Guides

Flight delayed, canceled or company gone bust? Your rights in the UK and EU

By Colin Bragg · October 31, 2026 · Checked against official UK and EU sources

A long delay at the airport is miserable enough without wondering what you're owed. If your flight is covered by UK or EU rules, the airline may have to feed you, put you up overnight, refund you, and pay you up to £520 or €600 each in compensation. And if the company you booked with goes out of business, ATOL, your credit card or your insurance may protect you instead. Here's how it all works, and how to claim, for free.

Flying within or from the US? See our guide to US flight rights.

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Is your flight covered?

The UK and the EU each have their own version of the same rules. The UK's is often called UK261 and the EU's EU261, after the original regulation. Your flight is covered if:

EU rules also cover flights to and from Iceland, Norway and Switzerland. A flight from New York to London on a US airline isn't covered by either; the same flight on British Airways is.

How much compensation?

Compensation is a fixed sum per person, set by the distance of your journey to its final destination, not the price of your ticket. For delays, it's due when you arrive more than three hours late, measured when the doors open, not when you land.

For a connecting journey on one booking, what counts is how late you reach your final destination. Miss a connection because the first flight was late, and you can claim if you arrive more than three hours behind schedule.

Help while you wait

Whatever caused the delay, even bad weather, the airline must look after you once you've waited long enough:

• Two hours for flights up to 1,500 km, three hours for 1,500 to 3,500 km, four hours for longer flights.
• Food and drink in proportion to the wait, often as vouchers.
• Two phone calls or emails.
• A hotel, and transport to and from it, if you're delayed overnight.

If the airline doesn't provide them, you can buy them yourself and claim the cost back. Keep itemized receipts and be reasonable: airlines are unlikely to pay for alcohol, luxury hotels or luxury meals.

Delayed five hours or more

You can decide not to travel and get a refund for the parts of your ticket you haven't used, and if you're partway through a journey, a flight back to where you started. Only choose this if you no longer want to go: once you take the refund, the airline doesn't have to get you there.

If your flight is canceled

The airline must let you choose between:

• A refund for the parts of the ticket you haven't used, paid within seven days.
• Another flight to your destination as soon as possible, or at a later date that suits you. While you wait for it, the airline must provide food, drink and, if needed, a hotel, however long that takes.

You may also be owed compensation, depending on how much notice you were given:

• 14 days or more: no compensation.
• 7 to 14 days: compensation, unless the airline offered a new flight leaving no more than two hours earlier and arriving less than four hours later than your original one.
• Less than 7 days: compensation, unless the new flight leaves no more than an hour earlier and arrives less than two hours later.

The amounts are the ones in the table above, and may be halved if the replacement flight gets you there not much later than planned.

Bumped off an overbooked flight

If you're refused boarding against your will, having checked in on time, you're owed compensation straight away, plus the choice of a refund or another flight, and care while you wait. Airlines usually ask for volunteers first; if you volunteer, the deal you agree with the airline replaces the fixed compensation, so make sure it's worth it. The exceptions are boarding refused for health, safety or security reasons, or because of missing travel documents.

"Extraordinary circumstances": when there's no compensation

Airlines don't have to pay compensation for disruption they couldn't have avoided. They do still have to provide care and a refund or new flight. According to the UK Civil Aviation Authority, the main examples are:

• weather that makes flying unsafe;
• strikes by people outside the airline, such as airport staff, ground handlers, air traffic control or border staff;
• terrorism, sabotage and security risks;
• political or civil unrest;
• a hidden manufacturing defect that grounds a fleet.

What usually doesn't count: ordinary technical faults with the aircraft, which courts in the UK and EU have ruled are part of running an airline, and strikes by the airline's own staff. If an airline blames "extraordinary circumstances", ask it to say exactly what happened. It's for the airline to prove it.

How to claim, for free

1. Write to the airline. Compensation isn't paid automatically. Most airlines have a claim form on their website. Give your booking reference, flight number, date, how late you arrived, and the names of everyone you're claiming for, and attach receipts for anything you paid yourself.
2. Wait for its final answer, up to eight weeks.
3. If it says no, or doesn't answer within eight weeks:
   • UK: take it to the airline's dispute resolution scheme (ADR), if it belongs to one, or to the Civil Aviation Authority's Passenger Advice and Complaints Team if it doesn't. Both are free.
   • EU: complain to the national enforcement body of the country where the problem happened.
4. Last resort: the small claims court.

You don't need a claims company. They do the same steps and keep a share of your compensation. In the UK you can usually claim up to six years after the flight (five in Scotland). Under today's EU rules, the time limit depends on the country.

Package holidays

If the flight was part of a package, your holiday company is responsible for the package as a whole and for sorting things out, such as a later transfer or a missed hotel night. Compensation for the delay or cancellation itself is still claimed from the airline that operated the flight.

If a travel company goes bust: ATOL, ABTA and your card

Flight rights cover delays and cancellations. They don't help if the company you booked with goes out of business. That's where these come in.

• ATOL. A UK travel company selling a package that includes a flight must protect your money through ATOL, the scheme run by the Civil Aviation Authority. If the company fails, you can claim a refund, or help getting home if you're already away. You'll get an ATOL Certificate when you book, so keep it. Flights booked directly with an airline aren't protected by any scheme.
• ABTA. The trade association for UK travel agents and tour operators. If you have a dispute with an ABTA member, its complaints service can help. Airlines aren't members, so for a flight booked directly, you deal with the airline.
• Paying by credit card. If something costs between £100 and £30,000 and the company doesn't provide it, your card company is equally responsible under Section 75 of the Consumer Credit Act. It's the price that counts, not how much you put on the card: pay even part of it, such as the deposit, by credit card and you can claim the whole amount. Under £100, or on a debit card, ask your bank about a chargeback under Visa or Mastercard's rules. Paying through a go-between, such as some payment services or booking sites, can lose you this protection, so pay the company directly where you can.
• Travel insurance. Policies usually cover your belongings, delays and cancellations, and medical help abroad, which can pay for things flight rights don't, such as a hotel night or trip you've paid for and miss. Very few cover a travel company going out of business, so check what yours says before you rely on it.

What's changing in the EU

New EU rules were published in October 2026 and apply to flights from 23 October 2027. Until then, everything above still applies. The main changes:

• The amounts stay at €250, €400 and €600, still due after a delay of more than three hours.
• You'll have nine months from the flight to claim compensation.
• Airlines will have to tell you, within 96 hours of your journey ending, whether you may be owed compensation and how to claim.
• An official list will set out which events count as extraordinary circumstances.

The UK's rules aren't affected.

Be ready before anything goes wrong

When a flight goes wrong, the claim depends on details: the booking reference, the flight number, the times you were due to arrive, and receipts for what you spent. Neatrip keeps all of that together for each trip, on your device even with no signal, so it's to hand at the gate and afterwards when you write to the airline. Real-time flight alerts are coming in a future release.

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Sources

• UK Civil Aviation Authority: flight delays and cancellations, am I entitled to compensation?, making a claim
• European Union: Your Europe, air passenger rights
• New EU rules: Regulation (EU) 2026/2202, applying from 23 October 2027
• Financial protection: ATOL, ABTA: is my money protected?

This guide explains the rules in general and isn't legal advice. Every case depends on its facts; if your claim is large or complicated, the bodies above can help. Spotted something out of date? Tell us at support@neatrip.app.