Rights regarding airline schedule change

When you purchase a ticket on an airline, any airline, you have agreed to both terms and conditions of the ticket and to the airline's Conditions of Carriage (or Contract of Carriage, or General Conditions of Carriage, etc.). The Conditions of Carriage is your contract with the airline, and sets forth what the passenger can expect as far as accommodations in case of delay or cancellation, advance notice of flight changes, and so forth, as well as what they are required to do in terms of payment, arrival at the airport prior to the flight, baggage size, and so on.

The Thomas Cook Airlines UK Conditions of Carriage, Section A5.1 reads

5.1 Schedule Changes
We will inform you of any significant changes to your flight as soon as we become aware of them. If flight times change significantly, we will send a revised confirmation itinerary to the email address or postal address that you gave at the time of booking. If a travel agent has made the booking on your behalf, all confirmations will be sent to that travel agent. However, it is your responsibility to reconfirm all flight details at least 48 hours prior to departure by viewing your booking itinerary online using our ‘Manage Booking’ facility on this website.

Departure and flight times shown may change between the date of booking and the date you actually travel. We do not guarantee them to you and they do not form part of your contract with us.

Before we accept your booking, we will notify you of the scheduled flight time in effect at that time, and it will be shown on your Ticket. It is possible that we may need to change the scheduled flight time subsequent to issue of your ticket. If you provide us with contact information, we will endeavour to notify you of any such changes. If there is a flight change on your booking, a significant change is: a change of time over 12 hours or more, a change of destination, or a change of the UK departure airport. Any other change is not a significant change. Any change which is not deemed to be significant will be classed as a minor change. If, after you purchase your Ticket, we make a significant change to the scheduled flight time, which is not acceptable to you, and we are unable to book you on an alternate flight which is acceptable to you, you may be entitled to a refund.

[emphasis added] This is repeated under Section A17:

17. Changes made by Thomas Cook Airlines prior to travel
The flight times shown may change between the date of booking and the date you actually travel. We do not guarantee them to you and they do not form part of your contract with us. Before we accept your booking, we will notify you of the scheduled flight time in effect at that time, and it will be shown on your confirmation email. It is possible we may need to change the scheduled flight time. If you provide us with contact information, we will endeavour to notify you of any such changes. If, after you make your booking, we make a significant change to the scheduled flight time, which is not acceptable to you, and we are unable to book you on an alternate flight which is acceptable to you, you will be entitled to a refund. If there is a flight change on your booking, a significant change is: a change of time over 12 hours or more, a change of destination, or a change of the UK departure airport. Any other change is not a significant change. Any change which is not deemed to be significant will be classed as a minor change. Occasionally your airline has to make changes on the day of departure that can result in withdrawal or changes to pre-booked flight services.

[emphasis added]

Ryanair's contract, in contrast, states

9.1.1 The flight timings shown on your Confirmation/Itinerary or elsewhere may change between the date of reservation and the date of travel.
9.1.2 When we accept your booking, we will notify you of the scheduled flight timings in effect as of that time, and it will be shown on your Confirmation/Itinerary. It is possible we may need to change the scheduled flight timings after you have booked your flight. If you provide us with your e-mail address and an away contact number, we will endeavour to notify you of any changes by such means. In the situations not covered by Article 9.2 below, if, after you make your reservation, but before the date of travel, we change the scheduled departure time by more than three hours and this is unacceptable to you and we are unable to book you on an alternative flight which is acceptable to you, you will be entitled to a refund for all monies paid in respect of the time changed flight.

Most of the above is standard language; you'll find very similar wording in BA's Conditions of Carriage or Virgin Atlantic's Conditions of Carriage, for example. A key difference is that neither BA nor Virgin define what a significant change is. This gives their agents a good deal of leeway. Ryanair puts a significant change at three hours. Thomas Cook pushes it out to twelve.

Unfortunately, because of the way Thomas Cook's contract is written, you have very little recourse here.

• The change was less than twelve hours, and so not a significant change as defined by the contract. They will say they owe you nothing at all.
• You did not experience a delay, bump, or cancellation, so stipulations for delayed, bumped, or cancelled passengers do not apply to you, nor does any obvious part of the European Union Air Passenger Rights legislation, which is similarly focused on delays, denied boarding situations, and cancellations.
• Thomas Cook is focused on leisure travelers, who as a whole tend to be more price-sensitive and less time-sensitive (whereas business travelers as a whole tend to be more time-sensitive and less price-sensitive). As such, they and airlines like them will make decisions that may negatively affect reliability in the interest of keeping their ticket prices low. In other words, their very business model requires that they be able to impose changes like this.

As such, any refund or other accommodation you can get from them seems like it would be done as a customer service gesture as opposed to any legal or contractual obligation. I would try to explain, calmly, the great inconvenience this is causing your party, and the negative impression it is leaving on a large multi-generational group, and that it is in your mutual interest to be reaccommodated. But there are no guarantees. Even if they were willing to move you to the previous flight, that flight could be full or cancelled.

Having organized groups of similar size, I know how difficult it must have been to get everyone to this point, especially with children. But in the grand scheme of things, if they decline you reaccommodation, it may be best to move on and just try to enjoy the holiday otherwise. In a time when a man in wheelchair was forced to crawl off an aircraft, and fistfights have broken out over seat reclining, flight being moved three hours earlier is not the most compelling cause for a Twitter campaign. And if you ever fly them again, your expectations have been set at a low bar.

In a situation like this, you are entitled to a full refund. That's all. It's in your terms and conditions somewhere. Yes, it's patently unfair, but it's the way things work.

Your only way to get shifted to the previous flight is to negotiate, and your only leverage is that you are entitled to a refund. The airline does not particularly want to lose 12 fares, so call them and tell them you'll be cancelling the flights unless they can shift you to something convenient. Of course, if the flights you want are already full, then the airline isn't going to bump paying passengers to accommodate you.

It may be better to negotiate with the airline rather than the travel agent, unless this is part of a package deal, in which case the agent will probably try to accommodate you to avoid you cancelling the whole package.

Incidentally 3 hours change is pretty close to the limit where you might not even be entitled to a refund.