EU 261 reform 2026: what changes for Romanian air passengers

The EU 261 reform 2026 — Regulation 2026/261 — is the most-discussed update to European air passenger rights in two decades. Most of what passengers read about it online is wrong, exaggerated, or out of date. The two questions that actually matter to someone whose flight from Otopeni, Cluj-Napoca International or Iași was just cancelled are far simpler: does the reform cut the EUR 600 cheque, and does it remove the free complaint route through ANPC and AACR? The answer to both is no. The compensation amounts stay where they are, the Romanian enforcement bodies stay where they are, and the three-year prescription period at Judecătoria stays where it is. What the reform does change is how an airline must behave when a claim lands on its desk — and that change is on the passenger's side, not the carrier's.

This page is the pillar guide for the reform on Compensare Zbor. It explains what is settled, what is still being finalised in the consolidated text on EUR-Lex, how the existing CJEU case law continues to govern every disrupted flight, and how a passenger from Bucharest, Timișoara, Sibiu or Constanța should think about a claim under the transition. If you need the step-by-step procedure rather than the bigger picture, our companion article on the EU 261 2026 claim process walks through the exact filing flow.

The headline first: compensation amounts do not change

A flight that is delayed by three hours or more at the final destination, or is cancelled with less than 14 days' notice and no acceptable rerouting, triggers a fixed payment under Article 7 of Regulation (EC) No 261/2004 . The figures are:

• EUR 250 for flights up to 1,500 km — for example Bucharest to Vienna or Cluj-Napoca to Munich.
• EUR 400 for intra-EU flights over 1,500 km and other flights between 1,500 and 3,500 km — for example Bucharest to Madrid or Iași to Brussels.
• EUR 600 for flights over 3,500 km outside the EU — for example Bucharest to Doha or Otopeni to New York.

The 2026 reform does not propose to change any of these three numbers, the kilometric thresholds, or the basic right itself. Every claim that today pays EUR 600 will continue to pay EUR 600 after the reform enters into force. Anyone who reads "the reform cuts compensation in half" on social media is repeating an old draft that never made it into the consolidated text. The misunderstanding is widespread enough that we mention it explicitly: if the rumour were true, the reform would be a downgrade of consumer protection that the European Parliament could not realistically sign off on without a fight neither the Commission nor the airlines want.

What stays the same

The reform leaves a long list of rights untouched. For Romanian passengers the most important elements that do not move are:

• The EUR 250 / EUR 400 / EUR 600 compensation grid.
• The three-hour delay threshold at the final destination — the rule from Sturgeon (joined cases C-402/07 and C-432/07, 2009), which turned a long delay into the equivalent of a cancellation for compensation purposes.
• The extraordinary-circumstances defence, and the rule that the burden of proof sits on the airline to show both that the circumstance existed and that the disruption could not have been avoided with all reasonable measures (Wallentin-Hermann, C-549/07, 2008).
• The duty of care: meals, refreshments, hotel accommodation where overnight stay is needed, transport between the hotel and the airport, and two free phone calls. This duty continues even when the cause is an extraordinary circumstance — McDonagh (C-12/11, 2013) made that explicit during the Eyjafjallajökull volcanic ash crisis.
• The three-year prescription period in Romania, under article 2517 of the Romanian Civil Code, confirmed for EU 261 cases by Cuadrench Moré (C-139/11, 2013).
• The free Romanian enforcement routes: ANPC for consumer complaints and AACR for systemic supervision of EU 261 compliance.
• The right to file in Judecătoria as a small-claims matter under Romanian civil procedure.

That list is the bedrock. Any claim filed today, any claim filed during the transition, and any claim filed after the reform enters into force will rest on the same foundations.

What the reform tightens

The reform targets the structural problem that anyone who has ever pursued a claim against an airline recognises: not the amounts, not the eligibility, but the way the airline handles the claim. The standard pattern is a flat refusal, then silence, then a low-ball offer, dragged out over months in the hope the passenger gives up. The reform is designed to close that window.

Two areas are in focus.

Response deadlines. Regulation 261/2004 does not give a single clear figure for how quickly an airline must reply to a compensation claim. The reform aims to introduce explicit deadlines — a fixed number of days within which the airline must acknowledge the claim, process it and either pay or give a reasoned refusal. The exact figure depends on the final consolidated text and we will not state any specific number as settled until the official version on EUR-Lex is unambiguous.

Active information duties. The reform discusses stronger obligations on airlines to inform passengers proactively about their rights — at the gate, by email, and in the documentation handed over during a disruption. Today many passengers learn about EU 261 from a third party, weeks or months after the event. The reform wants the airline to be the source.

The aim is not to invent new rights. The aim is to make the existing rights harder to ignore.

What is still uncertain in the consolidated text

A regulation is not final until the consolidated text is published on EUR-Lex and the transition dates are fixed. Several elements of the 2026 reform are still being finalised:

• The exact length of the new airline response deadline.
• The penalty for missing that deadline — automatic payment, statutory interest, an administrative fine, or some combination.
• How the duty of care during extreme multi-day disruptions interacts with the existing case law from McDonagh.
• The precise wording of the strengthened information duties.

Until the consolidated version is locked, we cite the direction of the reform but not the specific figures. That is not evasiveness — it is the only honest position when a regulation is between the Council and the Parliament. If you read a website that gives you exact day-counts for the new deadlines as if they were already law, treat that source with caution.

