European Union: Evaluation of Reg. 261/2004

European Commission has published a final report on the evaluation of Reg. 261/2004. Despite some significant improvements in the protection of passenger rights, the report identifies the following remaining problems:some carriers are still not consistently complying with the requirements of the Regulation or are interpreting the Regulation in a way which minimises their obligations;in many Member States, enforcement is not effective enough to provide carriers with an economic incentive to comply;in several Member States, there is no mechanism available by which individual passengers can readily obtain redress from carriers;although rulings by the European Court of Justice (ECJ) have addressed some ofthe issues in the Regulation that were unclear, a number of issues have not been addressed andin some areas the rights granted by the Regulation can lead to different understandings (for example relating to long delay and cancellation) or do not address all the problems that passengers may face (such as missed connections due to delays).The report makes a number of recommendations, including improvements to the enforcement of the Regulation, other improvements to the operation of the Regulation which would not require any legislative changes as well as possible changes to the requirements of the Regulation, if a decision is made to revise it.The study, which was first reported to IFTTA by Stephan Keiler, is avialable for download in pdf here>>.

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