I didn’t pay for my flight - can I still claim it?

It’s a common question that we encounter all too much. Thousands of people travel every day on airlines, even though as passengers they did not pay for the flight themselves. So what happens to their rights as passengers if they encounter a cancelled flight or a delay because they did not pay for their flight?  Our resident travel expert Steve Reid unravels this common problem.

Broadly, there are two groups of people who travel by air, but typically will not have paid for their flight. The first group is where relatives or friends will have paid for the flight, and the other and probably the largest group, are business travellers.

The first thing and the most crucial, is that YOU are the passenger (not the people or organisation that paid for the trip), and therefore your rights as a passenger are what matters when flight disruptions occur. Airlines owe a duty to their passengers if they suffer delays or cancellations. Airlines must assist and compensate their passengers where appropriate (and not the person or organisation that paid for the ticket). So, that’s good news for passengers, right?

Sadly, it’s all too commonplace, particularly with business travellers, that many people just don’t pursue their rights to compensation because of the misconception that they didn’t pay for their flights, and they wrongly assume that no compensation is due to them. This is NOT the case and you could be owed up to £520 in compensation.

Business travellers are the affected group that is most unlikely to claim any compensation from airlines when things don’t go as planned. Often it’s their business who foot the costs of booking alternative flights, hotels and other costs. So it’s no wonder then when business travellers are often not having to directly cover the costs themselves, that they wrongly assume that they won’t be entitled to any compensation.

If you have ever been a passenger on an airline where you have suffered a delay or a cancellation at any time in the past 6 years (irrespective of whether you paid for the trip yourself or not), we urge you to check your eligibility to claim as soon as possible. you could be in for a pleasant surprise.