TAP Air Portugal has the highest score and Romania's TAROM the lowest in a ranking of how European airlines handled delay and cancellation compensation claims filed through AirAdvisor. The ranking comes from AirAdvisor, a company that pursues compensation claims against airlines on behalf of passengers1. Euronews reported the ranking on 29 October 20262. Wizz Air is third, KLM eighth and Ryanair third from the bottom1.

How the ranking was built

AirAdvisor analysed 68,283 claims, filed between January and June 2026, against 59 airlines. Only the 22 airlines with at least 100 qualified claims made the final list. Qualified claims, 10,760 in total, are those still in progress or already successful. Each airline receives a score out of 100: 60% is based on the share of claims already resolved successfully and 40% on the share that did not go to court. Average days to payment are shown for information only and do not count towards the score1.

AirAdvisor calls the score an "Honesty Score". By its own description, the score reflects only how airlines handled claims filed through AirAdvisor and says nothing about safety, customer service or overall quality. Each court referral is AirAdvisor's own decision, taken after an airline rejected or ignored a claim that AirAdvisor judged eligible under the EU or UK rules1. Euronews noted that resolution and court rates across all claims against an airline will differ2.

Top ten and bottom ten

TAP Air Portugal scored 93.0 from 159 qualified claims: 88.7% were resolved successfully, 0.6% went to court and payment took ten days on average. LOT Polish Airlines (89.7) and Wizz Air (83.2) follow. TAROM was last on 23.3: of 122 claims, 3.3% were resolved successfully and 46.7% went to court, with payment taking 110 days on average1.

Highest scores

Lowest scores

KLM had the most qualified claims in the data set, 1,314, and the lowest court referral rate of the seven airlines with the most claims, at 0.2%. Ryanair, described by Euronews as Europe's biggest airline2, scored 34.2: of its 991 claims, 2.1% were resolved successfully and 17.8% went to court. Ryanair and Lufthansa had about three-quarters of KLM's claim volume, but AirAdvisor took them to court 45 to 90 times as often as KLM1.

When compensation is due

The legal basis is EU Regulation 261/2004. Article 7 sets fixed amounts: €250 for flights of 1,500 km or less, €400 for intra-EU flights over 1,500 km and other flights between 1,500 and 3,500 km, and €600 for all other flights3. The text of the regulation links compensation to cancellation and denied boarding. In the Sturgeon judgment of 19 November 2009, the Court of Justice of the European Union ruled that passengers who reach their final destination three hours or more after the scheduled arrival time can also claim compensation4. The two-, three- and four-hour thresholds in Article 6 concern care such as meals and refreshments, not compensation3.

What crew can and cannot influence

An airline does not have to pay if it can prove that the delay was caused by extraordinary circumstances that could not have been avoided even if all reasonable measures had been taken4. Two of the Court's rulings deal directly with crew. On 23 March 2021 it ruled that a lawful strike called by a trade union of the airline's own staff to assert their demands, and joined by staff essential for operating a flight, is not an extraordinary circumstance5. On 11 May 2023 it ruled the same for the unexpected absence of an essential crew member, owing to illness or death, shortly before the scheduled departure6.

The new EU Regulation 2026/2202, which applies from 23 October 2027, adds a non-exhaustive annex listing extraordinary circumstances. It includes weather incompatible with the safe operation of the flight, as well as air traffic management restrictions, airport capacity restrictions and airspace closures where the decision was beyond the operating carrier's actual control. Strikes at the airline itself are listed only when they stem from demands that only public authorities can satisfy. A serious health risk or medical emergency affecting a crew member is listed only if it occurs after departure and forces the flight to be interrupted or diverted. An airline can rely on any of these only if there is a direct causal link with the disruption, and the burden of proof rests with the airline7.

Flight duty limits and commander's discretion

Under EASA's flight time limitations, ORO.FTL.205, the basic maximum daily flight duty period for acclimatised crew is 13 hours for one or two sectors starting between 06:00 and 13:29 reference time, reduced by 30 minutes for each additional sector down to 9 hours for ten sectors8.

When unforeseen circumstances arise at or after reporting time, the commander may extend the flight duty period by up to two hours, or three hours with an augmented crew, after consulting all crew members on their alertness. The rest period that follows may be reduced but never below ten hours. The commander reports every such extension to the operator, and where the increase exceeds one hour the operator sends a copy of the report to the competent authority within 28 days. If unforeseen circumstances could lead to severe fatigue, the commander must reduce the flight duty period and/or increase the rest period8.

Air traffic flow restrictions are another source of delay. Between 1 June and 31 August 2026, Eurocontrol counted about 681,000 flights delayed by air traffic flow management (ATFM) restrictions, 21% of all flights, with ATFM delay averaging 3.27 minutes per flight. Of en-route ATFM delay, 49% was attributed to capacity and staffing and 43% to severe convective weather, while industrial action accounted for 1%9.

New EU rules from October 2027

On 16 September 2026 the European Parliament and the Council adopted Regulation (EU) 2026/2202, which amends the 2004 rules. It was published on 2 October 2026 and applies from 23 October 20277. In the Council's political agreement of June 2025, the delay thresholds for compensation were set at four and six hours, with a lower three-hour threshold for certain short trips10. In January 2026 the European Parliament maintained its position on the three-hour threshold11. The final text keeps the three-hour threshold at arrival and the amounts of €250, €400 and €6007.

Some things do change. On journeys over 3,500 km that are not intra-EU, an airline may halve the €600 compensation if the arrival delay does not exceed four hours. Passengers must submit a compensation request within nine months of the departure date, and the airline must pay or explain its refusal within 30 calendar days. If it invokes an extraordinary circumstance, it must say which one and explain the direct causal link and why the disruption could not have been avoided even if all reasonable measures had been taken7.

Time limits and enforcement

The 2004 regulation sets no time limit for bringing a claim; the Court of Justice ruled on 22 November 2012 that national rules on limitation of actions apply12. In the United Kingdom, the retained version of the regulation sets compensation at £220, £350 and £52013, and the Court of Appeal ruled on 19 June 2014, in Dawson v Thomson Airways, that under English law a claim for compensation under the regulation is subject to the six-year limitation period of the Limitation Act 198014. Enforcement is national. In Belgium, for instance, the civil aviation authority supervises compliance and can impose administrative fines on airlines that fail to comply, while compensation and refunds remain the responsibility of the airline concerned15.