My flight was cancelled, what should I do first?

At a glance#

The order decides#

A cancellation creates two entirely different questions, and mixing them costs time on the important one. The first is how to get there. It is urgent, it is decided at the airport, and it has a window of minutes. The second is who pays what. That one is not urgent, it is decided in writing, and it has a window of months.

Only the first matters at the desk. Arguing about compensation there spends the very minutes in which the last seats on the alternative are allocated.

Desk staff can rebook and arrange care. Compensation is decided by a different department, and nobody at the airport can reach it. At the desk, talk about flights, hotels and receipts; everything else belongs in a message written that evening.

The first ten minutes#

Find a concrete alternative#

Searching for a connection is what takes longest at the desk. Doing it yourself shortens the conversation to a decision. Search by flight number, time and connecting point, including partner airlines. Two alternatives are enough, a first choice and a fallback.

Arriving with that list usually produces one of the two. Arriving without it produces whatever solution sits closest to hand in the system. Connecting points belong in the search too, because an alternative through a different hub is often open while your own hub is sold out. Rail and coach belong on the list where the distance allows. Many airlines accept surface transport, and on short sectors it is often the fastest solution of the day.

Use several channels at once#

Queue, phone, app and messaging lead to the same goal. They do not exclude each other and they differ in speed: the queue is slowest and most certain, the phone is fast and often busy, the app is instant and can do less. Using all of them means taking the first usable answer.

A second phone number helps as well. The line for the departure or arrival country is frequently less busy than the home market line. Social channels are often the fastest route of all. The teams are small, but they answer in writing, which turns the answer into evidence at the same time.

Bookings made through an agency or a portal need one extra check: who is allowed to rebook. Some airlines refer such bookings back consistently, and then the portal’s number is the only effective channel.

Document immediately#

The cancellation display, the time and the reason given belong in a photograph, because none of them can be obtained later. Every answer from the airline gets recorded as well, including verbal ones, with time and name. That note decides the reimbursement of extra costs weeks later.

A screenshot of your own booking belongs in the file too. Reservation systems rewrite the record after a cancellation, and the original state is no longer visible afterwards.

Receipts get sorted by day and case straight away. Paper is not needed: a folder in the photo library named by date is enough and can be sent to the airline in one go. The effort takes minutes and saves hours.

Transport and money are separate#

The entitlement to transport exists regardless of cause. Even in weather or strike the airline has to offer a solution and may not simply end the journey. The entitlement is to transport, not to a particular flight, and which alternatives have to be offered depends on the legal regime the journey falls under.

Compensation depends on the cause and on the regime. Extraordinary circumstances regularly exclude it, and what counts as one is the subject of constant dispute. The two claims are made at different times, and combining them at the desk usually produces a worse result on both.

Duty of care is the item most often overlooked. It arises from waiting time alone, regardless of cause, and covers meals, accommodation and the transfer to it. It is also separate from compensation. Paying for it yourself when nobody is at the desk is usually reimbursed, provided the amounts are reasonable and receipts exist, and receipts are worth keeping even when the airline books the hotel itself.

Worked example: two travellers, one cancelled flight#

The same flight is cancelled for two people. One joins the queue, the other searches for an alternative first and calls in parallel.

There is no trick in the table, only an order. Replacement seats are a scarce good, and scarce goods go out in the order requests arrive. Whoever asks first chooses; whoever asks later takes what is left. A departure the same day saves a night, a working day and the entire follow up, and the difference is created in the first ten minutes.

Travelling with others means splitting the tasks. One queues, one calls, and both stop as soon as the first rebooking is confirmed.

Elite status shortens the queue here and does nothing else. It moves a traveller up the rebooking order by a few minutes and adds no entitlement to compensation. Why that is worth less than it looks is set out in when status gets you nothing.

