Along with five other groups, we were recently bumped off an overbooked Emirates flight back to London from South Africa. Our family of four were put up in a hotel and we flew the next day. All the other affected passengers were offered a return flight voucher in compensation, except us.
Because we booked through Opodo which – unbeknown to us – booked our return flight as two singles, we were only offered a one-way ticket: Cape Town to London. We spoke to the local Emirates staff who were sympathetic but said they were unable to override the system.
We hoped on our return to London that the head office would be able to rectify the situation, but to no avail.
We feel we should be treated equally as return flight passengers, as that is what we were. What do you advise? KW, London
Our original reaction was to use the EU rules governing denied boarding to ask the airline to pay up – and had you been using an airline based in the EU you would have been entitled to a cash payment of €600 per person, which for your family of four would currently be worth almost £1,840.
The same would also have been the case if the delay had been on the outward bound leg of the journey. But, sadly for you, the compensation is only payable on journeys that begin outside the EU if you are travelling on a Europe-based carrier.
It’s very odd that Emirates has refused to treat you the same as the other passengers, given that you travelled out and back with the airline – albeit on two singles – changing in Dubai. It must have been the cheapest option when Opodo calculated the price. We asked Emirates to take another look. It says the complexity of the inquiry means it will take it up to 30 days to respond. When it finally gets round to it, we will report back.
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