Two holidaymakers trying to get home from a Spanish island have said their break was “totally ruined” after being told by easyJet they would have to fly to Bristol and then back to Spain before finally travelling home to Scotland.
Carly Wilkinson and Reece Pollock had just spent a week in Mallorca when, while waiting at Palma airport for their return flight to Glasgow, they received a text from easyJet informing them their flight had been cancelled, reports LadBible.
The Independent understands that the flight was affected by air traffic control restrictions.
After rearranging their flights to Scotland, travelling via Bristol, the couple waited in the airport for hours – but were then told that their onward journey from the West Country had also been cancelled.
At that point, easyJet offered the couple a flight from Palma to Bristol, where they would then have to turn around and fly to Alicante, in south-east Spain, before finally being able to catch an onward flight back to Glasgow. The only other option was to spend an extra £600 to travel with an alternative operator.
“We couldn’t believe it – we had been travelling for hours and just wanted to get home. We didn’t want to end up stranded in Alicante,” said Ms Wilkinson.
EasyJet eventually agreed to pay for a six-hour, 400-mile (645km) taxi trip back to Scotland from Bristol along with eight other passengers who had been baffled by the airline’s proposal.
Ms Wilkinson said that while she loved her holliday, the trip with her partner was “totally ruined by the disaster” getting back to the UK.
“After the longest journey home, we then had to pay another £50 for a taxi back to Balloch to collect my car. We slept on the floor in the airport and easyJet didn’t offer us any vouchers towards food,” added Ms Wilkinson.
The couple had reportedly paid £1,500 for a seven-night package using the online travel agency On The Beach.
The Independent has contacted easyJet and On The Beach for comment.
This incident comes after a similarly perplexing re-routing by easyJet. Last month, a passenger booked to travel from Gatwick to Edinburgh had her flight cancelled due to storms, and was instead offered a connecting journey via Berlin – a total journey of 1,320 miles, almost four times as far as the direct trip and adding nearly 1,000 miles to the distance.
Under air passengers’ rights rules, all affected travellers are entitled to “re-routing, under comparable transport conditions, to their final destination at the earliest opportunity”.
The Civil Aviation Authority says that if a cancelling airline cannot offer a same-day alternative flight, it must pay for a seat on another carrier if any are available.
