Compensation claims flood in after landmark ruling over flight delays

Law firms are being inundated with enquiries from air passengers who are seeking compensation for delays caused by technical faults following a landmark ruling yesterday.

A Court of Appeal judgement yesterday means airlines may no longer be able to use technical faults as a blanket excuse to avoid compensating passengers for flight delays.

The ruling opens the floodgate to thousands of claims from passengers who have been refused compensation by airlines for delays caused by mechanical breakdowns.

Jet2, the airline involved in the case, said immediately that it will take the matter to the Supreme Court "to seek clarity and consistency".

It has 28 days to lodge an appeal to the Supreme Court and then it could be several months before a decision on whether to grant the appeal is made.

"We’re hugely disappointed that they are trying to prolong this matter," said Rochelle Bugg, a spokeswoman for Bott & Co, the no win, no fee law firm representing the passenger in this case.

"Jet2 has constantly said they wanted clarity and that was provided today."

She added that based on anecdotal evidence, only one in 10 applications for appeal are successful.

Under the EU flight compensation rules, airlines don’t have to compensate passengers if a delay is caused by "exceptional circumstances" and airlines have argued that this includes technical faults.

But Lord Justice Elias yesterday upheld a ruling of the Court of Appeal in Manchester which ordered Jet2 to compensate passenger Ronald Huzar for a flight that was delayed 27 hours due to a wiring defect in the fuel valve circuit.

In his ruling, the judge said that technical faults could only be considered as "out of the ordinary" if they "stem from events which, by their nature or origin, are not inherent in the normal exercise of the activity of the air carrier concerned".

He added: "In the context of technical problems one must crucially ask what caused the technical problem. If the cause of the technical problem is one which is ‘inherent in the normal exercise of the activity of the air carrier concerned’ then it necessarily follows that it is also within the control of the carrier and therefore not extraordinary.

"In Mr Huzar’s case the cause of the technical problem was simply wear and tear and the Court quite rightly took a common sense approach to this and held that wear and tear is entirely ordinary and therefore not extraordinary."

Bott & Co said it already has 700 litigated cases involving around 1,750 passengers in progress waiting the outcome of yesterday’s ruling, and another 2,000 cases representing around 5,750 passengers on its books ready to issue proceedings.

"Since yesterday’s ruling, we have seen a six-fold increase in hits on our website for our flight delay service and yesterday was a record day for use of our claims calculator for people checking if they have an eligible flight," said Bugg.

Bott & Co has issued advice for consumers following the Huzar case, urging them to start their claims as soon as possible.

Another law firm Thomas Eggar urged airlines to look at their businesses to ensure that they have built-in to their ticket prices and preserved a contribution to any potential flight delay compensation claims. 

"In the long term, this may mean that flight prices rise as airlines try and cope with the probable increase in compensation claims," said partner Hannah Clipston.

Jet2 described the judgement as "disappointing".

"The Judge noted that the issue "is not without some difficulty," and as such we are taking the dispute to the Supreme Court," it said in a statement.

 "The European National Enforcement Bodies have agreed that unexpected technical defects, such as the one in this case, are outside of the control of airlines, and would therefore be considered extraordinary for the purposes of compensation. The ongoing European review of EC261/04 also recognises this.  

 "Today’s ruling will only cause further confusion for passengers and airlines, which is why we will continue to seek clarity and consistency by appealing directly to a higher court.  

 "We regret any inconvenience to passengers.  We are always committed to getting them to their destination on time.  Our focus is to deliver a friendly service and low fares to our customers and we sincerely hope that this will not be jeopardised by today’s ruling."