LOT Polish Denied Boarding in PEK
 

I'm hoping someone can give me guidance regarding my situation. I booked a business class flight flying from PEK-WAW-FRA-JFK. PEK-WAW-FRA is on LOT Polish and FRA-JFK is on Singapore Airlines. This is all on one ticket. I booked this by transferring credit card points (87k) to Aeroplan. When I got to PEK, I was denied boarding since the agent said the way I booked the flight was flagged as fraudulent. They asked me where I got my miles to book this flight and I explained it was through credit card points transfer and the agent said there is no such thing which I tried to refute but they refused to listen. I then called the LOT Polish customer service and explained my situation. The representative on the phone agrees with me that my booking is valid and even offered to talk to the LOT Polish agents at PEK to explain the situation. I passed my phone to them and again, it was pretty obvious that they just refused to accept this as a valid booking. The representative then said she will call the manager of the LOT Polish office at PEK. Ultimately, she was not successful in persuading the manager and I was denied boarding.

I had to get back to NY soon, and LOT Polish did not offer me any alternative way to get me to my final destination. The next flight flying on LOT Polish to NYC was two days later and the price is nearly $5k for an economy flight. So I then just ended up booking Korean Air flying from PEK-ICN-JFK for around $5k on business.

Questions I have:
1. What are my chances in getting my 87k points back since I was denied boarding through no fault of my own and even LOT Polish customer service agreed that it was a valid booking and it was only the LOT Polish agents at PEK that said it was invalid.
2. Any ways I can get at least a portion of the $5k flight I booked on Korean Air reimbursed?

Any help or guidance is greatly appreciated. Thanks all in advance.



https://cimg2.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.fly...3917f77d5c.png

Have you asked Aeroplan?
Have you a history of flights/awards with Aeroplan?

I'm on hold to speak to them. So nothing yet. Just want to see if anyone else have a good strategy in the meantime.

I think that it would have been wise to try to reach Aeroplan/Air Canada while you were at PEK, but hindsight is always 20:20.

Since this was a single award ticket for travel to the United States, I would file a complaint with the U.S. Department of Transportation against Air Canada (which I assume was the issuing airline). While the DOT cannot order an airline to compensate you, it can bring an enforcement proceeding against an airline if DOT perceives that the airline is not acting appropriately if they've violated DOT consumer-protection rules. DOT complaint information here:

https://www.transportation.gov/airco...umer-complaint

If neither Aeroplan nor a U.S. DOT complaint gets you satisfaction, you might ask a lawyer you know or the Legal Aid Society
https://legalaidnyc.org/get-help/con...-claims-court/

about the feasibility of suing Air Canada, LOT, or maybe both of them for money damages in Queens County Small Claims Court (Air Canada and LOT both do business in Queens County; AC at LGA, and LO at JFK).

Yet another option is to contact Christopher Elliott at
elliott.org

to see if he can help. His organization advocates for travelers who have had travel-related problems. (This might be easier than engaging in litigation.)

Best of luck!

EU261 compensation for involuntary denied boarding on a EU carrier, travelling to EU member state on first segment, surely ?

LOT may allege that it not denied boarding as in the eyes of LOT the OP had no valid ticket.

To the OP: you do realise that for this itinerary you need Schengen visa?

I believe this is very relevant questions. If there is no history with Aeroplan except for a transfer from credit card and business class redemption, it most likely have triggered the red flag.

The OP def. needs to contact Aeroplan.

The whole itinerary as ticketed is third country to third country and therefore not subject to EC261/2004 regulation. Unfortunately this has been litigated relatively recently for KIV-VIE-BKK and it was ruled to be out of scope. Case C-451/20. Annoyingly, the ruling is not published in English.

This is very useful information, I've always suspected it to be the case.

People on here will be way more qualified than me to inform you but in slightly close situations. I hope you took timings, who you spoke to, who denied you?, what time you called, who was the supervisor they couldnt reach, what your expenses were for the following days, who did you reach at LOT that agreed with you. Its not a non exhaustive list but will give you a leg up.

Case C-451/20
 

Thank you. This is indeed very interesting EC judgment (but apparently not published in English but all kinds of other European languages).

The interesting part is the conclusion: "this Regulation does not apply to flights which has been booked together and which consists of two legs to be operated by a Community carrier when both the airport of departure for the first leg and the airport of arrival for the second leg are located in a third country, while only the airport where the transfer takes place is located in the territory of a Member State".

The other part/question was in fact also interesting. OS rebooked the pax to TK on a flight scheduled to arrive 40min after the originally booked OS flight to BKK, however, the TK flight was delayed by 1h47 min which meant that the actual arrival time in BKK exceeded the original arrival time by more than 2 hours. Airhelp claimed that this made the pax entitled to 300 EUR for cancellation of the OS flight. OS denied this stating that TK was scheduled to arrive at BKK within 40min of original arrival time and OS was not liable for any delay of the TK flight (not a stupid argument IMO). This Q was not dealt with as the EC court found that the EC regulation was not applicable at all.

I agree and think a small claims lawsuit would be the fastest way to resolve this. Just sue all parties involved and let them figure it out.

A small claims court action in Beijjng against
LOT could also be an option.

Unless the OP is Chinese and knows how to navigate the Chinese court system, this is not advisable. The risk of non-transparent process and decision is far too high.

Both would definitely need to apply. And I’m willing to bet LOT would pay up rather quickly in this situation as the court would likely side with a Chinese national. The amount in dispute is small enough that LOT would probably not fight.

But I agree NYC is probably the better venue.