neilma1

Hi Folks
I was on BA52 from SEA to LHR on the 20th April which ended up arriving 3 hours and 56 mins late into LHR (I have never seen a plane taxi, dock and get the door open so quickly ).
I submitted a claim to BA who responded that I wasnt entitled to compensation as it was due to a "Rotational Delay of the previous aircraft"
I asked for further information or for them to explain why this was or what it meant only to recieve the standard deadlock? response and suggesting I take it to CEDR if I wish....
How can I find out any further details on the delay or should I start something up with CEDR with the information I have (Not much )

Any suggestions would be appreciated.
Thanks

mavml

Hi all.

I'd appreciate some advice on my compensation claim with BA for flight BA208 MIA-LHR on 14th April. Some background first:

- The flight arrived at LHR approx 4 hrs 30 mins late.
- The delay was advised by text message on the day of departure from MIA as due to "operational reasons" and due to the captain on board as due to a technical fault which was found just before departure of the outbound flight from LHR which required an aircraft substitution.
- I believe the original aircraft due to operate our flight was G-XLEA and it was actually operated by G-XLEF.

I put in my claim on the day of arrival back to the UK (I know now since reading this thread that claiming so early was a mistake, but hopefully it won't change the eventual outcome).

The first response from BA came about a week later and was a fairly standard response saying compensation was not payable due to aircraft damage which wasn't caused by BA.

I responded, quoting some of the court cases mentioned on here, and received a response a couple of days later with more detail, again saying they weren't liable in this event.

Due to the location and the nature of the damage, it was confirmed by the engineers that the damage was due to debris on a runway. The debris had been thrown up either during a landing or a take-off. On further inspection, the damage was found to be outside of the acceptable limits to operate, and it required further non-destructive testing to check for further hidden damage. It also was decided that these checks would take time and this was limited due to crew hours, so the decision was made to tow the aircraft and replace it with an alternative aircraft.

To me, they are still liable in this case on the basis that:

- Aircraft damage was incurred in normal course of operations.
- Damage took place at least 2 sectors prior to mine (BA don't know when), providing ample time to replace with an alternate aircraft. The fact that the damage was only found just before departure was entirely within BA's control and therefore regardless of the cause of the damage, they are still liable.

I wrote back, quoting para 14 / 15 of the EC261 text, and that I was not prepared to let the matter rest, and today (2 weeks later) received this response:

Thanks for writing back to us. I apologise for the delay in my response.

Article 5.3 of the EU Regulation 261/2004 states a carrier is not obliged to pay compensation if it can prove the delay or cancellation is caused by extraordinary circumstances, that couldn’t have been avoided even if all reasonable measures had been taken. In Recital 14 and 15 of EU Regulation 261/2004, extraordinary circumstances include weather, strikes, damage to aircraft not caused by the operating airline and the impact of an air traffic management decision which gives rise to a long delay. This means you’re not entitled to compensation under the EU Regulation for your delayed flight.

Thanks again for getting in touch with us. Please feel free to contact me directly by using the blue link below if I can help you with anything else.

It seems to me that BA have at their own liberty taken the text from paragraph 14 and replaced the reference to unexpected flight safety shortcomings with something which is not at all mentioned in the text. My initial reaction to this is that this is outright lying, thus I'm very much angered by this response, so whilst I calm down to provide a rational response, I thought I'd get some advice here:

- I can't find any court cases or advice online which deal with this specific circumstance (the closest being the collision of ground handling vehicles with aircraft), but does anyone disagree with my conclusions, or think that maybe compensation isn't payable here?

- What should my next steps be? Customer service invite me to make another response, but I just don't feel like I'm getting anywhere, and I really don't want to deal with this individual again (I know he's just doing his job of fobbing people off, what a demoralising role....). Should I just write to customer services instead threatening a legal approach, or can I ask for this to be referred elsewhere? I'm happy to take any reasonable path to reach a conclusion.

