Comparison · success fee vs flat fee
Flightright alternative: pay $19, keep the payout
Both routes end with the airline paying EU261 compensation. One takes a success fee for filing on your behalf; the other charges a flat fee for the letters and leaves the filing to you.
No account. The verdict comes before the payment screen.
In Flightright's own published example, a €2,400 family claim (4 passengers, London-Abu Dhabi) costs €648 in fees plus €123.12 VAT — €771.12 total — leaving a €1,628.88 payout. With the $19 kit the airline pays the full €2,400.
A Flightright alternative is any way of claiming EU261 compensation without paying a success fee out of the payout. FlightOwe is the flat-fee version: $19 once for the cited claim letter, the airline's real submission address and the regulator complaint. Flightright's own worked examples show 32-34% of the payout going to fees and VAT — on a €2,400 family claim that's €771.12.
The short verdict
If your flight landed 3 or more hours late for a cause the airline can't hide behind, the claim is a letter and a date, and roughly a third of the money is a lot to pay for that. Buy the $19 kit. If Flightright has already told you the cause is contested, or you've written once and been refused, or you know you won't chase an airline for two months, their no-win-no-fee model earns its fee — you pay it only out of money you'd otherwise never see. Families should run the arithmetic first: compensation is per passenger, so a percentage grows with your booking and a flat fee doesn't.
The full side-by-side
Same regulation, same three bands, same airline at the other end. What changes is who files, who carries the risk of a rejection, and how much of the payout reaches you.
| FlightOwe · $19 flat | Flightright · no-win-no-fee | |
|---|---|---|
| Best for | A clear-cut claim you're willing to send yourself | A contested claim, or a claim you won't otherwise chase |
| Fee on a €600 claim (their own 27% example basis) | $19 | ~€193 (fee + VAT) |
| Fee on a €2,400 family claim (their published example) | $19 | €771.12 (fee + VAT) |
| Paid if the claim fails | $19, already spent | Nothing — Flightright states it covers the costs |
| Who files it | You | They do |
| Who the airline pays | You, in full | Them, then you |
| Ryanair claims | You file on Ryanair's own EU261 form | Ryanair refuses claims submitted by claim companies |
| Regulator escalation | Pre-addressed complaint in the kit, free to file | Handled for you |
| If a lawyer is needed | Small-claims guidance; you decide whether to file | +14% solicitor's surcharge, success-only, per their published fee schedule |
| Deadline tracking | Tracker in the kit, dated from your flight | Theirs |
Flightright figures are taken directly from flightright.com/costs (checked 22 September 2026): a success fee of "usually 20 to 30%" plus VAT, plus a 14% solicitor's surcharge, success-only, if lawyers are needed. Rates and terms can change — read the current ones on their site before deciding.
What Flightright's own examples cost
Rather than assume a rate, this page uses Flightright's own published worked examples from their costs page. Their intro example is explicitly framed around a 27% success fee — squarely inside their stated 20-30% range — with roughly 19% VAT on top of the fee, matching the ratio in their real examples.
| Service | Their cut | You keep |
|---|---|---|
| Flightright · fee + VAT | −€269.56 | €533.44 |
| FlightOwe · $19 flat | $19 | €800 |
London-Athens, 2 tickets, €800 compensation: €227 success fee + €42.56 VAT = €269.56 total cost, a 33.7% share of the payout. Source: flightright.com/costs, "Example 2." The $19 is charged in dollars at checkout, not deducted from the payout.
Four people on one booking
Compensation is per passenger. The letter is per flight. That gap is the whole argument, and it widens with every seat.
| Service | Their cut | You keep |
|---|---|---|
| Flightright · fee + VAT | −€771.12 | €1,628.88 |
| FlightOwe · $19 flat | $19 | €2,400 |
London-Abu Dhabi, 4 tickets, €2,400 compensation: €648 success fee + €123.12 VAT = €771.12 total cost, a 32.1% share of the payout. Source: flightright.com/costs, "Example 1." One FlightOwe kit covers everyone on the booking. The EU261 bands and who they cover set the amount; the number of you sets what a percentage takes.
