Offloaded from connecting IB flight. Anything we could have done?
Aug 31, 2019, 1:28 am
#1
Original Poster
Join Date: Jan 2010
Location: London
Programs: AA Lifetime Platinum
Posts: 329
Offloaded from connecting IB flight. Anything we could have done?
We were bookd on OVD-MAD-VCE on IB. Flight out of OVD delayed because another aircraft declared an emergency at MAD and controllers would not let our flight take off. Nevertheless we arrived at VCE gate while the flight was still boarding. After scanning our boarding passes the gate agent told us that we have been offloaded from our flight as the ‘system’ did not expect us to make our connection. She said we need to go to CS.
Protests that we had to make that flight and that we had no checked baggage did not help. There was nothing she could do. Of course at CS there was a massive queue, but one of the kiosks was working and printed BPs for the next flight that would depart 5 hours later. Throughout this our original flight was still paging missing pax. Indeed, our originally booked flight departed over an hour AFTER we presented ourselves at the gate.
In addition to 5 hours in The underwhelming Dali lounge, we missed a dinner engagement and accommodation for the first night and had to pay for a night at an airport hotel.
Was there anything i could have done? Surely the gate agent could offload standby pax or at least allow us to hang around to see if they could accommodate us due to other shows?
Protests that we had to make that flight and that we had no checked baggage did not help. There was nothing she could do. Of course at CS there was a massive queue, but one of the kiosks was working and printed BPs for the next flight that would depart 5 hours later. Throughout this our original flight was still paging missing pax. Indeed, our originally booked flight departed over an hour AFTER we presented ourselves at the gate.
In addition to 5 hours in The underwhelming Dali lounge, we missed a dinner engagement and accommodation for the first night and had to pay for a night at an airport hotel.
Was there anything i could have done? Surely the gate agent could offload standby pax or at least allow us to hang around to see if they could accommodate us due to other shows?
Aug 31, 2019, 7:36 am
#3
A FlyerTalk Posting Legend
Join Date: Sep 2009
Location: Minneapolis: DL DM charter 2.3MM
Programs: A3*Gold, SPG Plat, HyattDiamond, MarriottPP, LHW exAccess, ICI, Raffles Amb, NW PE MM, TWA Gold MM
Posts: 100,404
And dinner, associated taxis between airport and hotel, etc. but I'm confused. OP spent the delay in lounge, not an airport hotel. My guess is that the airport hotel occurred at the destination when arrival was too late to get to the reserved hotel. Maybe the plan had been to take a ferry to one of the islands near Venice?
Aug 31, 2019, 8:38 am
#4
Suspended
Join Date: Aug 2010
Location: DCA
Programs: UA US CO AA DL FL
Posts: 50,262
1. The sole question is whether OP arrived to the MAD-VCE gate no later than T-20 from scheduled departure. Whether the flight was still boarding irrelevant. Thus, no EC 261/2004 delay compensation (although the ATC emergency delay adds to that).
2. OP is due a duty of care for the five hours of delay. If he ate a meal outside the lounge, he may submit the receipt for reimbursement of a reasonable sum.
3. While unclear, it does seem that OP took an airport hotel on arrival at VCE. IB's duty of care was to get OP to VCE and does not cover consequential losses such as this. OP could ask that IB cover the expense as a customer service gesture, but that is highly unlikely to occur. Either the cost of the prepaid room or the airport hotel ought to be claimable against a half-way decent travel insurance.
2. OP is due a duty of care for the five hours of delay. If he ate a meal outside the lounge, he may submit the receipt for reimbursement of a reasonable sum.
3. While unclear, it does seem that OP took an airport hotel on arrival at VCE. IB's duty of care was to get OP to VCE and does not cover consequential losses such as this. OP could ask that IB cover the expense as a customer service gesture, but that is highly unlikely to occur. Either the cost of the prepaid room or the airport hotel ought to be claimable against a half-way decent travel insurance.
Aug 31, 2019, 12:59 pm
#6
FlyerTalk Evangelist
Join Date: Aug 2011
Location: Barcelona, London, on a plane
Programs: BA Silver, TK E+, AA PP, Hyatt Globalist, Marriott LT Plat, Hilton Diamond
Posts: 13,045
By your logic, with a delayed boarding, there is no way to demonstrate that you were at the gate T-20 and everybody on the plane could be offloaded.
IB probably will claim "extraordinary" to avoid paying EU261 compensation.
Sep 1, 2019, 1:53 am
#7
Original Poster
Join Date: Jan 2010
Location: London
Programs: AA Lifetime Platinum
Posts: 329
We must have arrived after the cut-off of the originally scheduled departure time, and i agree there is no case for compensation for either the delay under EC261 or the unplanned expenses in VCE. I was just wondering if there was something we could have done to get on this flight given that they were paging pax for at lease 30 minutes AFTER we were turned away at the gate.
Sep 2, 2019, 3:24 pm
#8
Join Date: Jul 2010
Location: TLV/ATH/LON/EZE/NYC/UIP
Programs: BA*GGL, A3*G, AF*P, VS*S
Posts: 1,011
Not sure if the IB app is any good but on other airlines, the app updates with new flight info when this happens. You might have therefore seen this as soon as you reconnected to data on landing in Madrid, and saved yourselves the wasted time arguing the toss at the gate, instead going straight to CS or phoning them to ask them to also preserve you on the previous flight as you could see you might now make it. That has happened to me exactly before with BA, and I had called them before even deplaning to get myself preserved on the original flight, which I duly made quite comfortably.