Brazil
Brazil pays a fixed sum only for denied boarding: 250 SDR on a domestic flight and 500 SDR on an international one, in cash at the airport. Delay and cancellation buy you assistance from one hour and a refund past four.
Check your own flight against ANAC Resolution 400 →Who it covers
- Flights departing Brazil, and flights to Brazil on a Brazilian carrier.
- The resolution is unusual in paying the denied-boarding sum immediately, at the airport, in cash rather than weeks later by transfer.
- Amounts are set in Special Drawing Rights, so the value in reais moves with the IMF rate.
What it pays
| Distance or situation | Per passenger |
|---|---|
| Denied boarding — domestic | 250 SDR |
| Denied boarding — international | 500 SDR |
| Delay or cancellation | assistance, not a fixed sum |
What triggers it
Denied boarding against your will
The only situation that produces a cash figure, and it is payable there and then. Volunteering in exchange for a benefit is a different thing: you negotiate that yourself and give up the fixed sum.
Delay or cancellation — the assistance ladder
From one hour: communication — internet and telephone. From two hours: food, by voucher or meal. From four hours: accommodation with transport where needed, and the right to re-routing or a full refund. The ladder is the entitlement; there is no separate payment on top.
Where you are re-routed
Re-routing may be on the same airline or another one, and at no extra cost to you. A refund includes the airport charges you paid.
Duty of care — separate from compensation
Communication from one hour, food from two, and accommodation with transport from four. A passenger with reduced mobility or who is accompanied keeps the accommodation right even when living locally, which many airlines get wrong.
The refusals airlines send, and what answers them
“It was beyond our control”
Resolution 400 does not give the airline an escape from the assistance ladder. Weather and air traffic restrictions may explain the disruption, but they do not remove food, communication or a hotel.
“We will pay you later”
For denied boarding the resolution contemplates immediate payment at the airport. A promise of a transfer in thirty days is not what the rule says.
“You accepted the voucher”
A meal voucher is the assistance you were already owed. It is not a settlement of the denied-boarding sum, and accepting it does not waive anything.
Enforcement
ANAC regulates and takes complaints, and consumer protection runs in parallel through the consumidor.gov.br platform, which airlines answer publicly. Small claims courts are used heavily in Brazil for this and need no lawyer.
How long you have
Five years for a consumer claim under the Consumer Defence Code — one of the longest windows anywhere, and far longer than the airline will suggest.
Primary sources
Read the law itself rather than anyone's summary of it, this one included. Every link below was checked on 12 September 2026.
By situation, rather than by statute
If you would rather start from what happened than from which law applies: my flight was cancelled · they are blaming a strike · they are blaming a technical fault · I was denied boarding · I am stuck at the airport
The other statutes
- EU261 compensation — EU261
- UK261 compensation — UK261
- Israeli Aviation Services Law — the Aviation Services Law
- US flight delay rules — US DOT rules
- Canada APPR compensation — the APPR
- Montreal Convention 1999 — the Montreal Convention
- Russia — Article 120 of the Air Code
- Türkiye — the SHY-Passenger Regulation
- India — the DGCA CAR
- Thailand — the CAAT passenger rules
- Indonesia — Ministerial Regulation PM 89
- Saudi Arabia — the GACA customer protection rules