Why the CJEU case law still runs the show

Romanian passengers sometimes ask whether the existing CJEU rulings still matter after the reform. They do. A reform of the regulation does not erase the body of case law that the Court has built on top of the 2004 text. Several rulings continue to govern day-to-day claims:

• Sturgeon (joined cases C-402/07 and C-432/07, 2009) — a delay of three hours or more at the final destination triggers the same compensation as a cancellation. This is the single most-cited ruling in EU 261 case law and the reform does not displace it.
• Wallentin-Hermann (C-549/07, 2008) — technical defects detected during routine maintenance are not extraordinary circumstances. The airline carries the burden of proving both that the circumstance was extraordinary and that the disruption could not have been avoided.
• Cuadrench Moré (C-139/11, 2013) — the prescription period for an EU 261 claim is set by the national law of the forum. In Romania that means the three-year period under article 2517 of the Romanian Civil Code.
• Krüsemann (C-195/17, 2018) — a wildcat strike by the airline's own crew is not an extraordinary circumstance. The reform does nothing to change that classification.
• McDonagh (C-12/11, 2013) — even when the cause is extraordinary (Eyjafjallajökull volcanic ash), the duty of care continues with no time limit.

Any rejection letter you receive that ignores one of these rulings is, in plain terms, wrong on the law — and ANPC, AACR or a Judecătoria will recognise that when shown the citation.

How this affects a claim filed from Romania

For a passenger whose flight has just been disrupted at Otopeni, Cluj-Napoca, Iași, Timișoara, Sibiu, Bacău or Craiova, the practical situation in 2026 is the following.

A disruption that happens today is governed by Regulation 261/2004 as currently in force. You contact the airline, you receive a reply (or silence), and if the airline refuses or stalls, you escalate to ANPC or you file in Judecătoria. The three-year prescription period at article 2517 of the Romanian Civil Code starts running from the date of the flight.

A disruption that happens after the reform enters into force is governed by Regulation 2026/261. The compensation amounts are identical. The route through ANPC and AACR is identical. What is different is that the airline will be under sharper time pressure to respond and stronger duties to inform you of your rights. Our step-by-step claim process guide explains how to use that pressure if the airline still drags its feet.

A disruption during the transition — between today and the date the consolidated text enters into force — is governed by the regulation in force at the moment of the flight. Save your boarding pass, the booking confirmation and any communication from the airline, exactly as you would today. The reform does not retroactively change a disruption that has already happened.

If you want to estimate how much you could be owed for a specific flight before you start the paperwork, our flight compensation calculator gives you the figure based on the route distance under the current grid — and the grid will not change after the reform.

ANPC, AACR and Judecătoria after the reform

The Romanian enforcement architecture is unchanged.

ANPC — the Autoritatea Națională pentru Protecția Consumatorilor — remains the first free escalation route when an airline refuses a claim or stops answering. ANPC handles the complaint as a consumer matter and applies pressure on the carrier. It is fast, free and does not require a lawyer.

AACR — the Autoritatea Aeronautică Civilă Română — is the national enforcement body designated under Article 16 of Regulation 261/2004. It supervises EU 261 compliance for flights departing from Romanian airports and handles systemic issues. AACR cooperates with the equivalent national enforcement bodies in other Member States, which matters when a flight to Romania departed from a foreign airport.

Judecătoria — the small-claims civil court — is the route of last resort. Under Romanian civil procedure a claim of up to RON 10,000 can be filed as a simplified action. EU 261 cash compensation almost always sits below that threshold. The three-year prescription period under article 2517 of the Romanian Civil Code, confirmed by Cuadrench Moré (C-139/11) as the rule for EU 261 claims, sets the clock.

The reform does not remove or modify any of these three routes. If anything, the tightened airline obligations should make the AACR and ANPC files shorter and the Judecătoria filings rarer, because the airline will have less room to stall in the first place.

When to use a claims service and when to file yourself

A reform that tightens airline obligations is, on paper, a reform that makes self-filing easier. In practice the calculation is the same one passengers have always made. If your case is clean — flight from a Romanian airport, delay above three hours at the final destination, no obvious extraordinary circumstance, airline that responds to email — self-filing through ANPC is fast and free and there is no good reason to share the EUR 250 or EUR 400 with anyone. If the airline is stonewalling, the cause is ambiguous, the flight crosses jurisdictions, or you simply do not want to spend two months chasing a carrier, a no-win-no-fee claims service handles the paperwork, the escalation and (if needed) the court filing in exchange for a percentage.

Check your flight with AirHelp — free assessment, payment only on success

A read-through of our self-filing versus claims-service comparison covers when each route is the better answer for a Romanian passenger.

The bottom line for 2026

The EU 261 reform 2026 is not the rights-cut some headlines have made it out to be. The amounts stay. The Romanian enforcement bodies stay. The three-year prescription period stays. What changes is the pressure on airlines to handle a claim properly and on time — and that change runs in the passenger's favour. Until the consolidated text is published on EUR-Lex with the exact response deadlines, treat any specific day-counts you read with healthy scepticism. The fundamentals — Sturgeon, Wallentin-Hermann, Cuadrench Moré, Krüsemann, McDonagh — keep running the case law and will keep running it for the foreseeable future.

If your flight was disrupted, do not wait for the reform to land. File now under the rules that are in force now. EUR 600 today is worth more than EUR 600 after another year of stalling.