Bacău flight compensation: EU 261 rights for delayed and cancelled flights from BCM

If your flight from Bacău International Airport "George Enescu" (IATA code BCM) was delayed by three hours or more, cancelled with short notice, or you were denied boarding, EU Regulation 261/2004 gives you a fixed financial right against the operating carrier. The amounts run from 250 to 400 euro for almost every route flown out of Bacău. This page explains what the regulation protects, how to file the claim against Wizz Air or any other carrier serving BCM, when ANPC and AACR step in, and how the Romanian three-year prescription decides whether your claim survives.

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Bacău airport at a glance — and why disruptions cluster here

Bacău International Airport is a single-runway regional airport in eastern Romania. Its commercial traffic is dominated by Wizz Air, which serves the Italian diaspora corridor (Bergamo, Bologna, Rome, Milan Malpensa, Treviso), plus a handful of UK, German, Spanish and Belgian routes. A smaller share goes to Ryanair and seasonal charters.

Two structural features make BCM more prone to disruption than larger Romanian hubs like Henri Coandă in Bucharest. First, a single low-cost carrier covers most departures, so a delay on an inbound rotation from Italy cascades into the next four or five outbound flights of the day. Second, the airport has limited spare aircraft and crew on site — when the night curfew on inbound flights hits, a delay rolls into the following morning.

For the passenger, none of this matters legally. Under EU 261, the carrier owes the fixed compensation whenever the cause is within its operational control, whatever the rotation pattern. The CJEU made the point clearly in Sturgeon (joined cases C-402/07 and C-432/07, 2009): a long delay at the final destination is treated equivalently to a cancellation for compensation purposes, regardless of the carrier's internal scheduling reasons.

Your three core EU 261 rights at BCM

A passenger checked in for a flight from Bacău has three separable rights under EU Regulation 261/2004 :

1. Fixed compensation of 250 or 400 euro per passenger when the flight is delayed by three hours or more on arrival, cancelled with less than 14 days notice, or affected by denied boarding — and the cause is within the airline's control.
2. Refund or re-routing when the flight is cancelled or delayed by five hours or more. The passenger picks; the airline does not.
3. Right to care — meals, drinks, two phone calls, and a hotel with transfers if the wait is overnight — from the moment the delay crosses two hours on a short route or three hours on a medium route. This right exists regardless of cause, including extraordinary circumstances.

The compensation amounts for typical Bacău routes:

The carrier may try to pay in lei at its own exchange rate — the regulation allows that — but the claim is denominated in euro. Insist on the euro amount and the day's official BNR rate if conversion is offered.

When the airline can lawfully refuse — extraordinary circumstances

The fixed compensation falls away if the carrier proves the disruption was caused by extraordinary circumstances outside its control that could not have been avoided with all reasonable measures. The Court of Justice has built a tight line of case law on what counts.

Not extraordinary (compensation is owed):

• Ordinary technical defects discovered during turnaround — confirmed in Wallentin-Hermann (C-549/07, 2008).
• A wildcat strike by the carrier's own crew — confirmed in Krüsemann (C-195/17, 2018).
• Crew shortages, missing slots due to operational planning, late inbound rotation from a previous Wizz Air leg.

Usually extraordinary (no compensation, but the airline still owes meals, hotel and refund/re-routing):

• Severe meteorological conditions over Bacău or the destination.
• Air traffic control closures, including Eurocontrol slot restrictions affecting Italy in summer.
• Bird strike on the aircraft, depending on circumstances.
• A security alert or airport closure.

In a Bacău case the typical defence raised by carriers is "technical issue" or "operational reasons". Neither holds up under Wallentin-Hermann unless the airline produces specific evidence — a manufacturer service bulletin, a fleet-wide hidden defect, a sabotage report. A bare assertion in a refusal email is not enough.

Filing the claim — step by step from Bacău

The procedure is identical for any Romanian airport, but a few details matter when the disruption happened at BCM.

1. Send a written claim to the operating carrier. Use the airline's official complaint form (Wizz Air, Ryanair and most others have one). Include: the booking reference, the flight number, the date, the duration of the delay or fact of cancellation, the requested amount in euro, your IBAN, and the legal basis — "EU Regulation 261/2004, articles 5 and 7". Do not accept vouchers in lieu of cash.

2. Wait 30 days. Romanian and EU consumer practice treats 30 days as the reasonable response window. After that, silence equals refusal.

