Monrovia-Europe flight delay: €600 compensation per passenger

Monrovia Roberts International (ROB) connects Liberia to Europe almost entirely through hubs. Which airline you choose decides two separate things here: whether you are owed a fixed €600, and what your baggage is worth if it goes missing. Liberia is one of the few African countries where the second question has a surprising answer.

Are you eligible? The rule in 30 seconds

EC 261/2004 applies in two cases:

• The flight departs from an EU airport: covered whatever the airline.
• The airline is European: covered in both directions, including departures from Monrovia.

The 3-hour threshold is measured on arrival (doors open), not at departure.

The Liberia exception: your baggage is worth four times less

This is the part almost nobody knows, and it is worth real money.

The Montreal Convention (1999) caps baggage compensation at 1,519 SDR per passenger, roughly €1,800, whatever your bag weighs. But it only applies if the country of departure and the country of arrival have both ratified it. Liberia has not.

So on a non-EU airline out of Monrovia, you fall back on the Warsaw Convention (1929), which pays by the kilo, about 17 SDR per kg. For a 23 kg suitcase that is roughly €460 instead of €1,800. Warsaw also gives you shorter deadlines to complain: 3 days for a damaged bag and 14 days for a delayed one, against 7 and 21 under Montreal.

There is one way out, and it is the airline itself. EU law (Regulation 2027/97) requires every European carrier to apply the Montreal rules on all its flights, whatever the route. So the same Monrovia-Brussels journey gives you about €1,800 of baggage cover on Brussels Airlines, and about €460 on a local carrier. Full detail: which text protects your flight.

Connecting flights

If your ticket is a single booking with a connection, the delay is measured at the final destination (Folkerts, CJEU 2013). A connection missed in Brussels, Casablanca or Lomé that lands you 3 hours late opens the right to compensation, calculated on the total distance.

The airline's excuses: valid or not

The airline only escapes compensation for an extraordinary circumstance it could not have avoided.

Valid: extreme weather, airspace closure, air traffic control strike.

Not valid, the compensation remains due: technical fault (Wallentin-Hermann, CJEU), aircraft late from its previous rotation, a strike by the airline's own staff (Krüsemann, CJEU), understaffing or poor organisation.

Family: every passenger counts

Compensation is due per passenger, regardless of age. A family of 4 on a Monrovia-Europe flight arriving 4 hours late: €2,400 recovered, of which €1,800 for you (75%) in the amicable phase.

What you receive, in full

Robin des Airs does not work for you: Robin des Airs buys your claim and recovers it in its own name. So you have no fee to pay, you have an assignment price to receive, which depends on what is actually recovered.

• €0 upfront, and €0 if nothing is recovered. The risk is ours, not yours.
• We always start with the amicable phase. You then receive 75% of what is recovered.
• Court only happens if the airline refuses to pay. You then receive 60%, and the lawyer, bailiff and court costs are advanced and borne by us, win or lose.
• Paid to your account within 5 working days of collection.