(27/02/2015) Airlines put under more pressure to compensate delayed customers
A Liverpool County Court judge has ruled that budget Airline Jet2.com can no longer put off payment of compensation for delayed flights.
Jet2 had maintained that it was holding off paying out compensation for delayed flights while it waited for the outcome of a case in the Netherlands (Van Der Lans v KLM). But the judge shrugged this off, saying that “a line should now be drawn. Justice delayed is justice denied”.
The EU had already effectively ordered Jet2 and the rest of the industry to pay up for delays caused by technical faults back in October
.
But Jet2, FlyBe, Ryanair, Thomas Cook and WizzAir have officially asked to delay these payments, arguing that compensation for delays of three hours or more is too expensive for them to reasonably bear.
The latest case involves Kim Allen, who has been claiming £292 pounds for a delayed flight from Manchester to Malaga back in 2012.
If you have a case like Kim’s, get the airlines to hear your issue by raising your case via Resolver. It’s free, simple and effective.
Whether or not the airlines actually respond to this issue is of course a different matter.
The original EU regulations, brought in in 2004, ought to oblige airlines to pay up for flights that are delayed or cancelled for anything other than ‘extraordinary circumstances’. This was reaffirmed in 2009 by the European Court of Justice.
Given this history, some airlines are unlikely to capitulate without a fight, but the fact is that the pressure is on the industry like never before.