For those who's flights experience delays while traveling through/to/from Europe, you may be entitled up to 600 Euros in compensation.

 

On a recent flight from BKK to Paris, my flight was delayed by two hours which resulted in missing a connecting flight to NYC/JFK.  I was put on another flight the following day, a delay of about 12 hours.  A fellow passenger, a Brit, advised me to file a claim with Air France the carrier. He  did this and was given 600 Euros. 

 

The applicable Regulation  is EC 261/204.  You can try to file a claim with the airline or through a "collection" agency.

 

If filing a claim be sure to refer to EC 261/204. 

 

Here are some links for more info.

 

 

http://www.thisismoney.co.uk/money/holidays/article-2271213/How-claim-EU-flight-delay-compensation-EC-261-2004.html

 

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/08/11/business/help-for-delayed-travelers-loath-to-leave-money-on-the-runway.html

 

My claim was denied by Air France because they claimed the delay was a result of extraordinary circumstances. My British friend was told the flight was result of routine maintenance.

Am now appealing the claim through a collection agency.

 

Good information.  I never really had thought about that before this thread. Thanks.

I would like to confirm that this process truly works.

About 2 years ago, I was supposed to fly FCO (Rome) to JFK (New York) on Alitalia and the flight was overbooked because of a problem with an inbound connecting flight originating from Tel Aviv.  The scene at the Rome, Fiumicino airport was complete chaos as Alitalia decided to give first priority to the Tel Aviv passengers over us local passengers.  Consequently, we were put in a local hotel near the Fiumicino airport and we were booked on the first Alitalia flight the next morning to JFK.

Filed a claim, via EC 261/204 procedure (all coordinated by Alitalia personnel - I was impressed) and within 1 month I received 600 euros into my Italian bank account.

Not bad considering that this paid for almost 2/3s of the original ticket price.

Interestingly, part of the regulation is the airlines are supposed to be proactively providing information about how to claim compensation at the time of the qualifying delay.  Doesn't sound like they are too good at that part, either.

Quite the opposite. The airline,Air France/Delta made no effort to advise anyone of their rights, and, in effect, told them to "fuck off" in the case of Air France/Delta. Which is reason for me to appeal my claim via European Courts.