Wizz Air flight delay and cancellation compensation

Your rights on a Wizz Air flight

Wizz Air is a low-cost carrier founded in Hungary and headquartered in Budapest. The main airline holds a Hungarian operating licence, and the group also operates through separately licensed entities including Wizz Air Malta, Wizz Air UK and Wizz Air Abu Dhabi. The first two sit inside the EU/UK framework; the Abu Dhabi entity does not, and coverage there depends on which airport you departed from.

For the great majority of Wizz Air flying, the position is straightforward:

• Departures from an EU/EEA airport — EU261 applies to any operating airline
• Arrivals into the EU/EEA from outside it — covered where the operating carrier is an EU airline, which the Hungarian and Maltese entities are
• UK departures and UK arrivals — UK261 applies, in sterling

Wizz Air's network reaches well beyond the EU into the Western Balkans, Georgia, Armenia, Moldova, the Gulf and Central Asia. A flight from Budapest to Tbilisi is protected on departure; the return leg's coverage depends on which entity operates it.

What a delay or cancellation is worth

Compensation is due when you arrive at your final destination three or more hours late, when a flight is cancelled with under 14 days' notice, or when you are denied boarding from an oversold flight after checking in on time.

• EUR 250 — 1,500 km or less, such as Budapest to Vienna or Katowice to Milan
• EUR 400 — intra-EU routes over 1,500 km and other routes up to 3,500 km, which is where most of the network sits
• EUR 600 — routes over 3,500 km, reached only at the eastern and southern edges of the map

UK261 bands are GBP 220 / GBP 350 / GBP 520. The amount does not move with the fare, so a EUR 20 seat and a EUR 200 seat carry the same entitlement, and each named passenger claims separately.

Fees, seats and the things that do not affect a claim

Low-cost pricing sometimes leads passengers to assume their rights are thinner. They are not. EU261 cannot be reduced or waived by an airline's terms and conditions, and the following make no difference to a compensation claim:

• Whether you bought bags, priority boarding or a seat
• Whether the ticket was non-refundable
• Whether you booked directly or through an online travel agent

What can defeat a claim is not turning up. You must have a confirmed reservation and have presented for check-in by the stated deadline.

When Wizz Air does not have to pay

The airline avoids compensation only by proving extraordinary circumstances — conditions outside its control that could not have been avoided even with all reasonable measures. Severe weather, air-traffic-control restrictions, airspace closures, security alerts and bird strikes are the recognised categories, and airspace constraints across central and eastern Europe have been a recurring operational factor in recent years.

The burden of proof is the airline's. It must identify the cause and show what it did to limit the consequences, including whether an aircraft or crew could have been repositioned. A strike by Wizz Air's own staff would generally not be extraordinary; a third-party or ATC strike usually would be.

Making a claim work

Keep the booking reference, boarding passes, the notification message, and receipts for meals or a hotel if none was provided. Note the actual arrival time at your destination.

Response times vary between airlines and between individual claims and lengthen after mass disruption. Where a claim is refused without adequate reasoning, it can go to the national enforcement body in the country of departure, to a dispute-resolution scheme, or to court within the applicable limitation period.

Our eligibility check is free, and our fee is a flat EUR 39 charged only after compensation is recovered — never up front, and nothing at all if the claim fails.