Delayed air passengers must be compensated
Abi BrayEuropean judges ruled today that passengers who experience extensive airline delays should be compensated in the same manner that are people whose flights are cancelled,.
According to them, a “long” delay translates into a traveller being delivered three hours or more than the scheduled time to his or her destination.
Unless the delay occurred because of extraordinary circumstances, commercial passenger carriers would then be forced to compensate the passengers in the same capacity as for cancelled flights.
In Luxembourg, the European Court of Justice ruled that a compensation is currently offered to passengers whose flight was cancelled, despite being re-routed through another flight if three or more hours occured in relation to the promised duration.
The judges added that there were no differences between the two situations, unless the carrier can demonstrate that extraordinary and unavoidable circumstances caused the delay after having tried to take reasonable steps to correct the incident.
The ruling did not equate an extraordinary circumstance with a technical problem in an airliner, unless the issue was caused by events which are beyond its control and by origin and nature are not related to the regular operations.
The judges’ decision came in as a five-year-old EU regulation was clarified. The ruling orders airlines to compensate with a flat-rate ranging from 250 Euros to 600 Euros (£223 to £535) for cancelled scheduled flights, although they did not indicate whether these specific rates applied for the delayed flights.
This European Court of Justice ruling regarded cases in German and Austrian courts where passengers demanded compensation after experienced delays – but not cancellations – of 25 and 22 hours respectively.
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Filed under Business & Finance, Europe News, Travel News