What ARE "The Rules" about flight cancellations?
 

And where can we find them?

I'm talking about both for US domestic and European flights.

The recent post about cancellations is prompting this post.

Can anyone offer a website(s) that doesn't require fifty years to wade through?

Would anyone see the benefit of a "superhread" post on this issue?

I found these very easily by entering {"contract of carriage" xxxx airlines } into Google:

http://airconsumer.ost.dot.gov/

http://www.aa.com/content/customerSe...html#Authority

http://www.airfrance.com.br/double6/...1?OpenDocument

http://www.airtran.com/policies/gene...formation.aspx

http://www.alitalia.com/EN_EN/Images...tcm9-10352.pdf

http://www.britishairways.com/travel...1/public/en_us

http://www.continental.com/web/en-US.../contract.aspx

http://www.delta.com/legal/contract_...iage/index.jsp

http://www.nwa.com/contract.html

http://www.southwest.com/travel_center/contract.html

http://www.united.com/page/article/0,6722,2671,00.html

http://www.usairways.com/awa/content...fcarriage.aspx

Very interesting thought Dukey. I recently read a post where the poster said she cancelled her reservation on Aegean and got a refund. Since I had booked three Aegean flights I went to the website and read their rules. It was very clear and concise and posted the fares that were completely refundable.

Thanks, Travelnut and Milliebz for taking the time to reply.

At first glace one would suppose that the "rules" about cancellations can vary between airlines and therefore one would have to be familiar with ALL the variations.

But is that really true? Are there basic refund requirements which must be followed in the event any airline cancels a flight because of mechanical difficulties, for exapmple.

There apparently is SOME uniformity since people here are comnstantly telling others "you won't get any compemnsation if the cancellation was due to weather."

BTW..that AirfRance link is kinda strange..try it out and you'll see.

I actually found a site which summarizes the compensation, particularly for flights in the EU.

http://www.airsafe.com/complain/bumping.htm

Unfortunately, the airsafe site Dukey refers to summarises the EU rules very badly. Above all, it fails to mention the many circumstances in which airlines aren't obliged to do anything at all in case of cancellation or delay.

The sentence "in the event of long delays (two hours or more, depending on the distance of the flight), passengers must in every case be offered free meals and refreshments plus two free telephone calls, telex or fax messages, or emails" is simply untrue, and it's irresponsible of the site to publish such balderdash.

There's no site that sums up cancellation/delay rules in a sentence, because the rules are complicated.

You have the read the whole thing at www.tiny.cc/KDOVd Not least because it's clear airlines abuse the exceptions, and if you don't know the real rules you can't challenge them.

Flanner, thanks for pointing out the deficiencies of that site I provided the working link for.

Apparently the whole (summarizing)issue is something nobody wishes to take on and I cannot say I blame them.

Of course, some of these people who aren't interested will be the same ones who are spouting off about how, "You should have done this (or that)" when someone does recount an "incident'`..sigh.

I'm curious to find out if there is a European Union provision that would prohibit the sort of incident that occurred with AA1348 - being stuck on the plane for 11 hours on the ground with no way to get off.

Sorry, Will..I guess the rules are just "too complicated" LOL...