Compensation Claim Aer Lingus

Edelie

I am hoping someone might be able to advise/clarify if I am correctly seeking compensation for a flight delay.

The whole ordeal is quite a story (5 page report) but below is a brief overview of what happened

Myself (5 months pregnant at the time) and my family (husband, 15 year old & 18 month old) and my sister and her 9 month old where travelling to Australia for a family wedding. We were due to leave Dublin the 14th Feb and arrive in Adelaide approx 23hrs later connecting in Heathrow and Kuala Lumpar.

• We were moved to flight EI176 by Aer Lingus staff with no explanation as to why – this was delayed leaving Dublin and subsequently had to turn back to Dublin from London Heathrow after trying to land. This was due to high winds in London. We arrived back in Dublin at approx. 1.30am on the 15th Feb.

• Our connecting flight left London for Kuala Lumpar as scheduled.

• Our original flight from Dublin EI178 landed in London slightly delayed but with plenty of time to make our connecting flight (if we had of been on it).

• As we had missed the rest of our flights Aer Lingus were due to reschedule our flights – our travel agent liaised with them and Aer Lingus booked us on a rerouted flight from Dublin on the evening 15th Feb via Abu Dhabi and Singapore with Etihad and Singapore Airlines respectively.

• When we arrived in Singapore we had not been booked on correctly by Aer Lingus and we were not allowed to board the flight, leaving us stranded in Singapore.

• We had to contact Aer Lingus in America (by mobile phone) and let Aer Lingus speak to the Singapore Airlines agent we were dealing with as they could not call each other. Aer Lingus could not amend the error they made with the booking and advised us to rebook tickets for the next available flight to Adelaide and claim this back from Aer Lingus.

From information I have gotten from the Commission for Aviation Regulation website I believe we should be entitled to compensation of €600 per person x 2
i.Flight delay more than 4 hours, flight length > 3,500km and delay caused by Aer Lingus
ii.Denied Boarding flight in Singapore/flight delay – and delay more than 4 hours and delay caused by Aer Lingus.

I have now contacted Commission for Aviation Regulation but they sent me an email response saying they are dealing with complaints from Jan 2014 so I am presuming it will be 6 months before I hear from them.

Aer Lingus have eventually agreed to repay us for most of the expenses we incurred but have claimed they do not have to compensate us. Their customer service has been shocking and each time we had to deal with an Aer Lingus representative they just tried to pass the buck and no hint of an apology.

We eventually arrived at our destination 2 days later than we originally should have.

I know it is an unusual situation but if anyone has any idea about this I would love to hear any advice.

Thanks

fabone007

Any recommendations, will I use the Air lingus site or the claim business on line for compensation for flight cancellation

Aidan17

use the Aer Lingus site. It is fairly straight forward.