FlightOwe, in detail
A $19 letter kit for one disrupted flight and everyone on the booking. You send it. The airline pays you.
What it does well
The letter arrives cited — article, band, case law — at the airline's real claim address rather than a customer-service form that goes nowhere. Then a dated follow-up, rebuttals for the six excuses airlines use, and a pre-addressed complaint to your national enforcement body. Escalating is free, and the regulator's existence is most of the pressure. What the $19 kit covers lists all seven pieces.
Who it suits
A clear-cut claim and twenty spare minutes: a 3-hour-plus delay, a cancellation inside 14 days, or a denied boarding, on a route plainly inside EU261 or UK261. Families gain most — the fee doesn't move when four of you were on the flight.
The limitation, plainly
The $19 is spent whether or not the airline pays. No refund is tied to the outcome, because what's sold is the letters and not the result. A letter pack also stops at the courthouse door: if the airline holds out and you'd need to go to court, that's you with guidance, not a firm acting for you.
Who FlightOwe is wrong for
Anyone who wants this handled for them. If the honest answer to "will I send a follow-up in six weeks?" is no, the kit becomes a $19 PDF you didn't use, and a success fee would have got you something instead of nothing.
Flightright, in detail
A German claim company operating since 2010 that files on your behalf under a no-win-no-fee agreement, taking a success fee out of whatever the airline pays. Flightright advertises a "99% success rate in court" and says it has secured over €700 million in compensation to date — both figures as stated on their own site, not independently verified here.
What it does well
By its own account, if the claim fails Flightright covers the costs, including its contracted lawyers' fees if those exceed the compensation in a settlement — a real transfer of risk on a contested claim. It also does the chasing: the submission, the reminders, and, where needed, legal action a letter pack can't take.
Who it suits
A contested claim, a thin paper trail, or no appetite for months of correspondence and a possible court filing. One traveller on a €250 claim gives up far less in absolute terms than a family on €2,400.
The limitation, plainly
The success fee scales with the payout while the work doesn't. Four passengers in the €600 band is four names on one claim, and on Flightright's own €2,400 example that's €771.12 in fees and VAT — the airline pays Flightright rather than you, so the money arrives second-hand. On Ryanair it can't help at all: Ryanair refuses claims submitted by claim companies and requires its own EU261 form.
Flightright publishes "usually 20 to 30% plus VAT" as its success fee, with a further 14% solicitor's surcharge, success-only, if its contracted lawyers are needed. Every figure on this page ties directly to their own two worked examples on flightright.com/costs, checked 22 September 2026 — rates and terms can change, so read the current ones before you sign.
When Flightright is the better call
Three cases, and they're not edge cases.
- The cause is contested. The airline is calling it extraordinary and you don't know whether that holds. A technical fault doesn't, under CJEU C-549/07; weather usually does. If your case sits on the line — see what counts as an extraordinary circumstance — a company that argues these for a living has an edge.
- You've already failed to move them. You wrote, they refused, and the next step is pressure and, potentially, court — which is exactly what Flightright's "99% success rate in court" claim is selling. A regulator complaint is still free and still yours to try first.
- You won't do the admin. Claims die around week six, when the airline goes quiet and the passenger stops. A success fee on something beats all of nothing.
Our argument isn't that a success fee is wrong — Flightright is genuinely taking on the cost and risk of a failed or litigated claim. It's that on a clear-cut claim you're paying roughly a third of the payout for a form letter and a date you could have sent yourself.
How we compare
The basis, so you can check the sums or substitute your own.
- The fee figures come straight from Flightright's own costs page — flightright.com/costs, checked 22 September 2026 — not an assumed or estimated rate. Their stated range is 20-30% plus VAT, and their own two worked examples (€800 and €2,400 compensation) are quoted directly.
- The claims are €800 and €2,400 — Flightright's own "Example 2" and "Example 1," two and four passengers respectively, both real distance-banded EU261 scenarios on ordinary routes out of Europe.
