Thank you for your question.
The process is indeed very cumbersome. The consumer has to fight like David against Goliath. He is the one who has to assert his rights, when he does not have all the necessary tools at hand. They have to fight against an air carrier that knows the ropes and has the information. That is why we believe that the burden of proof should be reversed. It should be up to the air carrier to justify that it does not have to compensate the passenger. This is problematic.
There is also another problem: we suspect that very few people will go through with the process. For a carrier, it is almost advantageous not to give the right information and not to admit responsibility. Consider a far-fetched scenario in which 10% of the passengers on a plane contest a decision. This would mean that 90% of the passengers would not be compensated. This is a very far-fetched scenario indeed, because in reality there are usually only one or two passengers per flight who claim compensation, if any.
The balance of power is really not balanced. The regulations should be reviewed to restore this balance of power.