By Maria Savva
A FEW THOUGHTS that might go through your head when thinking about your summer holiday this year may include beaches, relaxation or sightseeing. They might also include flight delays, cancellations, overbooking and lost luggage that could spoil any holiday, and which most people just take lying down as they are herded from one place to another under the guise of ‘air travel’.
Although it’s a small comfort for having missed your connecting flight or sleeping rough in an airport overnight, there is a mechanism to at least make the airlines pay for your discomfort.
Most people however, when asked what they think they’re entitled to usually think compensation extends to a drink and a sandwich and in extreme cases a paid night in a hotel.
In fact, you can be entitled to monetary compensation, but even if the inconvenienced traveller knows about it they must be prepared to deal with a maze of bureaucracy. To receive compensation one must first file an Air Passenger Rights EU Complaint Form, which is seven pages long, with an airline and/or a national enforcement body. And that’s just the beginning.
What people are not aware of is that there is help out there – those who will navigate that maze of bureaucracy for you… for a share of the spoils. Compensation may not amount to more than a couple of hundred euros in the end, but the more people that succeed, the more airlines will be forced to think twice before inconveniencing passengers.
In the International Air Transport Association (IATA) Annual Review 2014 it states that the EU’s 2004 regulation on passenger rights creates an estimated $4 billion in potential liability for airlines every year.
This regulation entails that if your flight is delayed by five or more hours, you are entitled to a refund. If denied boarding, or if your flight is cancelled or if it arrives more than three hours late to your final destination you are entitled to a compensation based on the distance of the flight and whether you are travelling within the EU or between an EU and non-EU airport.
Compensation ranges from €250 up to €600 depending on the distance to your destination.
Companies such as ‘AirHelp’ and ‘Green Claim’ can determine whether a person is eligible for compensation and assist with filing claims.
These companies help thousands of people file claims each year.
Tom van Bokhoven, co-founder of ‘Green Claim’, explains the process of figuring out if you are eligible to make a claim.
“Flight data is collected from flights all over the world. Furthermore, we collect weather data, court rulings and information from airlines and passengers. These sources combined make us able to make a good assessment.
Passengers only have to fill in their flight details and date of flight, answer a few questions and within seconds we are able to tell if a claim is eligible. After the claim is filed we will do an extra manual check,” he said.
According to Chrystel Erotokritou, a Cyprus official at ‘AirHelp’: “Filing a report takes passengers only a few minutes. On average it takes about two months to receive compensation.”
‘AirHelp’ keeps 25 per cent of the compensation, including VAT but charges nothing if the claim is rejected.
“AirHelp wants to close the gap between what legislation said people were owed and the ability for passengers to actually collect that money. They set out to streamline the process using data they collected,” she added. Since it launched in May 2013, AirHelp has helped about 45,000 passengers, it said.
There is also help available locally at the European Consumer Centre Cyprus’ (ECC Cyprus) at the ministry of commerce, industry, tourism and energy. According to its 2013 annual report the transport sector is the number one source of cross-border complaints, accounting for 28 per cent of the total.
According to its website, an example of a successful compensation story involved a Cypriot traveller who was flying from Larnaca to Sofia with his wife and baby. On arrival at the airport, they were informed that their flight would be delayed and they were not allowed to check in and were told that they had to do so in the morning. As a result they missed their flight. The couple had contacted the airline but had no success. After the intervention of ECC Cyprus and ECC Bulgaria, the consumer was fully compensated and was also offered a 50 per cent discount on a future flight, the ECC said.
ECC Cyprus: http://www.ecccyprus.org/index.php/en/ Tel 22867167
AirHelp: http://www.getairhelp.com/
EU Passenger Rights: http://europa.eu/youreurope/citizens/travel/passenger-rights/air/index_en.htm