- The FlightOwe side is $19, charged once at checkout, not deducted from the payout. The optional $5 expense pack is left out because it buys reimbursement letters rather than compensation.
- Currencies aren't converted. A $19 fee and a €-denominated payout are quoted as charged. The rate on the day is yours, not ours to guess.
Flightright's own fee schedule can change, and the 14% solicitor's surcharge only applies when its lawyers get involved — read the current terms on their site and drop the real number into the rows above if it differs from their published examples.
How to choose
Four questions about yourself, not about the two services.
-
Is the cause clear-cut or contested?
"Operational reasons" and a technical fault are rebuttable, and the letters handle them. A weather cancellation with a plausible METAR behind it is a fight — and a fight is what a success fee, and Flightright's own litigation track record, is for.
-
How many of you were on the booking?
On Flightright's own €800/2-passenger example, the total cost was €269.56 — 33.7% of the payout. On their €2,400/4-passenger example it was €771.12 — 32.1%. The flat fee is $19 either way, so the more of you there were, the more one-sided this gets.
-
Will you send a follow-up in six weeks?
That's the honest test. The full claim sequence, with the dates runs to four sends over about three months.
-
Which airline is it?
On Ryanair, filing it yourself is the only route that works, so the choice makes itself. On slow repliers — TAP at around ten weeks, Air France and Iberia at around eight — the follow-up date matters more than who wrote the letter.
Questions people ask
What's the best alternative to Flightright?
For a clear-cut claim, filing it yourself with a cited letter is the cheapest route that works, and FlightOwe sells that letter pack for $19 flat. The airline pays you directly, so nothing is deducted. For a contested claim, Flightright's no-win-no-fee model is the better trade — the risk of a rejection, or a court case, moves off you.
How much does Flightright charge?
Flightright's own costs page states a success fee of "usually 20 to 30%" of the compensation, plus VAT, plus a 14% solicitor's surcharge (success-only) if its contracted lawyers are needed. Their own worked examples come out to €269.56 on an €800 claim and €771.12 on a €2,400 claim — 32-34% of the payout. Check the current figures at flightright.com/costs before signing.
Is it cheaper to claim flight compensation myself?
Yes. Filing direct costs nothing but your time, and escalating to a national enforcement body is free too. What the $19 buys is the cited letter, the airline's real claim address, the dated follow-up and the rebuttals — the parts most people get wrong or abandon.
What happens if my claim fails after I've bought the kit?
You're out $19 and nothing else. That's the trade against a no-win-no-fee service like Flightright, which states it covers its own costs (including lawyers' fees, in a settlement) if a claim fails — the one honest argument for paying a success fee instead. Run the free check first: it names the article, the band and whether the airline's stated cause is one it can hide behind.
Which is better for a family of four?
The flat fee, by a wide margin. Compensation is per passenger, so four people in the €600 band is €2,400 on a single claim — and on Flightright's own published example for that exact scenario, the fee and VAT together come to €771.12. The kit covers every passenger on the booking for the same $19 it costs one traveller.
Can Flightright file a Ryanair claim for me?
No. Ryanair refuses claims submitted by claim companies and requires its own EU261 form, so a third party can't move it forward. Filing it yourself is genuinely faster there, and letters sent to customer service instead of the form are routinely ignored.
I've already signed with Flightright. Can I switch?
That depends on the agreement you signed. Read the cancellation and assignment clauses: some assign the claim itself, so the airline is told to pay the company. Settle it in writing before sending a letter of your own, or two claims run on one flight.
Is FlightOwe a law firm?
No. FlightOwe is an information service, not a law firm and not your legal representative. It tells you what the rules say and gives you the letters. You file your own claim and keep everything you recover, because the airline pays you and not us.
Find out what the flight is worth, free
The band, the article it comes from and whether the airline's excuse holds — before you decide who files it.
FlightOwe is an information service, not a law firm and not your legal representative. We tell you what the rules say and give you the letters — you file your own claim and keep everything you recover.