Papua New Guinea — Civil Aviation Safety Authority of Papua New Guinea

The clocks it starts

• Two years for a Warsaw Convention claim (Art. 29)Art. 29 extinguishes the right to damages if an action is not brought within two years of arrival, of the date the aircraft ought to have arrived, or of the date carriage stopped. Courts treat it as extinguishing the right rather than barring the remedy, so unlike an ordinary limitation period it is not suspended by correspondence and cannot be waived by the carrier.Warsaw Convention 1929, Art. 29 — Art. 29Limitation period

What it entitles you to, beyond money

• Papua New Guinea is in the Warsaw system, not the Montreal ConventionPapua New Guinea is not a party to the Montreal Convention 1999. International carriage with a place of departure or destination in Papua New Guinea falls into the older Warsaw system, where the liability limits are much lower and the written-notice periods for baggage claims are shorter — three days for damage and fourteen for delay under the unamended Convention, rather than seven and twenty-one. A Port Moresby–Brisbane ticket does not carry the Montreal floor a Brisbane–Auckland one does.
• Check the regime at the other end of the ticket firstLong-haul Pacific itineraries almost always touch a jurisdiction with a real tariff. A flight departing Australia engages the Australian Consumer Law; one departing New Zealand engages the Civil Aviation Act 2023 delay provisions, which are unusually generous; one departing an EU or UK airport engages Regulation 261/2004 or its UK equivalent against any carrier. Where a small-island regime has nothing to offer, the leg that departed Sydney, Auckland or London very often does.
• Warsaw Convention damages for delay (international carriage)Art. 19 of the Warsaw Convention makes the carrier liable for damage occasioned by delay in the carriage of passengers and baggage, and Art. 20 gives it a defence where it proves it took all necessary measures to avoid the damage or that it was impossible to take them. Like the Montreal claim it pays the loss the delay actually caused you rather than a fixed sum, so it lives on receipts. The ceiling depends on which Warsaw-system instrument the two States have in common — the 1929 Convention, the Hague Protocol of 1955, or the Montreal Additional Protocols of 1975 — and the figures differ between them, so we state none. The action is extinguished two years after arrival under Art. 29, and that period is a hard extinction rather than an ordinary limitation.Art. 19, Art. 20

Where to take it next

1. 01Written claim to the airlineComplain to the carrier in writing with the flight, the disruption and your itemised loss, and ask which provision of its conditions of carriage or the national regulations it says applies.Claim direct·typically 30 days
2. 02Independent Consumer and Competition Commission (ICCC)The ICCC regulates consumer and competition matters in Papua New Guinea, including in the domestic aviation market, and takes consumer complaints. It is the more useful destination than the safety regulator for a disruption complaint.Regulator·typically 90 days·official page
3. 03Civil Aviation Safety Authority of Papua New GuineaCASA PNG regulates safety and licensing. It does not administer a compensation scheme.Regulator·typically 90 days·official page
4. 04Small claims or magistrates' courtBinding on themAvailable where the carrier refuses. Most Pacific jurisdictions run a small-claims process suitable for a disruption claim built on receipts.Small claims·typically 180 days