LH Flight Cancellation – Rebooking Refund?

[mw4k]

Hi all

Wondering if I’ve got a leg to stand on here?

Booked LIS-FRA-SVG in Y on LH for approx. £100 one-way; 12.10-22.25 for today, 19 Feb. Both flights ticketed on LH on LH metal. Have a meeting in Stavanger starting at 9AM on 20 Feb, ending 3PM 21 Feb.

LH cancelled, on 18 Feb 20.00, FRA-SVG (approx. 24 hours before the flight is due to depart). About 30 mins later I get automatic confirmation of rebooking, LIS-LHR-SVG on 19 Feb, 14.40-22.40, on TP and SK. Confirmation is solely via email. This is of course acceptable. I try and check-in online with TP; I get an error saying check-in at the airport. Check on Lufthansa online chat which shows confirmed bookings. This isn’t my first rodeo; I have screenshots of this. I also can’t get through to the LH service centre at all at 9PM on a Sunday.

Come this morning, at 9AM I check that the flight is still confirmed (again, not my first rodeo). PNR shows no flights attached. Get through to LH Service Centre via Ireland (?!) after about 15 minutes, who said that the rebooked flight was automatically cancelled because I did not reconfirm. There was no suggestion or method for me to do this in the comms I received from LH prior.

Offered to rebook arriving on the 21st, presumably after my meeting has finished. Declined; said I would rebook an acceptable alternative as the 21st (48hrs after for a European flight…) was not acceptable.

Found the exact same rebooked flight (LIS-LHR-SVG on TP and SK) on Kiwi.com for £737 which I have now booked and had ticketed (I need to get to the meeting…). What are the chances LH will reimburse me the £737 without having to go to court?

Cheers

Max

[Matt]

Fairly sure you should get a refund. I doubt it will be easy though – you will almost certainly have to go use MCOL, whatever CEDR equivalent LH use, or a section 75 claim through your credit card if applicable. Make sure that you don’t accept a refund of your original booking – that would end LH’s requirements to you, or at least make it more complicated.

I’d still be more concerned about booking something through kiwi.com though…

[JDB]

@mw4k – the answer may lie partly in where you are based as this comes under EC261 but not UK261 so a court claim here is complicated and might fail. If LH doesn’t pay, you can go to ADR and they use söp but they are apparently much slower than the two ADR services we have in the UK.

You ought to win this one, but the precise facts and sequence of events will matter, because if LH can show or persuade an adjudicator/judge that they offered you a suitable rerouting that you refused by not accepting they might win.

Although some suggest it is possible, I think you would be very lucky to get your new ticket costs back via s75. I have never heard of it actually happening and credit card companies won’t be keen to start picking up the responsibility for paying 261 compensation.