To ask what happens now my flight has been cancelled?

You know it’s nothing to do with serving drinks, right?

You do realise that cabin crew are not just waitresses in the sky, yes? That they train incredibly hard and have to go through lots of difficult procedures in case of any problems, yes?

They are not there to serve you drinks. They are there to save your life in an emergency.

OP are you there now? If so enjoy your holiday.

Did you actually apply for compensation? You have to provide evidence in the portal and my experience of jet2 is they paid my claim in 2 weeks.

I'm not fully convinced either, just a couple of points though.

OP had decision on compo within 3 hours clearly without the company’s lawyers considering it and personally knew that both pilots were ready to fly.

At at least some airlines reasons for cancellations and whether there is eligibility for comp is tagged on company systems within minutes of the axe falling, so a passenger can sometimes get a yes/no on comp very quickly.

Because of the confused messaging it was never clear to me whether the problem the OP had was a shortage of pilots, cabin crew or crew in general.

I agree we don't know the exact details of the ATC problem, but there were certainly ATC capacity issues across Europe for several days end of last week...(Eurocontrol were pushing out details in their routine tactical updates, visible to the general public via their Public Portal)

Likewise if the crewing issue is a hangover from earlier and it is decided that is the flight to go as opposed to others it may be judged an operational decision.

True.

FWIW and I guess for future info at a glance and from my reading of it, it looks like one of the changes in the rejigged version of EU261 due next year is that continuing disruption late in the day due mass disruption early in the day definitely won't trigger comp.

It looks like the law makers have finally accepted that the airlines can't do the impossible and so have maybe reduced the scope for arguments over this.

Whether any changes in EU 261 migrate into the UK version of 261, don't know.

Happened to us with Jet2. Told at check in on the way home that it was a smaller plane than it should have been so over booked.

We ended up paying to fly home with someone else as their solution was to fly us the next day to Gatwick instead of Manchester with no overnight accommodation provided where we were.

I gave up trying to get a refund from Jet2 and disputed through my credit card.

Eventually got the return part of the flight refunded.

No other compensation at all.

I’m not convinced by this thread at all. Just saying.

OP had decision on compo within 3 hours clearly without the company’s lawyers considering it and personally knew that both pilots were ready to fly.

The ATC argument isn’t clear cut. If they had been able to fly an hour later and decided not to that is an operational decision. Likewise if the crewing issue is a hangover from earlier and it is decided that is the flight to go as opposed to others it may be judged an operational decision.

So Air Traffic Control said you couldn't fly.

That's not the airlines responsibility. Its beyond the airline's control. Therefore they are not liable.

Its makes fuck all difference if multiple crews have walked past.

Your flight will have been allocated a particular time slot. If ATC have said that they will not allow flights to take off/land during that time, you could have the entire Easyjet staff at the airport on shift and the answer would still be no.

If there are restrictions on the hours of operation for the airport, they can't just extend them. They can't increase the number of take offs / landings to unsafe levels just to get flights in and out.

It sucks, but that's what travel insurance is for.

They may have a legal obligation to even if its a US airline under UK or EU legislation.

The key point is where the flight goes from and to.

The information below is only relevant to flights covered by UK law. To be covered, your flight must either:

• depart from an airport in the UK on any airline
• arrive at an airport in the UK on an EU or UK airline, or
• arrive at an airport in the EU on a UK airline

EU air passenger rights apply:

• If your flight is within the EU and is operated either by an EU or a non-EU airline
• If your flight arrives in the EU from outside the EU and is operated by an EU airline
• If your flight departs from the EU to a non-EU country operated by an EU or a non-EU airline
• If you have not already received benefits (compensation, re-routing, assistance from the airline) for flight related problems for this journey under the relevant law of a non-EU country.

Both are significant and important.

Where it gets even more complicated is with partner airlines. If you have departed on a flight from the UK and have a change in the US and the operator of the second flight is an American airline, you may still be covered as it was booked under UK legislation and the airline provides flights on behalf of a UK carrier (so you effectively have booked a flight with BA but part of it might be operated by a third party but your contract is still with BA not the US carrier - the key point is you have a single booking reference - it is counted as a single flight with a connection). In this situation, liability is with who you booked not the carrier itself.

