A number of Air Malta passengers who were stranded for 12 hours at Budapest’s airport on Monday due to a massive delay of their flight are complaining about the bad service they received from the national airline. They also accused Air Malta of trying to circumvent EU rules to avoid paying them compensation.

After one of its aircraft was grounded due to a technical fault, the airline had to delay five of its scheduled flights last Monday. The worst hit were passengers travelling to and from Budapest on KM 520/1.

Passengers who were scheduled to leave Budapest at 1.50pm were in for a shock when they turned up at the check-in desk and were told their flight had been delayed by 12 hours.

“Instead of advising us through a call or an e-mail that our flight had been delayed by half a day they only deemed fit to tell us when we checked in,” a frustrated Maltese passenger told the Times of Malta. “They had all our details but no one bothered to advise us,” he complained.

Another passenger objected to Air Malta’s press statement on the delay, which said “passengers were given all the desired assistance”.

“In Budapest there was no one to complain to as Air Malta does not even have a representative at the airport,” said the passenger, who travels frequently to Hungary.

“We called Malta and they told us we would be entitled to some vouchers to buy a drink,” he complained.

We called Malta and they told us we would be entitled to some vouchers to buy a drink

“They should have provided us with accommodation, organised our transport and compensated us. Instead, we were told to remain at the airport for 12 long hours,” a Hungarian passenger said.

According to EU rules on passenger rights, air carriers are obliged to offer €250 compensation to their passengers the flight is delayed more than three hours.

Airlines are also obliged to offer alternative flights with a similar schedule. In that case, compensation is reduced by 50 per cent.

However, passengers complained that none of this was offered.

When contacted, an Air Malta spokesman conceded it was not possible for the airline to advise passengers about their delay as “the aircraft scheduled to operate the flight was declared unserviceable just one hour before the flight”.

According to Air Malta, at the time, the passengers were already at the airport checking in.

On the issue of offering assistance, the spokesman said: “In Budapest instructions were sent to our handling agents to provide assistance and attempts were made to offer alternative routes.”

“However, since August is a peak month, this proved challenging,” the airline said.