to Amex BA Premium Plus card insurance for the difference so will see what happens there.

pmcg

Just done a search and found the below information.

What's considered opinion, is it worth me pursuing given that BA have told me?

When there seems to have been a precedent already set:

corporate-wage-slave

It's not a precedent, unfortunately, it was an appeal on a county court judgement, and so persuasive and arguable, but not a precedent. Moreover, what perhaps isn't clear from the quote above was that the claimants' were in Egypt, the aircraft was struck by lightning on a previous service from Nice to Gatwick. Now normally you couldn't expect an airline to rustle up an aircraft in Egypt but the judge here decided that the claimants were entitled to compensation. Her reasoning was

Key to this is the "inherent" word, plus the fact that aircraft overwhelmingly don't need anything more than an inspection after a lightning strike.

However in your case it's all a red herring: your service started in LHR, the home of British Airways. The fact that BA didn't have a spare aircraft to handle a normal out-of-service fleet shortfall, caused by a very routine incident to just one aircraft is BA's problem, not yours. So letter before action and then MCOL, assuming there are no other factors involved.

theBro

Yep, sounds like the same case to me as well. However, my flights were within Europe, so I was expecting to be getting EUR 400. If BA is having a policy of ignoring the first leg, I think I just go for the offered EUR 250. Not happy about it, but not really interested in fighting for the rest of the money with no guarantee of the result.

hedgepig30

Hi,

i'm would like to ask for some help.

On 17th June my wife and i were due to fly to Istanbul on BA676 leaving 10.20. This was cancelled at 09.15 and we were rebooked to fly at 17.45 (flight actually did not leave until nearly 19.30).

I requested a EU compensation claim but have been told:

Thanks for your time on the phone today regarding your cancelled flight to Istanbul on 17 June.
Further to our conversation yesterday, your flight BA0676 was cancelled due to a lightening strike. The aircraft was damaged on arrival at London Heathrow from its previous journey that morning. As this is outside of our control, your claim has been refused. I realise this isn't the answer you hoped to receive. I'm sorry for any inconvenience this may have caused.


Given what i gather is the Evans v Monarch Airlines Ltd at Reading County Court ruling and that the flight was due to leave BA's home airport of Heathrow should i try and take the matter further?

Many thanks if anyone could shed some light/help.

Hedgepig

adrianlondon

When my LHR-BSL flight was cancelled a few weeks ago and I was rebooked onto one the next day, I was handed a leaflet which clearly had the limits explained.

It was titled "Compensation & Assistance for customers in time of disruption"

And it bullet-pointed

• Hotel (£200 per day per room - 2 people sharing)
• Transport to/from the airport and hotel (£50 for the round trip)
• Reasonable meals/refreshments (£25 per adult per day, £12.50 for children)
• Two reasonable telephone calls per customer.

Due to the sheer number of flights cancelled that particular day, getting a hotel (even a mediocre one) for under £200 proved close to impossible anywhere near the airport, so in my case they paid over £200 although I claimed for nothing else.

corporate-wage-slave

Yes, lightning strike from previous flights involving a LHR turnaround have not been deemed extraordinary since long before that case or indeed Huzar. So yes, push back on this, saying that under EC261 this is not extraordinary, its inherent and furthermore BA chose not to lay on a replacement aircraft at its home hub, where something like 240 aircraft are based.

corporate-wage-slave

Thanks for passing that on, it will be useful to others. I wasn't aware they were going public with this information. In a way it is helpful to passengers since they can effectively ring round, and if a hotel quotes £210 you can ask them to knock £11 off to conform to policy. Most hotels I know would accept this.

firstlight

Everyone,

So BA in record time (5 days for me at least) have admitted EU261 liability on the infamous BA2552 to Heraklion on 21 July. Whatever nasty smell was in the cabin was not blamed on extraordinary circumstances and they are paying out immediately with no quibble.

Diver Boy

Not sure if BA are getting on top of the back log yet but I had a LGW to BCN delayed by 3 hours and 5 minutes, the pilot was great came out of the cockpit to explain that despite what we might have been told the plane was delayed due to lack of serviceable aircraft before we even took off, when we arrived in BCN as I was checking the delay time with the cabin crew (so I could be sure for my claim) the pilot came on the PA to tell passengers to claim their compensation.

I emailed customer services, within 4 days I had a response which agreed they were liable, the entire email dealt with the delay and wished I had a good flight on an upcoming trip (all details were correct) rather than the usual mash up of non relevant text you often get. 2 days later I had the cheque.

hedgepig30

Many thanks!

Deltus

I've got a question about the "grey area" referred to in point 12 of the first post:
All the other references I can find state a 3 hour minimum for any delay compensation. A friend was on a Category 1 flight that was about 2hr 55m late - have they potentially got a claim? Is there any caselaw on that area?