Thanks for any help, just reading this thread has been a goldmine of information, I think without it I wouldn't have had a clue what to do!

corporate-wage-slave

Welcome to Flyertalk neilma1, welcome to the BA forum. It's good to see you here and I hope we will see you in other parts of FT too,

Rotational delay is not an acceptable reason for not paying EC261, and the person handling the case clearly doesn't know what they are doing. It's sometimes good to start this chain of letters with some specific legal references in it, in the hope a more qualified member of staff will look at it. So yes, just go to CEDR, you do not have to prove anything, BA have to prove that rotational delay is an exceptional circumstance - and it's not - or mention the correct reason for delay. Almost always the captain would have told you on departure, at least I've never been on a BA flight where the captain didn't give chapter and vere. If you recall what was said then by all means deploy that. You also could do MCOL, which needs more work and a cash outlay, but would be slightly faster in this circumstance - BA would capitulate before drafting up a case.

corporate-wage-slave

Very interesting this (though in your shoes I would be annoyed) - it is highly unusual to get this level of detail. Now I can see this is going to be a grey area since regardless of when it happened, when it was spotted a chain of events at MIA then happened that led to your delay. I think BA have an arguable case here. But so do you, in terms of the points you have made - this is inherent operations and, there is/was more BA could have done to prevent or mitigate the delay. Now accepting this isn't a slam dunk one, since MIA isn't a BA base, then you are probably looking at MCOL not CEDR and going through a number of the CJEU legal cases relevant to this (notably van der Lans v KLM, and Peskova & Peska v Travel Service. The latter said that bird strike is extraordinary circumstance, but airlines can't evade their responsibilities in terms of the follow-up). In other words, it seems to me the best issue is to politely reply that you don't accept this is extraordinary circumstances, that you give 16 days notice if settlement of 600€ isn't paid, and follow through on that. Be aware though that a District Judge may regard BA's defence as persuasive, however if you both have good arguments it is important to stress the Regulation's core intent on improving customer service.

mavml

Thanks CWS. I was leaning towards MCOL as well given there is no specific precedent.

However just to be 100% clear, the damage was discovered at LHR prior to the preceding leg (which was therefore also delayed) and thus there was a knock on impact to our MIA departure later that day. So I don’t think the outstation point is relevant to BA’s case unless I’m missing something?

corporate-wage-slave

Ah ok, that does change things, I assumed it was discovered in MIA, where the options would be fairly limited. At LHR then yes they would have had more options to avoid or mitigate the delay. That strengthens your argument.

mavml

Thanks. Will send the note giving 16 days notice of MCOL and see where that gets me.

serfty

I would go against "Hanlon's Razor" here and suggest the person really does know what they are doing.

just_starting

Can anyone give me an indication of what BA's response times are like on compensation/expense cases? I submitted a fairly straightforward case three weeks ago (dinner/breakfast/lunch + €250) and still haven't heard back...

BA945 on 22 April if anyone is interested, technical fault with the aircraft as backed up by The BA Source ? British Airways News and Information.

kaka

Same as my case in 2016, in short, my original flight was cancelled, and my replacement flight was delayed. They paid for the cancelled one, then said they have paid me so in the spirit of things they wont pay for the delay (over 4 hours LHR HKG) other wise it would have been a double-claim. got nowhere with them, and CEDR then paid.

I guess BA has calculated that its cheaper for them to send everything to india and force us to go thru CEDR than to pay up in the first place

corporate-wage-slave

After a month I think it's ok to call up and ask. The processing times seem to be related to status, and a month isn't unusual for those without status. It is also sometimes quicker - in terms of processing time rather than elapsed time - to defer a claim by a few weeks since if previous passengers have successfully claimed then the research process the agents have to undertake can be shortened.

neilma1

Thanks CWS - Much appreciated. I have put forward a CEDR claim. Will see how that goes.Now onto a service recovery request for my flight last week Oh I bet they love me at the moment Thanks again.

SK AAR

As a reference point, I'm still waiting for a response to my (reiterated) claim of 21 March for reimbursement of expenses incurred due to delayed luggage. My initial claim was submitted to BA on 7 February and I received a response on 21 March only appologizing for the delayed luggage but without adressing my claim for reimbursement at all. So after 3 months no resolvement - unbelieveable! (I'm not sure it has any bearing but my flight was a Sun-Air of Scandinavia flight and my luggage was delayed on the preceding ET flight rather than on the BA flight (but ET referred me to BA as BA was the last operating carrier). I have no status with BA.

simons1

Sounds like a difficult one, indeed the responsibility of the last carrier to resolve but guaranteed to result in finger pointing amongst the 3 parties....

SK AAR

As I understand the IATA rule the obligation to deal with (and settle) any delayed luggage rests with the last operating carrier regardless if it was the preceding carrier that caused the delay; this is at least the response I received from ET when filing my claim for reimbursement with ET (in my case BA is clearly not at fault; the luggage was never delivered in time to BA at OSL to make it on my BA flight OSL-AAR). BA to settle towards the pax as last operating carrier (but might be able to recover from ET subsequently)