Refund vs compensation: two different rights, often both

Refund: your money back

When your flight is cancelled or you are denied boarding, the airline must offer you the choice between re-routing and a refund of the unused ticket — the whole ticket, or the unused parts plus a return flight to your departure point if the journey no longer serves its purpose. The refund is due within 7 days, in cash, by bank transfer or card. A voucher only with your written agreement.

After a delay of 5 hours or more the same choice opens: you may give up the trip and be refunded.

Compensation: a fixed amount for the disruption

Compensation does not depend on the ticket price. It is €250, €400 or €600 per passenger (£220, £350, £520 in the UK) by distance, and it is due when a delay of 3+ hours, a cancellation announced less than 14 days ahead or an involuntary denied boarding is not caused by extraordinary circumstances.

Both at once

A cancelled flight two days before departure that you decide not to replace: refund of the ticket and compensation. A 6-hour delay you sit through: no refund (you flew) but compensation. A cancellation announced a month ahead: refund or re-routing, but no compensation.

Care and expenses: the third right

Meals, hotel and transport while you wait, or reimbursement of what you reasonably spent when the airline provided nothing. Also separate, also cumulative.

Voucher or cash?

Cash — unless you choose otherwise in writing. Article 7(3) says compensation is paid “in cash, by electronic bank transfer, bank orders or bank cheques or, with the signed agreement of the passenger, in travel vouchers and/or other services”, and Article 8(1)(a) applies the same means to the refund. A voucher pre-selected in the airline’s app, a credit “for your convenience”, or a form with no cash option is not a signed agreement. Reply that you want the refund to the original payment method within 7 days and keep the message. A voucher you did accept can usually not be undone, so decide before you click.

Rebooking and re-routing: what the airline must offer

When a flight is cancelled you choose, not the airline: a refund, re-routing at the earliest opportunity, or re-routing at a later date of your convenience. “At the earliest opportunity” is measured against every reasonable option, not only the airline’s own timetable — the Commission’s guidelines say re-routing should be at no extra cost even on another airline, in a higher class or by another mode of transport, and the Court of Justice held in Transportes Aéreos Portugueses (C-74/19) that booking passengers on another carrier can be a measure the airline has to take. If the airline offers nothing usable and you buy your own ticket, claim the cost back with the receipt.

The cancellation made me miss a connection

On a single booking, a cancelled first leg means the airline must re-route you to your final destination, not just to the connection airport, and provide care until it does. Compensation is measured on the arrival at the final destination and on the distance of the whole journey. On separate tickets, the second airline owes nothing for a first flight it did not operate; the missed connection guide and the separate tickets guide cover both cases.

What the airline cannot do

Offer only a voucher, deduct the refund from the compensation, or condition the refund on waiving compensation. Any of these is worth a written objection and, if maintained, an escalation.

How to ask

Write to the operating airline naming the flight, the cancellation or the 5-hour delay, and the option you choose. For a refund: “I choose reimbursement under Article 8(1)(a), to my original payment method, within seven days.” For compensation: the amount per passenger and the article. One letter can ask for both; the claim letter generator writes it with the refund paragraph in place.