A request to certify a class action lawsuit was filed last week in Tel Aviv District Court against El Al, alleging that the company refunds passengers whose flights were canceled in installments rather than through a full and immediate refund. It should be stressed that the claim concerns cases in which the full amount had already been collected from the customer before the cancellation. The request was filed by a customer of the company who is an attorney. The applicant, represented by attorneys Nitzan Gadot and Doron Radai of the Radai-Gadot law firm, estimates the damage to the customer group at more than 2.5 million shekels.
According to the request, El Al operates under an improper practice: When a flight is canceled, it refunds the payment in a number of installments identical to the number of installments in which the original purchase was made. This is done even in cases where the full amount had already been collected from the customer months before the cancellation. The applicant claims that this conduct violates the Aviation Services Law, which requires a full refund within 21 days and does not grant El Al any right to issue the refund in installments.
The request claims that “this conduct causes passengers real financial harm, including by tying up their credit limit and denying them the ability to make immediate use of their money.”
In the individual case described, the applicant says she purchased a Sun d’Or ticket to Warsaw for her daughter and paid El Al for the ticket in two installments. She claims that although she finished paying for the ticket in January 2026, when the flight, scheduled for April, was canceled at the end of March 2026 following new directives for the operation of Ben Gurion Airport that significantly reduced activity, El Al credited her in two future installments. This was despite the fact that by the time the flight was canceled, the applicant had already paid the full price of the ticket.
Attorney Doron Radai Photo: PrivateThe applicant says she was surprised by this conduct, since the full payment for the ticket had already been paid and had been held by El Al for several months. “Why, then, once the ticket was canceled by El Al, is the refund being delayed by the company?” she asked.
As part of her efforts to resolve the matter, the applicant contacted El Al to ask why the refund was being made in two installments even though the payment had already been received in full. According to her, El Al shifted responsibility and claimed that the credit card company was the one issuing the credit in installments. In effect, the applicant argues, “El Al’s puzzling response was that it had made the refund in one payment, and that when a ticket charged in an installment transaction is canceled, the method of the refund is the responsibility of the credit card company.”
Attorney Nitzan Gadot Photo: PrivateBy contrast, the request says that when the applicant checked with the credit card company, she received the opposite answer and was told that El Al was the one that issued the refund in two installments. Finally, the request argues that “by continuing to hold passengers’ money after their flights were canceled for a period exceeding the refund period set by law, El Al is unjustly enriching itself at their expense and effectively turning passengers whose flights were canceled into a source of financing for itself.”
El Al said in response: “The statement of claim in question has not yet been received by the company. Once it is received, the company will study it and respond through the legal proceeding as customary.”