The one to watch out for is flying with a Non-UK or EU airline for the RETURN flight. That's where you might get caught out as you aren't covered for this. You will be covered for the outbound but not the return. Unless its in your terms of the booking. This would be where you would use travel insurance.

There are also exceptions too - for 'extraordinary circumstances' beyond the control of the airline. These include:
Weather conditions incompatible with the safe operation of the flight,
air traffic control restrictions,
a manufacturer’s defect with the plane (where a recall has been made),
security risks
civil unrest
and airport strikes (but not airline strikes)

So you can be stuffed in these situations regardless anyway.

This is where you should think about your route / destination especially if you have a connecting flight. If you are planning to fly through an airport with a high cancellation rate due to weather or there's a high chance of civil unrest, you might want to think again. Deciding to go through or via somewhere at the height of hurricane / typhoon season, might not go so well. If there's an issue with civil unrest, then some airlines might over alternative options if the UK Foreign Office has issued an official warning. (Again this is where a UK or EU airline is probably better as they are more likely to offer this option).

You should also consider where you are connecting / flying over. For example: Air China offers much cheaper flights to Japan via China. But it flies over Russia. If for any reason a flight had to make an emergency landing whilst flying over Russia that could be problematic for ANY Brit in this situation. There are also warnings about even transiting through certain countries due to the enforcement of arbitrary local laws - even if you don't pass through passport control and the action happened in another country legally - eg social media posts. I know the UK government warn about this and Hong Kong is one of those places considered an issue currently with some companies advising that if passing through, you shouldn't take a phone with anything work related (eg apps or logins) and preferably just have a completely separate travel phone (device sanitation). It sounds crazy but it does matter.

The long and short of it, is you have more rights / are safer security wise across the board if you book flights with any UK or EU operator. They are also more likely to take responsibility for you in exceptional circumstances though this is not a given. This is also why non-uk/non-EU airlines are often cheaper for the same routes for long haul.

TBH I didn't know most of this until recently myself. Its not clear, its confusing and not well known.

What the hell are you taking about? How much drink do you think they sell on a very short hop over to France? Have you never left your mummy and daddy to go on holiday before? Cabin crew are not there just to be bar staff! They are there because you have several emergency exits across the plane and they will need a set number of crew to operate these exits and get people off. Do you think they cancel flights and had have to compensate people at cost because they were frightened that perhaps an extra drink might have been sold on that very short flight if they'd had an extra crew member!

If you had not sat stropping like a spoilt brat on mumsnet you could have probably found an alternative flight and got to France a lot quicker.

Do you think they just fly through thunderstorms and let flights be very dangerous and turbulent? If planes are hindered from getting to and from as per schedules then it of course impacts cabin staff being where they need to be and stretches the resource of standby crew! Maybe that standby crew member you are so angry about was on a delayed short flight to where you were and could not get there through nobody's fault.

Forget claiming for your Airbnb because the airline would see it as you could have booked onto a different flight with a different airline and got a refund to get to your Airbnb quicker, you chose to sit and take a late flight the following day rather than look to see what other airlines or airports could offer, France isn't hard to get to do the chances are you could found an alternative.

@LondonFlorals

That was a great post upthread but for the sake of other people's expectation management in the event of future delays I'd question the comment that:

They always hold multiple spare/support aircraft and crew available throughout the network but inevitably things do go wrong

Generally what spare aircraft the airline has, and at $50,000,000 is, plus/minus,for a shorthaul airliner it isn't many, are usually found at a company base, same with standby crews, not dotted around the network.

If an aircraft breaks or gets severely delayed at an outstation there's nothing spare tucked away around the back of the hangars - there's going to be a lengthy delay.

As you rightly say with fares as low as they are and companies maybe making £5 a head on the average passenger inventories and establishments are very very tight.

No I am genuinely serious. Cancelling a flight because they can’t make money off us by selling us drinks is abhorrent

It been a while since I’ve read anything as stupid as this.

When I had a flight cancelled (Westjet) I enquired about them providing food, hotel etc - they just gave me a nasty look and said “That’s what travel insurance is for”. Pricks.

