I strongly believe that taking enforcement action against airlines for not paying compensation due to technical delays is a terrible idea and it may be potentially the cause or contributory factor to the next major airline accident! I NEED YOUR VOTE, which hopefully give the right message to policy makers and ultimately relieve the operational and commercial pressure from people like yourself. Please vote by clicking this link.

‘EC261/2004 Passenger Rights Legislation’ was first introduced in 2005 to prevent airlines overbooking and not taking care of their customers. Within the last decade, the air traffic grew significantly and the safety performance of the commercial air transport industry has been remarkable; however the brutal competition (as described by an airline executive) in the industry and the consumer protection law such as EC261 has been putting tremendous pressure on operational staff such as pilots and engineers to keep the aircraft flying in order to achieve on time performance targets.

Over the last 10 years, there has been many court decisions setting precedence and the latest court decision in the UK not to include technical faults within extraordinary circumstances (despite the Guidelines issued by the ‘National Enforcement Bodies’ http://ec.europa.eu/transport/themes/passengers/air/doc/neb-extraordinary-circumstances-list.pdf) was seen as victory by the traveling public, media and the litigation lawyers, who might benefit from these decisions and policies. Furthermore the it is difficult to understand UK CAA’s decision to take enforcement action against three airlines (http://www.caa.co.uk/application.aspx?catid=14&pagetype=65&appid=7&mode=detail&nid=2437) Because while the CAA is not only a safety regulator but also is responsible to deal with consumer protection as well, this decision is contradictory to the guidelines published in 2013.

I am not entirely against the principles of passenger compensation stated in EC261 but I AM COMPLETELY AGAINST THE IDEA TO FORCE AIRLINES TO PAY COMPENSATION FOR TECHNICAL FAULTS. The guidelines produced by the ‘National Enforcement Bodies’, were measured and proportionate approach and IT MUST BE PART OF THE ENFORCEABLE LAW.

You can contact me @ cengiz.turkoglu.1@city.ac.uk or find more info about me @ www.cengizturkoglu.com

Source of the photo: http://rack.3.mshcdn.com/media/ZgkyMDE0LzA5LzIzL2ZkL2hlYWRzaW5zYW5kLjZmY2E0LmpwZwpwCXRodW1iCTk1MHg1MzQjCmUJanBn