You're completely missing the point.

If you can claim the delay as overtime from your employer in exchange for the airline compensation, you can get more money for your time.

IF (delay in hours)*(overtime payment per hour) > (airline compensation) THEN (give airline comp to employer and pocket overtime pay instead)

Would you still insist on keeping the airline compensation if an alternative arrangement with your employer gets you more money than what EC261/04 gets you?

Is this an ethical question or non-issue?
 

But she didn't claim anything from her employer in respect of overtime!

To raise again two points made earlier...

1. I would like to see a single example of a company travel policy that specifically mentions EU261 in the context of an employer benefit, and

2. Let's put it a different way: you're on a business trip and you order a pizza for dinner. The pizza arrives late and is cold. The pizza place says 'sorry, another one is on its way.' Do you hand in the first pizza to your employer, do you take it back home with you and reheat it and reimburse your employer for some element of your daily allowance because you've received a 'benefit'? Or do you just eat the second, warm, pizza and life goes on?

Whether the OP claimed overtime or not doesn't matter, since this thread has turned into a general discussion on EU compensation on company time quite a few pages ago.

1. I don't know of any company that would pay you overtime for delays and let you keep the EC261/04 compensation too. Maybe some companies would, but most companies willing to pay overtime would make you choose between one or the other. If you find a company policy that lets you keep the EU compensation when they also compensate you by paying overtime for the delay, feel free to let me know.

2. Wrong example. A new pizza for a cold pizza is not the same as money for time.
Better example: the waiter spills the minestrone over your suit and gives you a check for the dry cleaners. You can either keep the check and have your old suit cleaned, or have your employer pay for a new suit. If your employer won't let you have both, the choice is obvious.

I'm pretty sure that some moderator is going to shut this down as the donkey is left with only its torso, but here goes...

I'm also pretty certain that any company that explicitly states that an employee must hand over any EU261 compensation received (which is explicitly for the inconvenienced passenger and not for the employer) will have its wrists slapped by some employment legislation.

But to your example, you are still going on about double dipping (and your minestrone example is the same). Put the specific legislation aside for a moment and I will agree with you; ethically you should not be double dipping, charging your employer for something where you have already received the 'make-good'. If your suit is dry cleaned by the restaurant you shouldn't ask the employer for any recompense.

I'll also agree with you that, if the airline put you on a later flight, and you arrived home two hours late, and you were compensated by the airline for this (in the form of a MCO or whatever), it would be double-dipping to bill your employer for overtime.

In practice, unless you operate on a time clock, I think this is not likely anyway. And the OP clearly didn't do this. My point is simply that an employer cannot unilaterally force or coerce you to hand over the compensation given under this legislation.

Since I threw out the first pizza (or handed it back to the delivery guy who brought the second), there's no benefit involved.

Now suppose along with the second pizza they provided a coupon for a free pizza at some future date. I don't think my employer is entitled to that, either, because it's to compensate me.

On the other hand, if they refund the charge for the pizza, then I'm not entitled to bill my employer for it. (If I'm on a per diem, rather than reimbursed expenses, then it doesn't matter even if I decide I'm not hungry and don't eat dinner at all.)

I think we can all agree on that.

Why would you throw out the pizza? You could keep it to cure the massive hangover you have from raiding the minibar.

I think this is the first time we've had a minestrone analogy used in one of these ethical-question threads.

I prefer bananas.

I've not read every page of this thread, but some time ago I posted a thread about a colleague of mine who got comped for a voluntary bump coming from Eastern US. He went out and spent the comp on a monumental night out, then came back to the office the following week and bragged about it. The money was taken out of his expense payment by the company as they had paid for the ticket so argued the comp was theirs.

Moral of the story is, take the comp yourself and keep it quiet. If the company finds out and demands it back based on travel policy then just hand it over and play dumb. Otherwise, it's yours.

I never said that an employer could unilaterally force you to hand over the compensation in exchange for nothing.

Any employer can unilaterally decide that you have to hand over the compensation if you want them to pay overtime for the hours you spent stranded at an airport. Of course you can wave EC261/04 at them and keep the airline money, but then your claim for overtime payment goes out of the window because your employer can rightfully claim that the airline already paid you for your time.

So my original argument still stands: the right answer to the "ethical" question is that you should weigh the value of the EU compensation (law) vs. the value of possible overtime pay (company policy), and then decide which one works out better for you.

Related question: A friend of mine on a business trip arrived at his hotel to find out they were sold out. He was walked to another hotel. The first hotel waived the first night's charges and gave him $200 cash. Should he turn the $200 over to his employer?

Nope.

Your friend can't claim hotel expenses for the two free nights, but the $200 is a compensation for personal inconvenience. Your friend can keep it, provided that he doesn't claim compensation from his employer for the same thing.

It would be different if the company already paid the room in advance and the hotel refunded the first two nights in cash. That cash obviously has to go back to the company that paid the room.

No, especially since (I know you didn't mention this) the reason he got $200 was his personal status at the chain.

Yes indeed, he's Diamond. I figured his approach of keeping the money was the right one.

This is how I look at it. If I take a VDB I operate under the assumption that any benefits and expenses that result are my responsibility. I'm not going to sign over the voucher to my employer. But neither am I going to put down any extra meals or hotel stays that result on my expense report. Never double dip. But also never feel obligated to give your employer something that belongs to you.

The only time that I'll expense stuff that results from a delay is if it is something out of my control like weather or mechanical issues.

Isn't it easier to say that we agree double dipping is not acceptable?