Question: I have booked nine seats on a flight on December 30 from Manchester to Milan. The airline has now cancelled the flight. Are they obliged to say why?
Mike H
Answer: No, an airline is not obliged to explain why it has cancelled a flight – though I shall have a stab at guessing that it was for commercial reasons.
Even though you had booked nine tickets for the flight, I imagine relatively few other seats have been sold. Manchester to Milan tends to be a business route, and the day before New Year’s Eve there are unlikely to have been too many travelling executives.
Fortunately, there is an easy remedy. According to the Civil Aviation Authority, European passenger-rights rules mean that the airline is required to re-book you on the closest departure to your original schedule – even if that is aboard a rival carrier.
So identify the closest alternative departure, through a website such as Skyscanner, then politely ask the airline to buy nine seats for you.
The Independent