[Gin&Tonic]

Ryan Air have now backed down. In EU law they had no choice

[Potakas]

So can someone explain to me something at FaroFlyer’s situation,

As he tell us he booked with BA for Monday, is it correct to assume that BA had to sleep him at hotel until BA is able to get him home?

Or maybe he can tell us, if he took his money back, then BA has done with him.

This is maybe off topic but i had a similar case last January when London’s airports have been closed because of the weather, BA gave me a 10 pound coupon for food and then i choose to use their bus for free to go to Edinburgh, after one month they send back to my visa full refund of the airticket,

Conclusion? I went to Edinburgh for free (ok bus is by far the worst senario), i took a 10 pound coupon and a full refund.

[Age_of_Reason]

The volcanic event was ‘predictable’ in that it was known that it would happen, it just is not known when, or (as ypu point out) for what duration. The Mt St Helens eruption also caused a massive dust cloud with significant short and long-term environmental impact, so eruption is not unforeseeable. Probably more predictable than strike action, in some ways.
Insurers are expert at assessing risk – they call it actuarial assessment, well known for Life Insurance – in which a predictable event (death is a certainty – we just don’t know when, and only believers in god claim they don’t know the duration) is quantified, costed and insurance premiums offered competitively. So what’s the difference for the very profitable travel insurance business?

[Binman62]

I must say as a recipient of BA’s “Duty of Care” I think that, for once, the EU has got this right. Insurance has its limitations, even Amex Platinum.
When the law was drafted it did not consider such an eventuality as now being experienced and in these circumstances only governments have the resources and ability to protect its citizens. However, the means of doing this is via the airline and so I say that airlines should be required to provide this level of care but that they should be compensated by government for doing so. In this way passengers are protected and airlines are not exposed to unlimited liability of unprecedented events. I was in the US and “fox network news” at one point called those stranded “refugees” it was nonsense of course, but had events (and ash clouds ) taken a different course then we very well could have been, and many would have been left in penury.
If you try to change the current EU rules you will simply provide carriers with wriggle room. Leave this legislation alone, it focuses the minds of carriers to provide the service they have contracted to offer and stops the unscrupulous actions of some. It also provides valuable protection to passengers in the event of calamity. After all we pay enough in taxes.

[Age_of_Reason]

I disagree strongly with You, Binman, and sense that you are driven by self-interest, not logic or reason. The source of insurance is irrelevant – only he wealthy would be using AmEx Platinum and I dispute that any AmeEx Pt member would be subject to ‘penury’ by a week’s enforced holiday in an airport.
The Carriers’ responsibility is to convey passengers safely. If that cannot be achieved, they are entitled to admit defeat and passengers should use their personal resources. The prudent will have taken insurance. The rest pay cash.

[FaroFlyer]

A couple of replies:- Potokas, my BA flights were fully flexible booked in BA Miles. BA did not “look after me” as I didn’t go to Gatwick just to get a “free” hotel. I am fortunate that I have a base in the Midlands. My complaint about BA is that I still have not heard anything from BA about the second and third cancelled flights. I did get a text message for the first, but no suggestions about automatic re-booking, other than a useless phone number. I do not seek compensation, just courtesy.

I also disagree with Binman62 that Governments should compensate, other than as a payment out of the APD fund. It would be wrong for all taxpayers to have to pick up the bill for travellers. The cost should be borne by airlines who should insure against the risk, maybe as a Government backed policy. Naturally the travelling public would pay, which is reasonable.

I actually also disagree with Age-of-Reason that Amex Platinum card holders are all wealthy. I am a holder, but not wealthy. I pay the €550 because it includes very good travel insurance and also fully expensed Priority Pass for my wife & I, worth £15 a visit. I also wonder why Age-of-Reason assumes that everybody stranded was on holiday? I certainly was not.

