Ryanair flight grounded for 15 hours, passengers received £3.38 vouchers while EC261 compensation applies

Quick summary

Ryanair flight FR6359 from Kraków to Liverpool was delayed more than 15 hours on August 3–4, 2026, after a technical fault grounded the scheduled aircraft. Around 150 passengers received refreshment vouchers worth 17 Polish zloty (approximately £3.38) — less than the cost of a single coffee at Kraków Airport. Under EC261/2004, affected travelers on this sub-1,500 km route may be entitled to €250 in cash compensation, independent of what they paid for their ticket.

The technical fault is the critical variable: if Ryanair cannot demonstrate extraordinary circumstances, compensation is owed. Passengers still have time to file — claims can be submitted years after the flight date.

A technical fault on the morning of August 3 left roughly 150 Ryanair passengers stranded at Kraków Airport (KRK) for the better part of a day and night. Flight FR6359, scheduled to depart at 8:55 a.m. and land in Liverpool by 10:40 a.m., eventually pushed back just after midnight — the replacement aircraft touching down at Liverpool John Lennon Airport (LPL) around 2:00 a.m. on August 4.

What crystallized the frustration wasn’t just the wait. It was the voucher: 17 PLN, handed out per boarding pass as the airline’s care provision for a delay that stretched across an entire day. A coffee at Kraków Airport costs 21 PLN. The math is not subtle.

For travelers on EU-departing flights, this gap between nominal care and real airport prices is exactly the scenario EC261/2004 was designed to address — and it comes with a cash compensation mechanism that most passengers on this flight may not realize they can access.

What EC261 actually requires — and what Ryanair provided

Ryanair‘s own passenger-rights documentation states that for delays exceeding two hours, the airline must provide meals and refreshments that are reasonable relative to the waiting time, plus hotel accommodation and airport-to-hotel transport when an overnight stay becomes necessary. That language — “reasonable relative to waiting time” — is doing significant work here. A 15-hour delay is not a two-hour delay, and a voucher that cannot purchase a single beverage is difficult to characterize as reasonable by any standard.

On the compensation side, the Kraków–Liverpool route falls under the lowest EC261 distance band: under 1,500 km. Per Ryanair’s own EU261 document, passengers on flights in this band who arrive more than three hours late — and whose delay was not caused by extraordinary circumstances — are entitled to €250 per person. The ticket price is irrelevant; compensation is fixed by regulation, not by what anyone paid for their seat.

For passengers holding UK-issued boarding passes or filing under UK jurisdiction, the aligned domestic regime pays £220 for routes up to 1,500 km. Same threshold, same logic, different currency.

The extraordinary-circumstances question is where this claim lives or dies. Ryanair’s delay FAQ lists adverse weather, air traffic control restrictions, strikes, and medical emergencies as examples of qualifying extraordinary circumstances. A technical fault on the airline’s own aircraft — absent an external trigger — does not typically meet that bar. Ryanair attributed the FR6359 disruption to a “minor technical issue,” which, if that characterization holds, points toward compensation eligibility rather than away from it.

Why voucher complaints keep surfacing — and what the regulation actually allows

The 17 PLN voucher on FR6359 is not an isolated incident. Across the low-cost carrier sector, fixed-value care coupons have repeatedly fallen short of actual airport concession prices — a structural tension that exists because EC261 specifies reasonableness rather than a minimum monetary amount. Airlines set their own internal figures; regulators have not mandated a floor.

That gap creates a specific remedy passengers often overlook. Because the regulation frames care as reasonable provision rather than a fixed voucher, travelers who spent more than the voucher covered can submit receipted expenses directly to the airline. The voucher is not a ceiling — it is a floor that, in this case, sat below the price of a coffee.

Third-party EC261 specialists including Flightright and AirHelp accept Ryanair cases and typically allow claims to be filed for several years after the disruption date, which means FR6359 passengers are not under immediate pressure — though filing sooner keeps documentation fresher.

How to file and what to keep

FR6359 passengers face a straightforward claim path — but the technical-fault determination is still unresolved, and Ryanair’s response to individual claims will depend on how the airline classifies the cause.

• File the EC261 or UK261 compensation claim now. Use Ryanair’s passenger-rights portal directly. Attach your boarding pass and any documentation showing the actual arrival time in Liverpool. The claim is for €250 (EU) or £220 (UK) per passenger — not per booking.
• Submit a separate expenses claim for inadequate care. The 17 PLN voucher did not meet the “reasonable” standard for a 15-hour delay. Scan every receipt for food, drinks, transport, or accommodation incurred during the wait and submit through Ryanair’s expenses channel with a brief note that the provided voucher was insufficient.
• If Ryanair rejects on extraordinary-circumstances grounds, escalate. A technical fault on the airline’s own aircraft is not automatically extraordinary. Ryanair’s site lists approved alternative dispute resolution bodies — use them before paying a third-party claim service, which typically takes 25–35% of any payout.
• Travelers who used a third-party booking platform should still file directly with Ryanair — EC261 rights run against the operating carrier, not the booking agent.
• Document the delay independently. FlightAware and similar tracking tools provide timestamped departure and arrival records that can corroborate your claim if Ryanair disputes the delay duration.

Watch: Ryanair’s formal response to FR6359 compensation claims — expected within the airline’s standard 28-day acknowledgment window — will signal whether the carrier is classifying the technical fault as extraordinary. If it does, expect escalations to national enforcement bodies and third-party claim specialists to follow quickly.

Questions? Answers.