koksy

Hi all,

a friend was supposed to fly over from ORD to LHR to stay with me last night on the BA296. When he got home from work, he found this email:

Subject: Message for BA0296 ORD on 23 Mar 2009

Dear Customer,

Flight BA296 on 23 Mar/ORD - is cancelled due sick
Captain, however we have a seat on earlier BA298 for you.Just come to
airport.Check-in closes 20.30hrs.

Yours sincerely,
British Airways Customer Service

This email arrived 2hrs before the BA298 was due to depart so there was no way on earth he would have made the latest check in time. He called BA and they have told him he can only fly today. No mention of compensation, and no apology. The staff were very brusque... just like the original email!

The EU compensation laws, do they apply to fly coming back to the EU if you're a US citizen? If not, I assume it's just a case of complaining to BA customer services? What is especially annoying is that he paid £200 to change to this flight last week due to his work commitments!

Jenbel

All flights on an EU carrier are covered by EU compensation rules, regardless of citizenship of passenger. So this flight would be.

At the same time, it's hard to see why this isn't an extraordinary circumstance, particularly when BA did try to get him out on an earlier flight (albeit he found it impossible to do so )

koksy

Thanks Jenbel. I found this link which would appear to suggest he is entitled to 600 euros.

http://eur-lex.europa.eu/smartapi/cg...umdoc=304R0261

BingBongBoy

I hope the Captain is ok...

Caribbean flight had to be cancelled late last year due to Capt. being quite seriously injured in a car crash...

Unfortunate, but things do happen and the inflatable pilot, as demonstrated in Airplane does not actually know how to fly the plane...

Hope your friend gets back safe and sound.

Jenbel

The pertinent bit that will likely be used by the airline in this situation can be found in 14in there:

It's hard to see how a captain going sick and being unable to operate at an overseas base does not constitute extraordinary circumstances - so I wouldn't pin your hopes on actually receiving EU comp without a long fight.

graraps

It is not extraordinary for crew to be human and get sick.

Airlines can either pay for standby crew to cover such eventualities or pay for reaccommodation/compensation of stranded pax. In this case, there was no backup crew, and no offer of reaccommodation on non-BA alternatives was made.

Ergo, BA owe him compensation.

koksy

He's a lawyer (who up until now was unfamiliar with the EU compensation laws) ^

adrianjc32

I don't think it is reasonable to expect BA to have a standby crew at every outstation. I do not think that the EU rights were ever drawn up with that kind of commercial pressure in mind, at a home base certainly, but not down route.

BingBongBoy

I am a little confused...

Do you know of any airline who keep crew on constant standby at every outstation that they fly to?

Jenbel

That would be my thinking too. If it had happened at LHR, one would definitely argue that he would have had a case - but it's not reasonable to expect an airline as big as BA to keep crew sat around at all of their destinations.

I had a flight cancelled on me last year in the Caribbean. The inbound crew went out of hours to fly the aircraft the final leg, following the triggering of the cargo-hold extinguishers onboard, which meant the outbound crew could not get to the aircraft for the return leg (which I was waiting to fly). VS did what they could, but were stuck in an outstation which isn't even used by them to refuel or restock, so minimal VS ground staff, with passengers trying to get to Grenada and passengers trying to get to LGW all in one place - and when England were playing T&T in a friendly so the island was chocka! We flew back the next day (sans bag since the a/c hold was unusuable). After seeking some wise counsel on here, I decided not to push for EU comp (afterall, they could have chartered a plane from Grenada to Tobago to get the outbound crew over) but decided in the end sometimes it is just fate and not the fault of the airline.

Here, the airline tried to accommodate the pax on an earlier flight which he couldn't make. The lack of other (non company) alternatives is poor but still not sure if that is sufficient to push for comp on.

I suppose the alternative is that BA makes its sick captains fly, no matter what? not sure I like that as a thought really - manflu'd captain in charge of the plane

The Saint

My reading of the regs.

No compensation is due under Article 7, because Captain going sick down route is likely to be regarded as an exceptional circumstace (for the reasons stated by adrianjc32 and others).

Pax could have asked for a re-route (with another carrier if necessary) or reimbursement under Article 8 and/or "care" under Article 9 (neither of which entitlements is subject to the "exceptional circumstances" exception).

Ergo, graraps should read the regulations more carefully.

graraps

I don't.

That's why I expect them to reaccommodate me to other airlines if they can't operate their flight.

And no compensation would be due if they offered such an option on terms convenient to the pax (as AZ have done for me in the past).


It is silly to assert that no compensation is due in such a case, when AFAIK we already have precedent on aircraft parts (which stop working far less often than crew).


Otherwise, this is an open invitation for airlines to combine quiet flights because of "sick crew".

The Saint

You can't base an interpretation of the regulations on an assumption that carriers will lie about the reason for the cancellation. Bear in mind, too, that the carrier bears the burden of proving the reason for cancellation was an exceptional circumstance.

hammythehammer

I agree with most of the the other posters ...there's no way that this incident is covered by EU regulations.
Like Jenbel I'd hate to be on a flight where the crew were pressurised to operate a flight that they weren't 100% happy about.
To the OP the Email was probably sent out on the off chance that someone may be able to use the earlier flight....hopefully some managed to utilise it.

graraps

I agree that you can't write a law with this in mind, however carriers have shown that they are prepared lie to pax (if not in court) and feed them a rubbish excuse in order to get rid of them.

The legal side of my interpretation is based on the precedent on a/c parts, and on the fact that sick crew is a reasonably regular occurence.

Feel free to argue how crew sickness is a materially more extraordinary event than a malfunctioning part.