3. Escalate to ANPC. The National Authority for Consumer Protection (Autoritatea Națională pentru Protecția Consumatorilor) accepts free online complaints in Romanian or English. ANPC has the power to fine carriers operating in Romania and is often the fastest lever against Wizz Air.

4. Parallel complaint to AACR. The Romanian Civil Aeronautical Authority (Autoritatea Aeronautică Civilă Română) is the National Enforcement Body designated under EU 261 for Romania. AACR's role is technical: it confirms whether the disruption qualifies for compensation and pressures the carrier. AACR will not, however, force payment — that requires a court.

5. Judecătoria Bacău, small-claims procedure. If escalation fails, the competent court is the Judecătoria of the place where the passenger is domiciled or the Judecătoria Bacău as the place of departure. Claims under 10,000 lei follow the simplified small-claims procedure (procedura cu privire la cererile de valoare redusă). The stamp duty is symbolic — about 50 lei — and oral hearings are rare. Many cases are decided on paper within two to four months.

For a deeper walk-through of the filing options, see our step-by-step guide on how to file a flight delay claim from Romania and the trade-offs in filing yourself versus using a claims service .

Three-year prescription — the deadline that matters

The CJEU ruled in Cuadrench Moré (C-139/11, 2013) that EU 261 claims are subject to national limitation periods, not a uniform EU deadline. For a Romanian passenger this means three years from the date of the disrupted flight, under article 2517 of the Romanian Civil Code on ordinary prescription.

Three years sounds generous, but the period runs strictly from the flight date — not from the moment you decided to claim, and not from the airline's last refusal email. A 2023 Bacău departure must be filed by mid-2026; after that the Judecătoria Bacău will reject the case on prescription grounds, even if the file is otherwise watertight.

Two practical traps:

• A negotiation with the airline does not stop prescription unless the airline expressly acknowledges the debt in writing. A "we are reviewing your case" message does not interrupt the three years.
• ANPC and AACR complaints do not stop prescription either. Only a court filing or a written debt acknowledgment from the airline does.

Bacău flight delay — the three-hour rule under Sturgeon

EU 261's text says nothing about compensation for delays — only cancellations. The right to compensation for a long delay was created by the Court of Justice in Sturgeon (joined cases C-402/07 and C-432/07, 2009), which held that passengers who arrive at their final destination three hours or more after the scheduled arrival are entitled to the same fixed compensation as those whose flight was cancelled.

What counts is the arrival time, not the departure. A Bacău flight that left two hours late but landed five hours late at the final destination — for example a connection to Naples via Bergamo — still qualifies for the 250 euro compensation. The CJEU extended this logic to connecting itineraries in Folkerts (C-11/11, 2013) and Wegener (C-537/17, 2018): if your missed connection is booked on a single reservation, the delay at the final destination is what counts, not the delay on the first leg out of BCM.

For the practical thresholds, see our EU 261 2026 delay thresholds guide .

What to do right now if you are stuck at BCM

If you are reading this in the terminal, work through these steps in order.

1. Photograph the departures board showing the delay or "Anulat" / "Cancelled" status. This is your primary evidence and outlasts any later airline denial.
2. Save every SMS, email and push notification from the airline. The official notice time matters for the 14-day rule.
3. Ask staff for the cause in writing. If they refuse, note their names and the time. The cause stated at the airport often differs from the cause cited later in the refusal email — useful evidence for the Judecătoria.
4. Demand meals and hotel if the wait is long or overnight, under article 9 of EU 261. If staff refuse, buy reasonably and keep receipts — they are reimbursable.
5. Refuse any voucher or paper that "settles" the case. A signed waiver may bind you later before a Romanian court. The 250 or 400 euro claim can wait — there is no need to commit at the counter.
6. Do not rush. You have three years to file. Take notes, leave the airport, and submit the claim in writing once you are home.

For more on what to do in a strike or weather-driven disruption, see our strike compensation guide and the related native Romanian Bacău page for local context.

The bottom line for Bacău passengers

A delayed or cancelled flight from Bacău is, in compensation terms, no different from a flight out of Henri Coandă or Cluj-Napoca. The legal floor is set by EU 261/2004 and the CJEU case law that interprets it. Wizz Air and other low-cost carriers operating BCM routinely refuse first-pass claims — but those refusals fall apart at ANPC, AACR and the Judecătoria when the passenger has the evidence and acts inside three years.

The euro figures are modest but real. A family of four whose Bacău-Bologna flight is delayed five hours by a technical fault is owed 1,000 euro. Filing takes an hour. The cost of doing nothing is the same 1,000 euro — paid to the airline as a discount for the disruption it caused.

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