UK 261 Legislation Desperately Needs Reform ?

[Butts]

I think the time has come for the Government to revisit this successor to EU 261 and tighten it up considerably.
From my own personal experience over the last few days I have four British Airways Flights involving London City , Heathrow, Florence and Edinburgh with an aggregate delay time in excess of 6 Hours in total.
Rather than paying outlandish amounts for delays in excess of three hours they need to reduce the threshold to say an Hour (not dissimilar to Rail) and start paying compensation or refunding fares at this level.
A lot of the excuses they come up with are beyond the pale.


Admittedly there are always going to be extraordinary circumstances beyond the control of either the Airline or the Airport. If the Airport is responsible they should pay. If they can't handle the current frequency of flights they should be reduced to a level they can cope with.

Frustratingly the Airlines don't seem to care beyond meaningless platitudes. Even if they handed out a £10 Boots voucher to everyone as they got off it would be better than nothing ?

I have been on over 50 BA Flights this year and about half of them have been delayed by over 30 minutes

 

[AlterEgo]

I’m not aware of anywhere in the world that has an aviation regulatory regime akin to what you’re suggesting - no fault delay repay.

If it ever does happen flights are going to get a *lot* more expensive. I can’t see a government making short haul flying more attractive to customers in the current political climate.

Be very careful asking for a heavily regulated airline industry.

 

[Butts]

I’m not aware of anywhere in the world that has an aviation regulatory regime akin to what you’re suggesting - no fault delay repay.

If it ever does happen flights are going to get a *lot* more expensive. I can’t see a government making short haul flying more attractive to customers in the current political climate.

Be very careful asking for a heavily regulated airline industry.

That's not what I suggested as "Extraordinary Circumstances" would still preclude payment.

 

[island]

"Extraordinary circumstances which could not have been avoided by the taking of all reasonable precautions" are very narrow criteria.

I do think that the legislation is apt for review, but the main step I would take is making delay (as opposed to actual cancellation) compensation be a percentage of the ticket cost, rather than a flat sum.

 

[Tetchytyke]

I disagree, I think the system is about right. A delay of a couple of hours is (usually) irritating but nothing more, a magazine and an overpriced cup of coffee will fill that up. 30 minutes is neither here nor there in aviation, on a busy day at Heathrow the taxi to take off time can be half an hour.

Beware of unintended consequences, too. If airports pay for delays then ATC won't hold up on time flights to let a delayed flight take off.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 7 Dec 2022 ==

I do think that the legislation is apt for review, but the main step I would take is making delay (as opposed to actual cancellation) compensation be a percentage of the ticket cost, rather than a flat sum.

The law is as it is to prevent delay being a loophole. Your flight isn't cancelled, it's just delayed by 36 hours. Aye, right.

It's also a fixed sum because of the complexity of fares. What is "the ticket cost"? Does it include tax, fuel surcharges, airport handling fees, baggage charges, seat reservations? I'm flying later this month, £159 for three of us one way. The airport charges are £80, tax is £26, there's a "greenskies fee" of £4.50 and a fuel surcharge of £6. The actual "fare" is just under £40, and that's on an airline which includes hold baggage in the fare.

 

[Bletchleyite]

It's also a fixed sum because of the complexity of fares. What is "the ticket cost"? Does it include tax, fuel surcharges, airport handling fees, baggage charges, seat reservations? I'm flying later this month, £159 for three of us one way. The airport charges are £80, tax is £26, there's a "greenskies fee" of £4.50 and a fuel surcharge of £6. The actual "fare" is just under £40.

The total sum paid, presumably, just like Delay Repay.

With regard to the "no fault" getout, EU261 was designed to discourage airlines from overbooking, rather than to encourage them to consider flying when unsafe to do so to avoid big sums being paid.

 

[AlterEgo]

The total sum paid, presumably, just like Delay Repay.

Delay Repay doesn’t consider anything other than the fare. There’s no VAT or government surcharge on rail tickets and delay repay won’t consider the cost of your booking fee, for example.

Elsewhere the OP wants direct intervention on the airline market by central government which seems counterintuitive. Regulated airline industries are extraordinarily expensive.

The current system is about right except I agree with @island that the compensation should be related to the fare paid. Airlines might choose to settle outside this regime with frequent fliers for miles or other service recovery mechanisms.