Separate tickets are the hard case#

On a single booking the airline is liable for the whole chain, and the connection is its problem. On separate tickets responsibility ends with the first contract. The second flight is its own booking, and a missed departure there is an ordinary no show. The structure of the booking therefore matters more before the trip than any insurance, because it decides who carries the risk.

An adequate connection time is the only effective protection. It costs convenience at booking and saves the entire exercise during disruption. Two bookings with a generous gap are the middle path: they cost less than a through ticket and carry the same risk only when the gap is too tight.

The choice between refund and rebooking needs a cool head. Abandoning the trip returns the unused portion but ends any chance of travelling that day, and an abandoned booking cannot be turned back into a rebooking later.

When the airline offers nothing#

If no reasonable solution appears, self booking comes into play. It is the most expensive route and the only one that fails without documentation. You have to show that you asked, what was answered and why the offer was unreasonable. Without those three points the invoice stays with you.

Reasonable means the same class, a comparable routing and the next available date. Book the obvious connection, not the most comfortable one. Choose the most expensive option instead and only the reasonable part gets reimbursed.

Where payment has been made and nothing delivered, the payment route comes last, as a chargeback describes. An insurance route exists as well where a policy is in place, and it matters mainly for costs nobody else reimburses, such as separate tickets or non refundable onward arrangements. Which cases it covers is set out in what card travel insurance covers.

When it is not worth the effort#

Five situations in which it is not worth it:

• Short delays. Below the thresholds no claim arises, and the time is better spent travelling on.
• Extraordinary circumstances. Weather and closures regularly exclude compensation while duty of care remains.
• Very cheap tickets without extra costs. The effort exceeds the amount at stake.
• Without evidence. A claim without proof is an assertion, and assertions get rejected.
• Relying on verbal promises at the desk. What is said there appears in the written process only if somebody recorded it.

Travellers who book tight connections regularly should read the fare rules before departure, not after, as fare rules explains.

What to do afterwards#

The rest is handled in writing, in three steps.

Sort the claims first. Refund, compensation, duty of care costs and additional costs are four separate items with four separate justifications.

Then note the deadline. It follows the legal regime and starts with the event, and a missed deadline ends the case regardless of the merits. The period is longer than most people think, but it is not indefinite.

Finally, make it one case. A single message with all the evidence is more effective than five messages with one item each, and a complete case with five attachments is processed faster than a long account without evidence. Keep the tone factual and short, send it once and wait out the stated period. Following up pays only afterwards, with a reference to the earlier case and no fresh account. If the airline still does not reply, a written reminder with a deadline comes next, and only then does an ombudsman or a court make sense, depending on the country.

Vouchers deserve caution. An offer at the desk looks generous and is regularly the cheaper solution for the airline. Accepting it can waive parts of a claim depending on the regime, so the decision does not belong at the desk, as voucher instead of cash shows.

Travellers already on the way should also check their bags. After a cancellation they tend to stay in the original flight’s record, and restoring that takes longer than the rebooking.

Claim companies handle the case for a share. They pay off when your own effort would exceed the share, and they change nothing about the legal position. Writing it yourself keeps the full amount and takes about an hour, so the decision is about time, not about prospects.

A short note of what worked at which airline turns the next disruption into a routine instead of a scramble, and disruptions repeat more often than anybody expects.

The most common mistakes#

• Discussing compensation at the desk. The rebooking comes first. Money follows in writing, weeks later and through a different department.
• Waiting in the queue only. Phone, app and messaging run in parallel, and the first usable answer wins.
• Asking without an alternative. Two concrete flight numbers turn a search into a decision.
• Documenting nothing. Display, time, reason and every answer have to be captured on the spot, because none of it can be reconstructed later.
• Rebooking yourself immediately. Without a documented refusal the invoice usually stays with the traveller.
• Accepting a voucher at the desk. That decision can wait until the evening and be made in writing.

Related topics#

• How a chargeback works
• What applies to denied boarding
• Voucher instead of cash
• When status gets you nothing
• What card travel insurance covers
• What applies with separate tickets