A new survey quantifies the financial and emotional toll of flight disruptions, pointing to a widening gap between passenger rights on paper and passenger experience in practice.

Nearly eight in 10 travelers experienced a flight disruption in the past year, and for most the damage went well beyond the inconvenience itself. A new survey from AirHelp, a company dedicated to supporting travelers throughout their journey, puts a number on what disruption actually costs passengers: an average of €514 out of pocket, plus a real toll on their time, plans and well-being.

These figures reflect an industry operating under sustained pressure, with disruption continuing to shape the everyday experience of millions of travelers.

Air travel has largely recovered from its pandemic-era lows, but disruption remains a persistent feature of modern flying, driven by everything from air traffic control constraints to weather, staffing and aging infrastructure. Globally, 79 percent of respondents had a flight canceled, delayed by more than two hours or otherwise disrupted in the past 12 months. Of those disruptions, 50 percent were delays over two hours, 15 percent were cancellations, and 14 percent involved delayed, lost or damaged luggage. These figures reflect an industry operating under sustained pressure, with disruption continuing to shape the everyday experience of millions of travelers.

The financial toll

Globally, nearly three-quarters of passengers (73 percent) incurred additional expenses due to disruptions, with costs averaging €514 per person, although that figure masks wide differences. It also marks a clear increase from previous surveys, which found average costs of just €362.50 per passenger.

UK and German travelers report the highest average costs, at roughly €708 and €619 respectively. Portuguese and Spanish travelers report the lowest, at approximately €277 and €340. The United States and Brazil sit in the mid-to-high range, at around €577 and €529. The spread likely reflects differing living and wage levels, but it also means the highest-cost markets can see disrupted trips cost nearly three times what they would in the cheapest.

Money isn’t the only thing that weighs on passengers during disruptions.

Fifty-seven percent of passengers had to spend extra out of pocket during a disruption. Another 20 percent lost money that couldn’t be recovered, a non-refundable hotel stay, for instance, while 5 percent lost income they’d expected to earn. Just over a quarter, 27 percent, said the disruption cost them nothing.

Emotional toll

Money isn’t the only thing that weighs on passengers during disruptions. Sixty-eight percent of all respondents globally cited stress or frustration as a consequence of their disruption. That finding holds up when you look at what passengers rated as a major problem. Globally, waiting around for long periods ranked as the most common major complaint, cited by 50 percent of passengers, followed closely by stress itself at 43 percent.

The knock-on effects extended well beyond the airport. Thirty percent said the disruption derailed specific plans during their trip, such as sightseeing or connecting activities. Twenty-nine percent reported negative health or well-being effects like fatigue, missed sleep or illness. Twenty-two percent missed work or professional obligations, and 20 percent missed personal events like family gatherings or celebrations. Only 8 percent said they experienced no impacts beyond the disruption itself.

A pattern of inconsistent support

Much of the toll passengers describe traces back to communication. Many report not knowing what support or compensation they were entitled to during a disruption.
Globally, in-the-moment support was inconsistent: 47 percent of passengers said they never received vouchers, air miles or future discounts, and 44 percent said they never received cash compensation or money back for their costs. Basic support fared a little better but was still patchy- 38 percent never received food and drink, while adequate information about the disruption was more reliably provided, with just 25 percent saying they never got it.

These findings vary by market. On cash compensation, American passengers were the least likely to receive money back, with 52 percent receiving none, while German passengers were the most likely, with only 34 percent reporting none.

The regulatory question

Over a third of travelers (35 percent) said they didn’t know that regulations protecting passenger rights exist when flying in Europe. Among those who might have been eligible for compensation, 31 percent globally never filed a claim simply because they didn’t know they could, while another 22 percent held back because the process seemed too complicated.

Travellers are paying a very high price for flight disruptions, and the damage goes well beyond the bank balance.

Tomasz Pawliszyn, CEO of AirHelp

These findings come from a global survey commissioned by AirHelp and launched in February, polling 1,996 passengers across the UK, Europe, the United States and Brazil about their experiences with flight disruptions over the past 12 months.

“Travellers are paying a very high price for flight disruptions, and the damage goes well beyond the bank balance,” says Tomasz Pawliszyn, CEO of AirHelp. He points to the gap between the protections that exist on paper, air passenger rights laws and what passengers actually experience.

“Passengers are entitled to care and, in many cases, compensation when their flight is disrupted,” Pawliszyn said. “But when the majority of travelers remain uninformed, that protection isn’t reaching the people it’s meant for.”

The findings point to a narrower and more tractable question than airline performance itself: whether existing consumer-protection rules are being communicated clearly enough to function as intended. As aviation authorities in the UK, EU and elsewhere continue reviewing passenger rights frameworks, this data suggests the more urgent gap may not be the rules themselves, but how well travelers understand them.

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Brussels is bracing for an unusual fight between the EU’s smallest country and a British ex-footballing legend.

Peter Shilton, the England goalkeeper who conceded the “Hand of God” goal from Diego Armando Maradona in 1986, has started a new life as an anti-gambling advocate after overcoming a decades-long addiction.

Despite being a diehard Brexit supporter, he’s become the poster boy of the European Parliament’s push to tax online betting in a bid to raise some much-needed funds to finance the bloc’s next €2 trillion budget.

But the campaign has run into strong opposition from Malta. The tiny island in the Mediterranean Sea, with a population of just over half a million people, is home to a burgeoning betting sector. It says that higher taxes will cripple its gambling industry, boost illegal operators and drive firms outside the bloc.

