What to do if your travel plans are disrupted by IT outage – as some passengers told ‘complete nonsense’

Travellers around the world are facing a second day of chaos in the aftermath of Friday’s global IT outage.

Here, Sky News looks at what you can do if you’re affected by the disruption.

Air passengers

Friday was meant to be one of the busiest days of the summer as families jetted off on holidays at the end of the school year.

But more than 300 flights to and from the UK were cancelled, with many more suffering significant delays, while others reported lost baggage.

The bad news is that as the global IT outage was an extraordinary circumstance, compensation is not payable for flight delays or cancellations.

Travel journalist Simon Calder told Sky News: “Unfortunately, if your flight is cancelled, then you don’t automatically get priority on the next one.

“What happens is that the airline gives priority to people already booked on the flights which are going, and then you have to kind of scramble around for the few remaining seats. And this weekend, there aren’t many of those.”

But Mr Calder assured passengers that “it’s very clear what the rules are”.

He added: “I’m hearing from [people] in various parts of the world being told various things by various companies, including, ‘Oh, well, we haven’t got another flight for three days, so you’re just going to have to wait’.

“That’s complete nonsense. Under air passenger rights rules within Europe, if your flights are cancelled, then the airline has to get you to your destination as soon as possible.

“If that means the airline has to spend hundreds of pounds buying a seat on a rival airline, well, that’s just tough. That’s what the rules say.”

However the global nature of the IT outage means it may be difficult to get airlines to abide by the rules.

The travel expert said package holiday companies give travellers more protection than “a DIY trip”.

“If you’re on a package holiday, you have rock solid consumer protection,” he added.

“The organisers, the airline has to get to [the] destination as soon as possible. If they really have pulled the plug and said, ‘okay, your trip’s cancelled’, well, I’m glad to say that there are still – even at this late stage – plenty of holidays around.

“So [the passenger] will be able to book a different holiday, hopefully to the same destination with a different provider. Going to see a good travel agent would be a very good way to sort that out.”

If your package holiday is curtailed, and resulted in you missing a day or two of the trip, Mr Calder says: “You should be entitled to get a proportion of the cost of your holiday back because, there you were in Birmingham when you were hoping to be in Benidorm.”

But airlines do have a duty to take care of passengers caught up in the chaos.

Mr Calder said airlines should provide vouchers for hotels and food but if they don’t, passengers should pay and claim back with an itemised receipt.

He offered an important tip for the receipts, saying: “They don’t want to see any alcohol on that meal bill, thank you very much.”

Rail passengers

While most trains are running across the country, there have been short-notice changes and cancellations.

Refunds and compensation are due once a train is late. Most operators will issue compensation for a 15-minute delay, others 30 minutes.

If your journey is cancelled, you are entitled to a full refund.

Customers have to get a claim submitted within 28 days. Keep the journey ticket to send it in as proof.

Crossings at the Port of Dover

Port of Dover authorities said on Saturday it was dealing with “hundreds of displaced” airport passengers and it had a 30-minute processing time just after 11am.

The processing time had been 60 minutes earlier this morning.

It advised customers to have a booking for the crossing before arriving.

The authorities also asked customers to have their documents ready to ensure “the quickest possible processing time through border controls and check-in”.