Will Young on compensation for flight delays – Blanche v EasyJet

Will Young discusses the impact of important new guidance provided recently by the Court of Appeal, in Blanche v EasyJet [2019] EWCA Civ 69.

The guidance centres on circumstances in which airlines will be able to avoid paying compensation to passengers whose flights have been delayed as a result of air traffic control decisions.

The Claimant was booked onto a flight travelling from Brussels to London Gatwick on 10 October 2014, however the flight was delayed by five hours and 42 minutes in total.

Delays had been caused by a series of thunderstorms that afternoon with the result that Air Traffic Control (“ATC”) at Gatwick had suspended all eastbound flights. The aircraft, which had been scheduled to fly from London to Brussels at 16:10, had been delayed, meaning that it did not depart for Brussels until 21:40, and hence that it was not there in time to fly the Claimant to Gatwick at 17:45.

The Claimant issued proceedings claiming compensation for the delay to the flight under Regulation (EC) No. 261/2004 which provides, in Regulation 5, that in the case of a cancelled flight (N.B. passengers subjected to a delay of more than three hours are also entitled to compensation under the regulation, under previous CJEU case-law), passengers have a right to compensation unless the airline can rely on the defence in Regulation 5(3)…

Please click here to find out more.

For further articles by Will Young, click the link for his article on time extensions limitations and the Athens Convention in the March edition of APIL’s P.I. Focus.

Legal Blogs 19 Feb, 2019