Jaenks

That should help any TA . EU law is above any member state law.
https://ec.europa.eu/transport/sites.../c20201830.pdf

englisha

I have a booking for 3 June which is still showing as confirmed. I'd be happy to rebook for December, especially if Austrian will add an extra 50 euro. Is there any advantage in waiting to see if its cancelled, if I don't need a cash refund? My understanding from the website is that I would be ok to rebook now and still get 50 euro credit.

Quote from website :"Already booked tickets for still existing flights no longer expire and can be rebooked until August 31, 2020. In addition, Austrian is now offering a discount of up to 50 Euro for rebookings with a travel date within the year 2020." https://book.austrian.com/app/fb.fly

4flying

What is more valuable in case of insolvency and/or administration: a promised refund or a new flight booked with a later changed date? Can both be equally written off? Sorry for the doomsday question...

behuman

The realistic post of the day !

Bankruptcy may well be the best way out . And then rebuild a new company with the same name without the old obligations.

Carpacchio

That's actually what Lufty is threatening. The German government said they can provide financial help, but want 2 seats in the board and also charge 9% interest.
Spohr said he cannot accept that and planned bankruptcy would be the alternative then.
Obviously political bargaining on both sides, but let's see what's really coming out.

john1987

my flights were cancelled one day after purchased probably due to Corona Virus which left in difficulty because I was due to travel over the next 48 hours.. they assume no responsibility and fobbed me off saying it was a third party responsibility and for the travel agency to provide a solution .which did not include to re book my flight to travel at date of my convenience at the same class.
they are strangely imposing a rule that I have to travel within 7 days of my original flight.
they offer a refund ,but I need to contact the travel agency, but I want to travel.
they offer no compensation at all . can you help?

SK AAR

First of all you need to deal with the TA.

If you want to want to travel with 7 days of original flight date, you may get rebooked without paying any fare difference. If you are asking to rebooked beyond 7 days, you need to pay any applicable fare difference (if the same booking class is not available).

There is no compensation due because of extraordinary circumstances.

Dave_C

No!

That might be LH Group policy, but that is not EU law! If they cancelled the flights they must rebook you, free of charge for dates convenient to you. The only restriction is that there must be available seats in that particular cabin (and not booking class).

SK AAR

I beg to differ. This is not the way EU reg. 261/04 art. 8 is construed and applied by the airlines.

Dave_C

Of course, they're going to take the most restrictive interpretation that saves them money. That's not to say you wouldn't prevail in the small claims court in your jurisdiction. I think in nearly every single 261/2004 case, courts have ruled in favour of passengers.

Personally, I've had success in getting a P ticket rebooked to C/J just by HUACA.

I have no doubt that had I not got this outcome and tried to take (LX in my case) to small claims court in the UK, I would have prevailed before it even made it in front of a magistrate. They absolutely do not want to get a definitive ruling on this as they know which way it would go.

SK AAR

Taking the airline to small claims court to get rebooked into a higher booking class for a date of your convenience seems excessive and something that the vast majority of pax are not prepared to do. Also to be able to advance a claim in court the pax would have to purchase the more expensive fare for dates the pax wants to travel and then claim reimbursement of what was paid for the new ticket and already paid for the cancelled flight; again the vast majority of pax would never be prepared to do that/to take this risk of succeeding in court afterwards.

I'm not convinced that your interpretation of art. 8, 1 (c) will prevail in court. Obviously, there is a distinction between asking to travel at earliest opportunity (after original flight date) - this is described in art. 8, 1 (b) - and rebooking to any day at the convenience of pax (this is art. 8, 1 (c). I believe you are referring to the art. 8, 1 (b) situation which indeed allows the pax to be rebooked under comparable transport conditions (i.e. in the same service class regardless of booking class) whereas under art. 8, 1 (c) rebooking is "subject to availability of seats", which in reality means that the same booking class needs to be available. If art. 8, 1 (c) was read the way you do (that the pax is entitled to be rebooked regardless of booking class) there is no difference between rebooking under art. 8, 1 (b) and art. 8, 1 (c) - this is not the true legal construction as art. 8, 1 (b) and 8, 1 (c) deals with 2 very different situations, sorry.

GetSetJetSet

Rebooking within 7 days is not possible if flights are cancelled for weeks after my intended travel date.

callmedtop

My May award flight ZRH-MUC-ORD in LH F using M&M was just cancelled. I called the US M&M hotline and they told me that they cannot currently refund miles or taxes, essentially leaving my miles in limbo. I can understand not refunding taxes (based on reading this thread), but miles too? Is this worth trying again or is this indeed the policy?

Dave_C

The point of part (b) is to ensure that airlines will rebook passengers on other airlines in order to get them to their destination as soon as possible. They regularly flout this too.

Part (c) makes no mention of booking classes, simply "comparable transport conditions" and "availability of seats". Let's say I have a 'P' class ticket and then cancels my flight and Lufthansa tells me that I can't have a seat because there's only 'D' or 'C' available in business class. If I were to take them to small claims court here, the logical response for the magistrate would be to ask Lufthansa what the comparison is between a ticket in 'P' and one in 'D' would be? The only answer is price. Part (c) makes no reference to price, just simply that seats are available.

I also think it's perfectly reasonable to bring these kind of actions. If Sturgeon hadn't prevailed for example, then we'd all be totally screwed due to mechanical delays. Thank goodness someone did have the chutzpah to take it all the way.

I strongly suspect that any EU airline wouldn't want to fight something like this beyond the small claims court, as they'd risk having a precedent set in the same way that Sturgeon did.

olm022

I have a ticket for LIS-BRU-GVA (same day connection) issued on 220 stock. SN cancelled its flights and asked LH to rebook. The only *A option was via FRA with a forced overnight connection. I will book an airport hotel for around 100 EUR. Am I correct in my understanding that I should send the bill to Brussels Airlines, and not to LH, with whom I have a contract for transportation.Thanks