lincolnjkc

For clarity, I believe you mean either "non-EU carrier departing from a non-EU station" or a "US carrier departing from a non-EU station" -- but either way, yes. EU 261 is only a 100% magic pill if you're on a EU carrier; otherwise it's the 50% magic pill: you can get its benefits leaving the EU but not arriving.

mduell

Thanks, fixed.

aacharya

I had an almost identical dilemma when EWR-IAD delays meant I'd miss IAD-BRU. Booked on to the nonstop. UA, to its credit, got bags on a late flight IAD-FRA, then FRA-BRU. Bags arrived 4 pm in Brussels airport - 8 hours later than I did, but still same day.

MSPeconomist

Even on EU carriers, there can be exceptions if the route doesn't touch the EU. For instance, there's a KLM flight between DPS and SIN and an AF flight between EZE and MVD.

PTahCha

As others had pointed out, this is simply not true. UA does re-route passengers onto other airlines in case of non-weather IRROP or potential misconnections. One of the issues in the past is that SHARES makes it difficult for agents to look up non-*A alternatives and confirm availability. Not sure if this has been resolved, but if you have the specific flights in mind, the agents are willing to look it up. On OAL, they will only rebook you in the booked cabin, not upgraded cabin supported by instruments/miles/CPU.

spin88

The problem is that if you don't appropriately balance the customer service aspects then you end up losing future revenue from those who are messed over. United has seen a lot of this which is why it has been a revenue metric (PRASM/TRASM) laggard, earning about 1/2 of what it would have, had it retained its former revenue premium.

My guess - like yours - is that OP's friend went EWR-IAD-LHR because it was a lot cheaper than EWR-LHR options (including JFK-LHR options, if that is a workable airport too). I get that what are probably discount travelers will get the short end of the stick, and my guess is that UA will make them stick to UA metal. Evidently that is what happened. I do think when - as here - its clearly an airline issue (lack of crew in EWR) then the airline should go above and beyond not to delay people by 10+ hours. I also think legislation like EC261 is needed in the US.

StuMcIlwain

YOW agents routinely reroute people on AC during weather and ATC delays, even people without status, and they are very proactive.

As a 1K, I've called in twice this year during weather delays and had the agents offer to rebook me on AA (once) and AC (once) without me asking. It does happen if it is a reasonable option.

JimInOhio

Here's a good story:

Long ago my boss and I were headed to a meeting in the UK. We had the daytime flight to Heathrow in J on BA out of JFK. We both started on a puddle-jumper early that morning from PHL. It turns out he was on one airline while I was on another... on a morning it was snowing. The result is I made the connection that morning at JFK while he didn't. So I land in Heathrow that evening and find my boss standing outside customs. He beat me by about 10 minutes.
The rest of the story is the BA folks at JFK told him what time they could get him there the next morning to which he replied that he'd miss the meeting. At that point they said the Concorde leaves at 1 PM and we'll get you a seat on it.

Often1

EC 261/2004 is available in the US. It's called travel insurance.

Rather than forcing everyone to pay the cost of what amounts to travel insurance as part of their ticket, the world outside of the EU and Israel, leaves it to the passenger.

The purpose of the Regulation was to make it in the carriers' financial interest to operate on schedule. But, here we are in 2019, and there is not even a remote suggestion that EU carriers operate at a better ontime rate or that flights covered by the Regulation operate at such a rate either.

moondog

While there are certain aspects of EC 261 that I find flawed (e.g. duty of care during weather related delays is a bit over the top), IMO it's a better approach than travel insurance because it provides financial motives to airlines to properly maintain their airplanes, and put passengers first when things go south.

jsloan

No it doesn't. It provides financial motives for airlines to ignore maintenance issues in favor of getting the flight out on time, It further provides motives for them to pad their schedules unreasonably, increase minimum connection times beyond what some people would otherwise be willing to risk, etc.

I'm not saying that carriers actually make these trade-offs, but it's unquestionably what the actual financial motivations are.

moondog

I'm also not able to opine on this point in a knowledgeable manner, and it's possible, if not likely, that EC 261 misses the mark, but I do like the idea of at least attempting to incentivize airlines to deliver services as promised. Furthermore, it's safe to say that passengers self insuring does not accomplish this at all.

MSPeconomist

One problem I have with EC261 is that in delays it gives carriers a disincentive to follow FIFO (first in first out) procedures. Once someone is eligible for the maximum EC261 delay compensation, there's no incentive to prioritize finding a seat for that customer. Instead, carriers should give available seats to those who can still arrive early enough so as not to receive the (maximum) delay compensation. I'm not sure this is fair.

More importantly, downgrade reimbursement/compensation is 75% of the applicable fare paid (on longer flights) for any/all involuntary downgrades, so carriers *should* under such rules give a FC passenger a coach seat rather than sending the FC passenger to business class, a business class passenger to premium economy, and a premium economy back to coach. In addition, there's an incentive to pick the person with the cheapest ticket (including award tickets) to downgrade first, independent of FF status or HVC recognition at that airline. In addition, if instead of a downgrade a passenger wants to wait for a flight with space available in the purchased cabin class, there's no right to do so and no right to any compensation or reimbursement for the resulting delay.

cjermain

As with many things and UA, your milage may vary.

Sometimes on threads like this where re-bookings are discussed, posters say "UA policy is..." and then make some claim that UA's policy is to rebook only on UA metal, or only on codeshares, or only on *A, or that policy is to book on any available flight, or that different of these apply in different settings (weather? mechanical? domestic/international?). As another poster said upthread: such "policy" claims are usually based off of some personal experience that is extrapolated to a policy.

Don't believe any of it! There is no policy. Or, if there is, it is not widely followed. The "policy" such as it is, is whatever the UA agent you are speaking to is willing to do.

There are certainly typical responses to various things you'll ask for---you might need to talk to half a dozen agents before one is willing to put you on a non-*A flight to Europe---but you are liable to get any and every possible "policy" if you shop different agents.

As always: if you don't like the response you get the first time, say "thank you" (so you don't get a notation in your record) and then hang up and call again.

sinoflyer

I actually would venture to say that non-status pax regularly get compensated to J during irrops. Just anecdotal and not scientific, but over the last five years, on UA and AA, I can count three instances where my seatmate or the person across the aisle was originally a Y pax (and presumably non-status) who missed their flight from the day before or were inconvenienced some other way by the airline. And those instances don't include possibly others whom I never spoke with, or who weren't so excited about being in J that they couldn't contain themselves from announcing it to the world.