[shaun the sheep]

My understanding is that he is not entitled to financial compensation using EU 261 or UK equiv as flight cancelled more than 2 weeks in advance.

BUT he is entitled to be rerouted by BA to get him home if he has already made his outbound journey.
Try BA again

[Fair2380]

Daniel,

Let’s keep a little perspective here. BA have not ‘stranded’ a British student overseas – as you point out there are plenty of other options for him to rebook. Given that a month’s notice was given and a full refund offered, you have no claim under EU261. Arguably, they could be praised for not waiting until the last allowable moment pre-261 (so 2 weeks before dep) to inform your son and offer the refund.

As someone who lives in Dubai, I have been the victim of sudden changes to flight schedules due to both operational reasons and fresh government regulations. On every occasion , I’ve found both BA and EK to be very accommodating but – without exception – would always try to rebook me before refunding. The only case where the refund has been automatic was last week given that flights between the UAE and UK are banned. I am therefore pretty certain that if BA could offer a rebooking, they would.

The FCO has always been quite clear in its advise to British citizens overseas – you should try to get home and stay home, else you risk severe inconvenience. It’s the price we pay for choosing to live as we do. But no one can say they haven’t been warned.

With so many flights operating between TLV and LHR, might I suggest you just book one of those.

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Bullfrog

[ASK1945]

[quote quote=1093030]Let’s keep a little perspective here. BA have not ‘stranded’ a British student overseas – as you point out there are plenty of other options for him to rebook.[/quote]

Fair2380 – you talk of “perspective”. So, please explain what part of the regulations which BA is obliged to follow, discussed and explained in depth earlier, do you believe is wrong? “Fairness” is following the rules.

My own experience of BA in the last year has also been positive – but that is irrelevant to the OP’s personal experience.

[SimonS1]

[quote quote=1093030]Given that a month’s notice was given and a full refund offered, you have no claim under EU261…..

I am therefore pretty certain that if BA could offer a rebooking, they would…..

The FCO has always been quite clear in its advise to British citizens overseas – you should try to get home and stay home,[/quote]

All the above are totally incorrect.

First EC261 applies in all aspects except cash compensation. The traveller was fully entitled to rebooking.

Second BA clearly could have offered a rebooking as other airlines were/are running flights. They have no defence under EC261 if they decide not to.

Third there has never been any such advice. Guidance at the start of the pandemic (March 2020) was given to tourists and short stay travellers. There is and never has been any advice for people living, working, studying etc abroad [the traveller her was studying] to return home and to this day the advice on FCO website is to “follow the advice of local authorities where you are”.

Strange also that EK have been rebooking Dubai-UK travellers to Dublin and Frankfurt to connect, but BA couldn’t rebook people via Qatar (OneWorld partner). In fact there are several alternative routes to UK (Doha, Bahrain etc) so even there BA argument would not stack up in court.

Honestly I do wonder why people try to give advice when they don’t have a scooby what they are talking about. If the OP had followed guidance from posters in this thread it would have been thoroughly bad advice.

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Frederic

[ASK1945]

By an amazing coincidence, as I was reading SimonS1’s last response, an email came in from BA cancelling our own return flights from TLV to LHR in mid-April. They offered a day earlier, or later, on the same flight number. I accepted a day earlier – although I don’t believe that we will be able to go anyway, because of governmental restrictions.

My own experience with BA remains positive, which makes their intransigence for the instigator of this thread both odd and seemingly wrong.

[Fair2380]

1. I would personally disagree on EC261 as a cash refund has been offered and more than reasonable notice has been given. I would also argue that this comfortably counts as ‘exceptional circumstances’. The text is open to interpretation on this point and compensation is certainly discounted. Given that my legal career has been almost entirely focused on financial services since I left law school, I will bow to your clearly superior legal training on this point.

2. Can only speak of my own experience with EK last week and they offered a refund rather than a rebooking option. I must concede I didn’t peruse the latter as I have no intention of staying in a hotel for 10 days. Again, you might be better informed than me.

3. Finally, on the FCO advice, you conveniently leave out the very next sentence ‘some other countries have closed borders, and may further restrict movement or bring in new rules including testing requirements with little warning’. Nice to provide full context 😉

[SimonS1]

[postquote quote=1093068]

It doesn’t require superior legal knowledge, just a basic ability to read the guidance notes issued by EC affixed above or the CAA website. Or you could head over to BA Flyertalk forum where there is a dedicated thread with dozens of case studies.

Re your experience with EK, well that’s great but nothing to do with the question the poster asked.

Re FCO advice….the addition doesn’t really add much so why don’t you just direct us to the place where we can see the Government’s advice to citizens abroad to “get home and stay home?”. Like you I have residency in Dubai and have never seen that. Nor do I see many Brits following it.

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Frederic

[ASK1945]

I agree with SimonS1. Your legal experience is not relevant here.

The OP was not looking (initally) for compensation. His son just wanted to get home. Most of what you wrote a short while ago was totally irrelevant to this issue.