“[Malta] will not accept the introduction of any EU-level taxes designed to sustain the bloc’s spending,” the country’s Prime Minister, Robert Abela, told the Maltese Parliament in June.

But Shilton, who lost more than £1 million in betting on horse racing over 45 years and now runs his own gambling addiction charity, dismisses the arguments by Malta and the gambling lobbies as “window dressing.” He’s in favor of higher taxes as he wants to shrink advertising revenue that is used to lure in new gamblers.

“Deep down they’re after everybody’s money. Simple as that,” he told POLITICO during a visit to Brussels in June.

The topic has split the EU’s 27 governments, pitting gambling-heavy Southern European countries against their more supportive Western European peers, led by France. Capitals are already fighting even though the Commission hasn’t yet issued a formal proposal for the possible tax, which would ultimately need to be unanimously approved by governments.

It’s one of numerous budget battle lines being drawn, with Ireland — which is steering the talks as chair of the rotating Council presidency — set to restart negotiations to facilitate an overall deal on the EU budget before the end of the year.

That’s no mean feat given Dublin’s task to mesh competing spending priorities into a single budget — financing everything from farmers’ subsidies to foreign aid — that is acceptable for each of the EU’s 27 governments.

National capitals will have to unanimously approve new EU-wide taxes — known as own resources — to pay for soaring defense spending and post-Covid debt repayments if they want to avoid drastically increasing national contributions to Brussels.

Supporters of the gambling levy point to the fact that it would rake in over €13 billion throughout the next budget cycle and — for some, more importantly — address a serious public health issue. An estimated 80 million adults globally have experienced a gambling addiction, according to experts.

“We look on it [gambling] as an illness. It’s something that’s inborn in you and that can be ignited,” Shilton said.

Malta’s game plan

Malta has invested heavily in the gambling industry — including lotteries, betting and casinos increasingly operating online — which now accounts for around 12 percent of its gross domestic product.

These firms have relocated to Malta because of its light-touch licensing regime, business-friendly tax regime and balmy weather.

The country is “as dependent on the online gambling industry as Germany is on cars,” said an EU diplomat, granted anonymity to speak freely.

While gambling firms need local authorization to operate in most other European countries, securing the Maltese license is crucial to access banking services and gain a foothold in the EU market.

Malta-based firms dominated the German and Austrian online gambling markets before national regulators cracked down. This has prompted the Maltese government to refuse to recognize some court rulings and sanctions issued by other EU countries against its gambling firms.

Given its influence, it is hardly surprising that the gambling industry has found a friendly ear among Malta’s politicians in Brussels.

The Maltese president of the European Parliament, Roberta Metsola, last year gave the opening speech at an international gambling conference in Rome that also featured Italian Foreign Affairs Minister Antonio Tajani.

“I’m more than a little proud that it started in my island home of Malta,” she said, referring to SiGMA, a Maltese events company that focuses on online gambling founded by Eman Pulis, a university friend of Metsola.

Betting lobbies say they oppose higher gambling rates on the grounds that they will fuel appetite for the illegal market, away from the grasp of EU rules.

“A higher tax would lead to worse odds for the customers … and it is relevant because access to the illegal markets in Europe is, obviously, one click away,” said secretary general of the European Gaming and Betting Association, Maarten Haijer.

Nicola Matteucci, an economist at the Università Politecnica delle Marche in Italy who has undertaken extensive research on the gambling sector, argued there is a “point where prices exceed a certain level and the demand [for gambling] diminishes. But it’s not as immediate as suggested by the industry.”

Matteucci said that most gamblers will be undeterred by slightly higher taxes and worse odds as they are not fully rational consumers.

Anti-gambling groups reason instead that higher taxes will reduce the sector’s spending on commercials, preventing would-be punters from getting sucked in to gambling in the first place.

“Higher taxes will therefore mean less gambling advertising overall and many people would regard that as a public benefit,” said Derek Webb, the founder of the Campaign for Fairer Gambling advocacy group.

Club Med joins Malta

Malta has joined forces with fellow Mediterranean countries — Italy, Portugal and Spain — to challenge the mooted tax which was first proposed by the Parliament’s socialist lawmaker Victor Negrescu, said four diplomats with knowledge of the discussions.

According to the European Commission’s estimates, seen by POLITICO, a 3 percent tax on the net turnover of the online gambling sector would generate an estimated €1.9 billion per year.

With its big online gambling market, Spain is expected to be among the biggest financial losers, should the tax go ahead. It is estimated to be on the hook for €414 million per year, almost a quarter of the total amount. That compares to a projected bill of €165 million per year for Malta— a disproportionality high amount for such a small country.

Portugal is also reluctant to back the levy. It fears that higher taxes would eat into revenue brought in by state-run betting and lotteries that is currently channeled to the charity Santa Casa da Misericórdia de Lisboa‘s healthcare and youth support programs, said a Portuguese official.

Meanwhile, given the relatively low uptake of online gambling, Italy’s misgivings have surprised anti-betting advocates. Rome is expected to pay a mere 7 percent of the proposed new levy — a significantly lower proportion than its regular EU budget contributions.

However, Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni’s Brothers of Italy party has previously been receptive to the gambling industry. Last year its MPs passed a resolution encouraging the reversal of a ban on professional football clubs advertising gambling firms.