Emirates Told to Pay $10,000 to Passenger Whose Flight Was Canceled and Lost Job
May 22nd, 2009 | By Jared BlankThe details of this are a bit odd, but here it goes: A judge has ordered Emirates to pay $10,000 (INR 500,000 – or 5 Lakh as we say in India) to an Indian nurse who lost his job in Libya after his flight was canceled back in 1999. I know, that’s a long time ago. It gets a bit weirder: The Emirates flight from Delhi to Malta (with a connection to Libya) involved a codeshare flight with Air Malta. The Air Malta portion of the flight was canceled. The passenger was never told about the cancelation, and hence, missed his return to Libya. He then lost his job.
The judge in the case didn’t buy Emirates’ argument that it wasn’t responsible, since it didn’t operate the flight. But the judge ruled that because it sold the ticket and its code was on the Air Malta flight, Emirates was responsible. Whew.
Yes, this is a random (and odd) case, but it brings up a bigger issue: Who is responsible when a you have a connection to a codeshare partner and things go awry? In my experience the answer is: whichever airline you’re not talking to at the time. If you’ve had a more positive experience, I’d love to hear about it…