 

[Tetchytyke]

The total sum paid, presumably, just like Delay Repay.

Delay Repay is based on the fare paid. This is often the same as the total sum paid, but not always (e.g. booking fees).

Because of the complexity of airline fees, the actual fare is often just a tiny amount of the total charge. My example was a full service airline, Loganair. With the likes of Wizz, Ryanair, or EasyJet, you can add seat reservation and baggage fees to the mix too.

 

[island]

EC261 already has compensation (for downgrades) payable as a percentage of the fare and that works perfectly fine.

 

[najaB]

The total sum paid, presumably, just like Delay Repay

The difference there was is that what you pay in train fares are just that: fares. Pretty much 100% of it goes onto the TOC's balance sheet as revenue.

Why should the airline have to fork out to cover the fees and taxes that will still be due if the passenger travels? They won't get any refund from the airport or government.

 

[Tetchytyke]

EC261 already has compensation (for downgrades) payable as a percentage of the fare and that works perfectly fine.

In that specific context it makes sense, though, as the various surcharges (APD excepted) are usually the same regardless of class. The fare is what gets you the bigger seat and the better whiskey.

The problem is that airlines lump baggage fees and seat reservations fees as auxiliary revenue, along with duty-free and catering- in their opinion, a hold bag is the same as buying a coffee on the plane, and you wouldn't get EU/UK261 on your coffee.

 

[neilmc]

The last two long haul holidays we've had out of the UK have both been subject to huge delays, the latest the carrier paid up without question but the previous one they tried to wriggle out of until we (and several others on the affected flight) contacted solicitors. So a 600 Euro compo was quite adequate for missing a day of a scheduled holiday, even taking into account the disruption with baggage and last minute hotels.

Once again of course it's a benefit we accrued by joining the EU, the UK government as it is now would never have countenanced such a deal.

 

[najaB]

The problem is that airlines lump baggage fees and seat reservations fees as auxiliary revenue, along with duty-free and catering- in their opinion, a hold bag is the same as buying a coffee on the plane, and you wouldn't get EU/UK261 on your coffee.

And I can see their point: your bag wasn't delayed any more than you were nor was your seat. As long as your bag arrives on the same flight you do and you get the seat you paid for they have delivered on that part of the contract.

 

[Tetchytyke]

And I can see their point: your bag wasn't delayed any more than you were nor was your seat. As long as your bag arrives on the same flight you do and you get the seat you paid for they have delivered on that part of the contract.

Not all airlines charge hold baggage fees, though. Of our three airlines here, EasyJet always does, Loganair never does, and Aer Lingus sometimes does, depending on whether you're connecting on to long haul in Dublin or not.

So if we're calculating fares for a refund, Easyjet's compensation will be lower because they include less in their fare, and charge more as "optional" extras.

I'm not convinced that's the way forward tbh.

I'm also not convinced by excluding airport fees- train and bus operators pay access fees but don't get to add these as extras to the fare.

 

[najaB]

So if we're calculating fares for a refund, Easyjet's compensation will be lower because they include less in their fare, and charge more as "optional" extras.

Perhaps a workaround is to offer the compensation on the options in the form of flight credit? It seems harsh on the airline to effectively penalise them twice for one failure to deliver.

 

[Tetchytyke]

It seems harsh on the airline to effectively penalise them twice for one failure to deliver.

Not really.

Loganair charge X. EasyJet charge X. But Loganair lump everything in together and charge X as a fare. EasyJet charge Y as a fare and Z for the bags, but X=Y+Z.

If anything, it's unfair on full service airlines to exempt "optional extras" like hold bags and cabin bags from any compensation.

I think the current flat rate is the best solution, given the complexity of airfares.

 

[Mojo]

The difference there was is that what you pay in train fares are just that: fares. Pretty much 100% of it goes onto the TOC's balance sheet as revenue.

Why should the airline have to fork out to cover the fees and taxes that will still be due if the passenger travels? They won't get any refund from the airport or government.

Although on the other hand whilst I (obviously) wasn’t complaining, it was a bit rediculous recently when I got £220 compensation from WizzAir for a flight when the ticket cost me less than £15.

Having said that I wouldn’t have been impressed with just getting £15 back as instead of an £8 train fare home I missed the last train from London so had to shell out for a taxi in addition to the train.