New rules for European travelers

Henry Williams / Saturday 9th January 2010

Passengers whose flights originate

in, or travel to the European Union,
and who experience long delays
are now able to claim the same
compensation as those whose
flights are completely canceled,
according to a ruling by the
European Court of Justice, in what
can only be described as a
landmark case.

Christine, one of our faithful

tipsters, filled us in:-

“My flight to Singapore from

London was severely delayed
recently, meaning we didn’t actually arrive at the other end until 18
hours after we were meant to. As I’m currently pregnant, this was an
altogether unpleasant experience.

As I was looking into my eligibility for compensation, I came across

the new European ruling. I’m going to drop Singapore Airlines an
email and see what they say.”

We’ve spent some time studying the new rules, and while the obvious
caveat that we are not lawyers applies, it does look very promising.

According to the ruling, barring extraordinary circumstances (e.g.

weather), people whose flights are delayed by more than 3 hours are
entitled to compensation of between €125 and €600. The judges
said:-

“Passengers whose flights are delayed may be treated, for the

purposes of the application of the right to compensation, as
passengers whose flights are cancelled and they may thus rely on the
right to compensation laid down in Article 7 of the regulation where
they suffer, on account of a flight delay, a loss of time equal to or in
excess of three hours, that is, where they reach their final destination
three hours or more after the arrival time originally scheduled by the
air carrier.”

Existing regulation allows for overnight accommodation and food for

long delays. The ruling is probably not going to make carriers flying to
and from the Europe too happy; a flight of 250 people could cost a
staggering $216,000, before even the hotel and food costs are
factored in.

We’ll let you know how Christine gets on.

Links:-

European Regulation FAQ

(http://ec.europa.eu/transport/passengers/air/doc/neb/questions_ans
wers.pdf_reg_2004_261.pdf)

European Court Judgment

(http://eur-
lex.europa.eu/LexUriServ/LexUriServ.do?uri=CELEX:62007J0402:E
N:HTML)