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What your airline actually owes you for a delay
Two different bodies of law govern a delayed flight between the United States and Mexico, they use different triggers, and on a northbound flight they apply at the same time. This checker works out which ones reach your itinerary and cites the provision so you can read it yourself. It asks for no booking reference and no surname, stores nothing, and sends nothing anywhere — the calculation runs in your browser.
What you can actually claim
Both regimes cover this flight
A flight leaving Mexico for the United States sits under Mexican compensation law and US refund law at the same time. Most guides pick one and drop the other, which is where travellers lose money. Read both cards.
US Department of Transportation
Applies, nothing owed yetOne end of this itinerary is in the United States, so Part 260 applies even on a foreign airline. It is an international itinerary, so the threshold is 6 hours, not 3. A 5 hours delay is 1 hour short of the 6 hours threshold, so no refund is owed. Anything offered to you now is the airline's own policy, not a legal entitlement.
If the airline refuses: DOT aviation consumer complaint form
Mexican Civil Aviation Law (PROFECO)
Full remedies owedA 5 hours delay exceeds 4 hours, which under section V(b) pulls in the same remedies as a cancellation.
What is owed
- Your choice of remedy, not the airline's. A refund of the ticket or of the unflown portion, substitute transport on the next available flight, or transport on a later date that suits you. The election belongs to you.
- Indemnification of at least 25%. Where you take the refund or the later-date option, the carrier owes an additional indemnification of no less than 25% of the ticket price or of the unflown portion. The statute sets a floor, not a ceiling, and the ticket price includes taxes and charges.
- Care provided then, and money within 10 days. Food and, where the wait runs overnight, lodging and ground transport must be provided at the time of the disruption rather than reimbursed later. Indemnification itself must be settled within 10 days of your claim.
If the airline refuses: PROFECO Concilianet
This is a summary of published regulation, not legal advice
The rules quoted here are public and cited so you can check them yourself. Whether a disruption was genuinely within an airline's control, and what your particular contract of carriage adds, are questions this page cannot settle for you.
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Three free templates covering a DOT refund, a PROFECO indemnification claim in Spanish, and an involuntary bumping cash demand. Copy-paste, no signup.
Why the same delay has two different answers
US and Mexican law are built on opposite premises. The US rule is a refund rule: if the airline no longer offers what you paid for, you may have your money back. It pays you nothing for the ruined day. The Mexican rule is a compensation rule: past certain thresholds the carrier owes an indemnification on top of whatever it does about your travel, precisely because the day was ruined.
That difference is why the two never substitute for each other. A traveller who gets a refund from a Mexican airline on a flight out of Cancún has collected under the US rule and has not touched the Mexican indemnification. The airline has no obligation to point this out, and in our experience it does not.
The three-hour figure everyone repeats is only half the rule
Nearly every article about US delay rights quotes three hours. That figure is correct for a domestic itinerary and wrong for an international one, where § 260.2 sets six. On a US–Mexico route map that distinction covers most of the flying: Los Angeles to Cancún, Houston to Mexico City and Chicago to Guadalajara are all international, so a four-hour delay creates no refund right at all.
One useful exception runs the other way. Puerto Rico is US territory, so New York to San Juan is a domestic itinerary and takes the three-hour threshold despite crossing 1,600 miles of ocean. Travellers routinely assume the opposite.
The mistake that costs the most money
Accepting something at the gate. The US refund right exists only while you decline the airline's alternative, so a rebooking tapped through in the app, or a travel credit accepted because the agent offered it and the queue was long, closes the entitlement to cash. Airlines are not doing anything improper by offering the credit first — it is simply cheaper for them, and the passenger who takes it has chosen.
So decide what you want before you reach the desk. If you need to get there, take the rebooking and stop thinking about the refund. If the trip no longer works, say plainly that you are declining the alternative and requesting a refund under § 260.6, and get that on record in writing or in chat where the timestamp survives.
Guides for the carriers and airports this comes up on
Each of these covers the carrier or airport in its own right, including which regime governs it and how disruption tends to play out there.
FAQ
Delay and cancellation rights — common questions
Answers drawn from the published regulation, with the provision named so you can check it. This is not legal advice.
Does US law give me cash compensation for a delay, like the EU does?
No, and this is the single most common misunderstanding. EU Regulation 261 pays a fixed cash sum for the inconvenience itself. US law does not. What 14 CFR part 260 gives you is a refund — your money back for a flight you no longer want to take. Meals, hotels and rebooking come from each airline's own customer service plan filed under 14 CFR 259.5, which means they vary by carrier and are worth asking for but are not a legal entitlement.
Is the significant-delay threshold three hours or six?
Both, depending on the itinerary. Under § 260.2 it is three hours for a domestic itinerary and six hours for an international one. A Los Angeles to Cancún flight is international, so a four-hour delay does not reach the threshold even though the same four hours on a Los Angeles to Chicago flight would. Guides that quote a flat three hours are describing only the domestic case, which is why travellers on cross-border routes are told they have a claim when they do not.
Can an airline give me a voucher instead of a refund?
Not if you refuse it. The refund right under § 260.6 survives only while you decline the alternative. Accepting a rebooking, a voucher or travel credit is treated as taking the airline's remedy and ends the entitlement to cash. If you want your money back, say so before you accept anything, and say it in writing. Once the credit is in your account the argument is effectively over.
How long does the airline have to pay a refund?
Section 260.2 defines a prompt refund as seven business days where you paid by card and twenty calendar days for any other payment method. The clock runs from when the refund becomes due, not from when the airline gets round to processing it. If you pass those windows, that is the point at which a DOT complaint stops being a threat and becomes the appropriate next step.
My flight left Mexico. Do Mexican rules or US rules apply?
Often both, which is the case most published guides get wrong. Mexican law under art. 47 Bis binds the concession or permit holder for service provided in Mexico, so it covers a departure from a Mexican airport. US part 260 covers a ticket on any flight to, from, or within the United States, and it applies to foreign carriers too. A Cancún to Los Angeles flight therefore sits under both at once: the Mexican rule can owe you an indemnification of at least 25 percent while the US rule separately obliges a refund, and neither cancels out the other.
What does 'attributable to the carrier' mean in the Mexican rule?
Art. 47 Bis section V only owes compensation where the cause is the airline's own — crew shortages, maintenance, scheduling decisions. Weather and air traffic control restrictions fall outside it. This is the part no calculator can settle for you, because the airline states the cause and you may reasonably disagree with it. What you can do is ask for the cause in writing at the time, since a stated reason is much harder to revise later.
Where do I escalate if the airline simply refuses?
For a flight touching the United States, the DOT aviation consumer complaint form. Every complaint is forwarded to the airline, which must respond substantively, and the DOT publishes carrier complaint volumes — so filing has a cost to the airline beyond your individual case. For a departure from Mexico, PROFECO's Concilianet handles conciliation online. Both are free, and both work considerably better once you can quote the specific provision rather than describing how the day went.