When Airlines Impose Their Own National Laws to Block Foreign Claims
Uzbekistan Airways demanded a notarized Power of Attorney under Uzbek national law before considering a valid UK261 claim. Notarization is not a requirement under UK261. The case has been filed for litigation in the UK.
The situation
A claim was submitted against Uzbekistan Airways under UK261 following a qualifying disruption on a flight departing from a UK airport. Because the departure was from the UK, UK261 applied and compensation was owed regardless of the airline's country of registration.
The intended path was direct submission through Uzbekistan Airways' online claim form. The form did not function. Attempts to submit the claim through this channel produced no acknowledgment and no successful record of submission.
When an airline's own claim submission mechanism fails to work, the passenger is left without a functioning intake process. The obligation to submit a claim in a specific way cannot logically apply when the airline has not provided a working channel to submit it through. In this case, formal notice was sent to the airline by email as an alternative.
What the airline did
Uzbekistan Airways responded to the emailed notice, which was the first meaningful acknowledgment received. The response, however, was not a substantive engagement with the merits of the claim.
Instead, the airline stated that the case could not be considered until the Power of Attorney authorizing representation had been notarized under Uzbek national law. Until this notarization was completed and verified, the airline maintained that no further processing of the claim would take place.
The requirement was not framed as optional or as a preference. It was framed as a condition precedent to any consideration of the case at all.
This is a specific and identifiable tactic. The airline is not denying the claim on its merits. It is not arguing that compensation is not owed. It is inserting a procedural requirement drawn from its own domestic legal system as a barrier to engagement, in the knowledge that most claimants will not have the time, cost tolerance, or knowledge to comply.
Why this requirement is not valid under UK261
UK261 sets out the substantive rights of passengers and the corresponding obligations of airlines. It does not impose specific formalities on how a passenger authorizes a third party to act on their behalf. A signed Power of Attorney identifying the claimant, the representative, and the scope of authority is legally sufficient under UK contract and agency principles.
The regulation is silent on notarization for a reason. UK261 is a consumer protection framework. Imposing formal notarization, apostille, or foreign-law authentication requirements on a routine consumer claim would defeat the purpose of the regulation. It would create a friction cost so high that most claims would be abandoned before they were even considered.
Airlines operating under UK261 are bound by the regulation as it is written. They are not entitled to overlay procedural conditions from their own national law and require passengers to satisfy those conditions before the airline will engage. Where an airline's home jurisdiction imposes additional formalities on domestic claims, those formalities apply within that jurisdiction. They do not travel with the airline into every other legal system it operates in.
This is the same underlying pattern as airlines invoking domestic substantive law to reduce liability. In that scenario, national law is used to argue against the size of the payment. Here, national law is used to argue against the claim being considered at all. The mechanism is different. The intention is the same.
See: How Airline Compensation Works
What we did
The notarization demand was rejected on its face.
The position taken was that UK261 governs the claim, that the regulation imposes no notarization requirement on the Power of Attorney, and that the airline was not entitled to introduce foreign procedural requirements as a precondition to processing a valid claim. The airline was given a defined window either to process the claim as submitted or to face litigation in the UK.
Uzbekistan Airways did not withdraw the notarization demand. The airline maintained its position.
At that point, escalation was the only viable path. Claim Catalyst prepares every case with enforcement in mind from intake, which means litigation documents are drafted alongside airline engagement rather than after it. When an airline signals that it will not engage substantively, the transition to court is procedural rather than reactive.
See: How Claim Catalyst Handles Airline Resistance, Why Escalation Is Sometimes Required
Current status
The case has been filed for litigation in the UK through Money Claim Online, the standard route for UK261 enforcement against airlines that refuse to pay valid claims. Uzbekistan Airways will now be required to respond in a UK court, where its notarization demand carries no legal weight.
The case is not yet resolved. It is moving through the court process.
Lesson
Airlines operating in multiple jurisdictions are bound by the law of the jurisdiction the claim arises under. A UK261 claim is governed by UK261. The airline's home national law does not add procedural requirements to a claim it does not govern.
When an airline imposes such requirements anyway, the demand is not a legal condition. It is a friction tactic. Airlines that make claim intake procedurally expensive know that most passengers will abandon their claims before satisfying the additional requirements. The demand does not need to be legally valid. It only needs to be plausible enough to deter engagement.
Recognizing this distinction is the difference between a claim that stalls at intake and a claim that proceeds to the court where the underlying entitlement can actually be enforced.
Why most passengers lose here
A demand from an airline that carries the appearance of legal authority is difficult to challenge without a specific understanding of what UK261 does and does not require. Most passengers, faced with a formal-sounding request to notarize documents under foreign law, either comply, delay, or give up.
Compliance is expensive and time-consuming. Notarization of a foreign-law document typically requires consular or embassy involvement, translation, and formal authentication. For a claim worth a few hundred pounds, the process is rarely proportionate.
Delay allows the airline to continue treating the claim as pending indefinitely, without ever addressing the merits.
Abandonment is the outcome the tactic is designed to produce.
This is the same structural pattern seen across many airline resistance strategies. The airline does not need to prevail on the merits. It only needs to make engagement expensive enough that the merits are never reached.
Bigger picture
Airlines that impose foreign-law requirements on claims governed by other legal systems are exploiting the same enforcement gap that runs through most passenger compensation cases. The regulation exists. The entitlement is clear. What is difficult is compelling the airline to engage with it.
Where regulators lack enforcement power, airlines use silence. Where the case involves genuine legal complexity, airlines use domestic law defenses. And where the barrier can be introduced at the intake stage, airlines use procedural formalities that do not apply but sound authoritative enough to cause hesitation.
The remedy in each case is the same. Move the dispute into a forum where the airline is required to engage on the actual legal standard. In the UK, that forum is the court system, accessed through Money Claim Online. Once a claim is filed, the airline's foreign-law procedural demands become irrelevant. The court applies UK261.
See: What Claim Catalyst Actually Does For You
Frequently asked questions
Does UK261 require a notarized Power of Attorney to authorize third-party representation?
No. UK261 sets out substantive rights and obligations. It does not impose specific formalities on how passengers authorize third parties to act on their behalf. A signed Power of Attorney identifying the claimant, the representative, and the scope of authority is legally sufficient under UK law.
Can an airline require documents to be notarized under its own country's law?
Not for claims governed by another jurisdiction. UK261 applies to flights departing from the UK regardless of the airline's country of registration. The airline's home national law does not overlay additional procedural requirements onto the UK-governed claim. Airlines that impose such requirements are engaging in a friction tactic rather than a valid legal condition.
What happens if the airline's online claim form does not work?
The airline remains bound by UK261 regardless of whether its own claim submission mechanism functions. If the form fails, formal written notice sent directly to the airline is a valid alternative. If the airline does not engage, the claim can proceed to court without further intake steps.
How is a UK261 claim enforced when the airline refuses to engage?
The standard enforcement route in the UK is Money Claim Online, the small claims procedure. Filing a claim through MCOL transforms the dispute into a court proceeding, at which point the airline is required to respond formally. Foreign procedural demands that carried weight in pre-filing correspondence carry no weight in a UK court.
If you are dealing with a UK261 claim that has been blocked by procedural demands, foreign notarization requirements, or a non-functional airline claim form, Claim Catalyst prepares claims for enforcement from intake onward. Foreign-law barriers do not survive a UK court filing. Start a claim or learn more about how our process handles airline resistance at every stage.