A Swiss lawyer has accused the budget airline easyJet of deliberately making it hard to claim delay and cancellation compensation, which is required by both Swiss and EU law. Jean-Cédric Michel has now appealed for others to join him in calling for action, while the airline has vehemently rejected the allegations.
Our story starts in June 2023, when Michel’s easyJet flight was cancelled. While the airline itself was swift to grant Michel a refund, the lawyer accused the company of trying to get out of giving compensation offered as part of laws passed by both the Swiss government and the European Union.
According to the rules, if their flight is cancelled passengers travelling out of Swiss airports are entitled to a total refund of the ticket price, or a free rebooking on another connection. If a passenger chooses the latter, meals, drinks, hotels, transport and phone calls are all complimentary if required.
Crucially, regardless of whether they rebook or not, passengers may also be entitled to compensation. This ranges from 250 to 600 euros, depending on the distance of the flight.
However, this does not apply if the rebooked journey leads to a delay of less than two to four hours (depending on distance), the cancellation is announced 14 days in advance of the flight or the flight was cancelled due to “extraordinary circumstances which could not have been avoided even if all reasonable measures had been taken.”
Michel argued that easyJet places deliberate barriers in front of those who wish to claim this extra compensation. He noted that there is “an asymmetry between the few clicks needed to buy a ticket” and the “24 fields of the compensation request form.” He also claimed that the form is automatically rejected even if it is correctly filled in “so that the passenger becomes discouraged and gives up.” He said that his form was rejected six times for allegedly incorrect information.
He concluded by arguing that easyJet likely saves huge amounts of money by making claiming compensation difficult. Though the data on this is not publicly available, 20 Minuten estimated that the international company would likely have to pay 45.000 euros in compensation per cancelled flight under EU and Swiss law, on top of regular refund and rebooking costs.
Michel had submitted his complaint to the State Secretariate for Economic Affairs back in April, but recently officials told the lawyer that they would only respond if there were around 20 high-quality complaints about the practice. He has now called for more people to come forward and contact the authorities, so that the government can investigate.
In response to the allegations, an easyJet spokesperson told 20 Minuten that they “absolutely refute any accusation that we have any practices that avoid paying compensation where it is justified.” The airline "takes its responsibilities under EU261 seriously and will always pay compensation to eligible passengers when they make a claim."
"We have a simple, quick and free online form available for customers and encourage them to claim directly to get 100 percent of their claim without any third-party deductions," the airline concluded.
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