ESRC Festival of Social Science, Coping with flight cancellations in a post-COVID world: What are my consumer rights?

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What’s on offer?

This event workshop will outline the findings from a project on consumer rights and COVID flight cancellations. This will be followed by talks from consumer rights experts on what passengers can do when their flights are cancelled, and possible avenues of redress. The airlines representatives can share how they are responding to this crisis and provide an overview on recent changes on flight cancellation policies.  At the end of the session, the attendees will be given an opportunity to ask questions from our panel.  It is envisaged that the attendees will have greater understanding of their rights as air passenger and how the crisis is being handled by the airlines, which consequently will make travel less daunting. 

What’s it about?

The COVID-19 pandemic saw mass flight cancellations, and even in this recovery period, travellers are still facing disruption and suffering the consequences (e.g., disappointment, stress, unrecoverable cost, lost holidays).  Our research, funded by LAWPL, reveals that consumers have a low awareness of their consumer rights and avenues for redress.  Consumers were found to generally trust airlines to look after them, but some consumers had negative experiences with claiming for refund and were nudged into accepting travel vouchers or rebooking. Due to the lack of knowledge on how to claim refunds, some have been left out of pocket. 

Although travel restrictions have been lifted and travel regulations become less complex, flight cancellations continue to be a major problem for many travellers.  It is crucial for both consumers and airlines to have a dialogue on this issue. This event, designed for the general public, will give the attendees the opportunity to understand their consumer rights as air passengers and for airlines to reach out to consumers. 

Who is leading the event?

Carmela Bosangit, Senior Lecturer in Marketing at Cardiff University 

Sara Drake, Reader in European Union Law and EU Competition Law at Cardiff University

Who is it open to?

This event is open to adults from the general public. 

Of interest to:

This is of particular interest to those who have been impacted by COVID-19 related flight cancellations and those with an interest in consumer law.  

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