[Age_of_Reason]

faroflyer – why do you misquote me?
I do not assume you are on holiday…. I merely say that in all events there are unforeseen outcomes, not always negative, and if on business (or pleasure)…. (in Faro – why go there?.) then an enforced holiday is not necessarily bad. Enjoy the ride and ride your luck. Or insure. Or work online

[MarkCymru]

Surely the point is that Ryanair have, yet again, shown they are willing to ignore the law when it suits them and if they think they can get away with it. If the law is wrong, you campaign to change it; you don’t unilaterally ignore it. Which other laws do they ignore until someone threatens to prosecute them? Aircraft safety laws? Well, if they disagree with them, why not? What was it that O’Leary said? Passengers should be willing to take reasonable risks. Personally, I’d rather fly with an airline that abides by the rules — even rules it thinks are unnecessary or too strict.

[Age_of_Reason]

O’Leary is right, but he is not referring to law-breaking or safety breaches. To fly is to take a chance – risk is just the probability. To my memory, BA and AF have each crashed more planes than Ryan.

[CharlieBrown]

Here’s one viewpoint on the matter from The Telegraph:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/newsbysector/transport/7626470/Iceland-volcano-Governments-not-airlines-should-be-picking-up-the-compensation-bill.html

I think there are two debates here. 1) Whether airlines are following/breaking EU law (or trying desperately to reinterpret its meaning) and 2) whether the law (in particular EU261) is fair in the first place.

[PaulJennings]

The EU regulations does not provide any time or monetary limit on airlines’ responsibility and there is no ambiguity in the wording. So the airlines can either (1) accept it, (2) choose not to fly to / from the EU or (3) try to get the rule changed. But any rule change would not be retrospective. If the airlines have mispriced the risk then that is their problem. They have only themselves to blame and only their shareholders to turn to. It seems obvious to me that the cheapest short-haul airfares are unrealistically and unsustainably priced and a change is overdue.

[TominScotland]

The Ryanair issue is one that appears to have solved itself in that the airline now claims to have sorted its passenger backlog – not so problematic with short-haul, I agree.

BA, however. do not appear to be covering themselves in glory in the manner that they are going about sorting out the mess on their patch
(http://scotlandonsunday.scotsman.com/uk/British-Airways-bow-to-critics.6251835.jp). To blaim a computer system for selling seats that they don’t want to be on the market is absurd – surely thay have a proper over-ride in place? WW was quick to grab the headlines by participating in the ash test flight but has been markedly quiet over the past few days…….

Maybe that is a good thing because, at the same time, I am not sure that the bold Sir Richard did much to instill confidence in VS for the future by saying that, had they been allowed, VS would have flown throughout the crisis because their “engineers and pilots” considered it safe – easy to say AFTER the event! Notwithstanding all the issues here, I think that in unknown territory such as this, caution always has to prevail – as I have said before on this Forum, who would want to be the one who made the call to send up a plane which subsequently got into difficulties?

[Binman62]

The point surely is, that when there is mass disruption on this level which is due to a natural disaster or acts of terror ( this is the biggest event of its kind since 9/11) then only governmentst have the resources to provide aid. You cannot insure against such a risk. This was not limited to the UK but affected much of Europe. Are we suggesting that the “first world” simply turns it back of hundreds of thousands, potentially millions of it’s citizens and leave them as refugees in countless countries around the world? I thought we were civiliised. Such an abdication of responsibilty would have very serious long term affects both on those directly affected and then on national/global economies.
This was not some snow disruption, or ATC computer failure for which adequate insurance would have provided some help. Airlines should not have to take on the burden of these costs but they are best placed to act as a tool for national governments to provide assistance to their citizens in the event of catastrophy such as this.
There is no need to change the law but there is a need to make clear that governments will cover the costs incurred by the airlines.
There is such a thing as society and if governments can bail out banks they can sure as hell look after their citizens in extraordinary times.

[VintageKrug]

its = possessive

it’s = it is

[VintageKrug]

Agree entirely Binman62. Of course, it is we taxpayers who foot the bill ultimately, and assuming so £250million of disruption caused in the UK alone, that’s a fair bit of compensation.

You could equate it to every taxpaying UK resident giving £5 to people who happened to be abroad at the time….

[Author]

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