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Bullfrog, Frederic

[FormerBA]

I do not believe that some of the replies are correct.

BA have a duty of care and while they cannot magically open TLV airport, they can and must rebook the passenger once the airport does reopen. This will include re routing on other carriers including non one world.

I’d love to see how they plan to price out the refund on what, on the face of it, seems like a economy class fare. If they use historical fares for the one way LHR – TLV it is unlikely there would be a refund at all.

I think you need to keep at it and one the airport does reopen then your son should present himself at the airport. Airport staff tend to be much more switched on about re routing than those in call centres on other continents.

[rferguson]

My advice would be this – query the legality of BA’s response that they cannot book you on an alternative carrier with one of the free consumer services online like Citizens Advice Bureau. They were brilliant at giving me advice on getting a refund from a Travel Agent recently and the reply was relatively quick.

If you are 100% confident that they MUST re-route you ON THE SAME DATE as your original booking and you are desperate to get your son home I would again contact BA via email instead of phone so you have an e-paper trail of their reply. If they refuse in black and white, then if it was me, I would book a ticket myself on another carrier and put a claim forward to BA for the cost. If they refuse, Small Claims court. I used the small claims court for my travel agent refund and it was a very easy process online. But you need the evidence (emails, replies etc). My claim cost me £185 to lodge as it was for £3.5k but it works on a sliding scale so a claim for £300 is £25, £300-£500 is £35 etc etc.

I’m unsure of why there is inconsistency on the point of re-routing. I’ve read reports online of people that got caught out when the UK banned flights from DXB and BA re-routed pax back to the UK via FRA/ZRH (including those travelling C and F whilst on AVIOS redemption tickets). So, i’m unsure why they are not in your case unless there is some legal loophole that they are taking advantage of.

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ASK1945

[SimonS1]

[postquote quote=1093168]

Indeed, or you can head to the arbitration service CEDR. It’s free (BA pays).

If insisting on re-routing same day, you would need to work hard to make a case. However if other airlines were still flying and the best BA could do was say 3 days later then the argument would be much stronger.

Re Dubai, well a member of my family works in Customer Services at BA, I know for a fact that when flights from Dubai – London were pulled staff were briefed to offer either a refund or rerouting via Frankfurt (Lufthansa) or Swiss (Zurich). EK is generally offering Dublin with a connection to Aer Lingus. So BA knows the score as well.

Remember under Article 14 of EC261 any airline cancelling a flight is required to give passengers a written notification of their rights under EC261 together with contact details of the CAA. So if the traveller didn’t receive these, that also should form part of the case filed.

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ASK1945

[TimFitzgeraldTC]

BA are due to resume flying on 28th March to TLV – so if all other avenues fail then BA are obliged to rebook that for free if you cannot get another means back.

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Bullfrog

[ASK1945]

[quote quote=1093034]My own experience of BA in the last year has also been positive – but that is irrelevant to the OP’s personal experience.[/quote]

A week ago I responded in this thread with the above statement. Unfortunately, I no longer feel the same way.

Following the goverment’s announcement about continued banning of international travel, earlier this week, I attempted to postpone the flights I have booked to/from TLV in early April, as even if they are going, we will be unable to travel. They were booked last October, using Avios in Club World. The online change facility would not work for Club World replacement flights at a later date, nor was a facility to change the class to Premiun Econ.

I spent hours trying to get through to BA by phone the last two days, using the dedicated Bronze line and any other relevant one – without getting through. I tried the general line this morning at 0615 GMT and was put through without any delay.

It seems that the tickets I booked were in a seat sale and we have to complete all travel before June 30th. It’s our problem that there aren’t actually any premium Avios seats for sale before then (which I knew and understand), except during the period when we know international travel will not be permitted. If we cancel to get back my money paid (for so-called taxes) it will cost us £70. Their policy is not to extend the period of the tickets such that we can fly using the tickets in July, when some seats are available, despite our request to move them to then being from circumstances out of our control.

I am not looking for advice from the Forum. I just wanted to withdraw my earlier statement and give my reasons.

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SimonS1

[RoyJones]

I cancelled my 8th April flight to Orlando on 15th February. My Avois have been recredited and the fees etc. were credited to my credit card account on 22nd February. In fact this is much better than others incl. Lufthansa and Air Malta Well done BA, they’re not that hopeless.

[SimonS1]

To keep some balance, of course the vast majority of air trips pass without incident. However it is also worth bearing in mind that if airlines had treated people fairly to start with there would have been no need for regulation like EC261. Also if airlines did what was required under EC261 there would have been no need for ADR schemes to enforce the regulation (typically around 65-70% of cases go in the consumer’s favour).

In Q4 2019 there were 1150 complaints about BA at CEDR which is not insignificant (bearing in mind one of the issues is airlines don’t meet their obligations to make customers aware of their rights) but nonetheless a small percentage of overall journeys.

[Author]

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