I had an Easyjet flight cancelled from Paris to the UK on Thursday night (there were lots of cancellations - possibly due to the weather, I don't know). Their initial response was for me to deal with it all through the App then the check in staff member was amazing, booked me a hotel super quickly, rebooked the flight for the next day and advised me to claim for the taxi too and from the hotel, up to £20 for dinner and to submit it on line - I was amazed at how efficient and straightforward it was! I am sorry your experience wasn't as smooth.

I can imagine that should OP ever be on a plane that is falling out of the sky she will be penning an email of complaint to the airline that she hasn’t been allocated her own member of cabin crew to assist because there aren’t enough of them for one each.

You seem to not be accepting the responses people are providing you with here. Let me break this down for you and give you a bit more information, having worked close to the airline industry in the past

a) you are paying the airline to provide you a service (a flight. Not a holiday.). If they cannot deliver that service, they are responsible (thanks to EU legislation 261, which luckily still applies to flights from the UK into the EU, despite Brexit) for reimbursing you with all directly incurred costs (hotel and food covering the delay) and to either provide a refund or a reasonable alternative flight, which they have done. They are also required to provide you with a fixed level of compensation, depending on your original flight length (around £200 for most EU flights) if the delay or cancellation was due to a failure within their own operation, as this was. Compensation is not paid due to circumstances such as weather or strikes which are beyond their control. You are entitled to this ~£200 and you simply need to fill out a short form on their website. They are not responsible for your holiday, that is indeed what travel insurance is for and is a fact of international travel. If you missed a flight because your train was delayed to the airport, you would not expect the train company to pay for your holiday, you’d use insurance. These consumer protections are already much stronger than those elsewhere in the world, especially than the US where the airlines can bump you or cancel and don’t have to give you anything.

b) there is incredibly strict regulation about the number of staff required on a flight per passenger for health and safety reasons. If they could not fly because of a staff member being missing, they did not cancel your flight because they couldn’t ’make more money off you’ selling food and drink on board. It is to ensure there are enough staff to manage passengers in the event of an emergency. This would have been a regulatory necessity, not a commercial decision on the part of the airline if they were short a crew member.

c) airlines are incredibly complex operations. EasyJet has about 300 planes last I looked, each flying an average of 4-6 flights per day. There are thousands of staff. They need to interact with airports, air traffic control, baggage handling companies - multiple different stakeholders in the operation, across thousands and thousands of people. They always hold multiple spare/support aircraft and crew available throughout the network but inevitably things do go wrong. This is the nature of complex operations of this scale. EasyJet last I checked made about £5-10 profit per seat flown. This is not a question of cutting corners, but understanding that by flying - or indeed undertaking any kind of international travel - you do engage in some risk. (Hence travel insurance)

C) the reason we are able to fly abroad so easily nowadays is because of the low cost airline model which easyJet pioneered. It was not the norm 30 years ago. Most of us grew up camping in Dorset if we were lucky. Again, low cost airlines are not ‘out to get you’. They have democratised international travel.

OP, reading your posts and your reactions to responses you frankly come across as incredibly entitled. Have you not flown abroad much before? Delays and cancellations are a fact of travel. Some holidays don’t go to plan. Honestly, a 1 day delay, whilst annoying, isn’t going to ‘ruin’ your whole holiday. It sounds like you had a bit of bother which got sorted out and you are now safely booked on a flight the next morning. You’re not sleeping on an airport floor. You’re not stuck abroad in a disaster zone (others are right now). You are in fact still going on holiday (many cannot afford to do so)

Sounds like you’re absolutely fine to me.

Not true. Depends on the reason for the cancellation. Air traffic control restrictions, weather related events, volcanos erupting etc are classed as extraordinary events and no compensation is payable. Travel insurance covers out of pocket expenses.

My son had a flight cancelled by Easyjet a couple of years ago, thankfully within the UK. He used the app to book a flight for the next day and had to pay for a hotel.
Keep all receipts. He was easily able to claim back for the hotel on the website.

But cabin crew numbers aren’t based on how many are there to sell you drinks, they are based on how many are needed to help save lives in an emergency?!

Were there no flights from any airline going to Lisbon? That seems surprising

Similar predicament, flight was supposed to take us home, it was rerouted elsewhere. All in all an extra 43 hours, two extra hotel stays, only dirty clothing to wear and a weekend supposed to r&r before work under the bus. Airline seriously woeful lack of communication etc

They don't have to for US flights.