Where your rights actually come from: ANAC, not a GOL courtesy
The section you cannot copy from a comparison site, because it starts with reading the Brazilian law, not the airline's marketing.
Here is what shapes this whole page. On a flight within or from Brazil, what you are owed after a delay or cancellation is set by the country's civil aviation regulator, ANAC, in Resolucao 400/2016. We source the specifics here to ANAC's own passenger-rights explainer on gov.br, the government's page, updated in April 2026. This matters because it changes the nature of the conversation at the desk: you are not asking GOL for a favor, you are citing a rule that applies to every airline in Brazil. GOL delivers the assistance, but the entitlement is the law's, which is why it does not depend on how sympathetic the agent is that day.
One honest clarification that saves a lot of confusion, and that no comparison site will give you. GOL's own website carries a compensation section that is genuinely labeled for Mexico, and it describes a percentage of the ticket. That content is Mexico-specific and does NOT apply to a Brazilian flight. If you have seen a figure like a quarter of the fare and assumed it covers your Sao Paulo departure, set it aside: Brazil does not work on a percentage of the ticket. Brazil works on the material-assistance ladder below, plus a fixed SDR payment if you are bumped. We keep the two straight so you are not quoting a Mexican rule to a Brazilian gate agent, and we confirm the current ANAC text against your specific disruption before advising you.
The material-assistance ladder, hour by hour
As ANAC Resolucao 400/2016 sets it. Every rung is a passenger entitlement, not a fee.
Once the delay passes an hour, you are owed a way to communicate, internet access or a phone, so you can reach whoever needs to know and start working alternatives. Modest, but it is the first rung, and it marks that the clock is running.
At two hours the entitlement becomes food, in the form of a voucher, a meal or a snack. Note the threshold is two hours, not one, a point people routinely get wrong. Ask for it by name once the clock passes two, because a voucher nobody offers is one you have to claim.
At four hours you are owed hotel accommodation when the wait forces you to stay overnight, together with round-trip ground transport between the airport and the hotel. The overnight condition is the catch: a long afternoon delay that still gets you out the same day does not put you in a hotel.
Passengers with special assistance needs (PNAE) and their companions are entitled to hotel accommodation regardless of the overnight test. If this is you or someone you are traveling with, say so early, because the rule that applies to you is more generous than the general one.
These entitlements are the Brazilian statutory floor under ANAC Resolucao 400/2016, sourced to ANAC's gov.br passenger-rights explainer; airlines and regulators can revise the terms, so we check the current text against your specific disruption before advising you.
At 4 hours, a cancellation, or an interruption: your choice
Three routes, and you pick, not the desk.
When a delay passes four hours, or a flight is cancelled or a trip is interrupted, ANAC gives the choice to you. You can take free rebooking at the earliest opportunity, and that can be on GOL or on another airline; or you can take a full refund; or you can accept alternate transport, such as a bus, to your destination. It is a genuine three-way choice, so weigh getting there soonest against getting your money back and rebuilding the trip your own way.
There is a useful fallback inside the rebooking option. If GOL's first rebooking offer does not suit you, you can ask instead for a different date or time on GOL, within the ticket's remaining validity. That is the lever people forget: you are not stuck with the one seat the system spits out. Tell us your real deadline and we work the option that actually lands you where you need to be, when you need to be there.
Bumped from an overbooked flight: the fixed SDR payment
The one situation in Brazil with a set cash figure, and the real compensation story.
Denied boarding is where Brazil does attach a fixed number. If GOL oversells a flight and cannot find enough volunteers to give up their seats, and it bumps you involuntarily, ANAC Resolucao 400 requires it to pay you immediately: 250 SDR on a domestic flight, or 500 SDR on an international one. That payment is on top of, not instead of, everything else, you still get your choice of rebooking, refund or alternate transport, and you still get the material assistance for the wait.
A word on SDR, because it looks cryptic on a form. SDR, Special Drawing Rights, is an international currency unit, not reais and not dollars. The airline converts it to reais at the Banco Central do Brasil daily exchange rate, so the amount in your currency shifts a little day to day. We deliberately do not print a dollar or real figure here, because a stale conversion would be worse than none; we confirm the current converted amount with you on the call. The point to carry into the airport is simpler: an involuntary bump is not a favor you negotiate, it is a fixed statutory payment you are owed, and many passengers accept a small voucher because nobody tells them that.
If your bag doesn't arrive with you
A short note, because a disruption and a missing bag often happen together.
Separate from delays, ANAC also sets when a bag is officially considered lost: after 7 days on a domestic flight, or 21 days on an international one, without the bag being located. If it is not delivered by then, the airline indemnifies you, up to 1,131 SDR on a domestic flight or 1,288 SDR on an international one, again converted from that international currency unit rather than a fixed dollar figure. If you are away from home and separated from your bag, keep your receipts for essential expenses. It is not the focus of this page, but if a delay and a lost bag hit at once, tell us both so we work them together.
When your route touches the US: the DOT layer
Verifiable rules for flights into or out of the United States, like Miami or Orlando to Sao Paulo.
If your GOL flight enters or leaves the United States, US Department of Transportation rules add a separate layer, and it is worth not confusing them with the Brazilian ones. The most useful piece in a cancellation is this: when a flight is cancelled or changed significantly and you decline the alternative offered, you are owed a refund of the ticket, even on a non-refundable fare. The US also has a 24-hour rule that lets you cancel a booking made directly for a full refund within 24 hours of buying, when you booked at least seven days before departure.
Said plainly, because counters get this backward in both directions: the DOT rule covers the ticket price, and only that. It does not require any airline to pay for a hotel, meals or lost time. On a Brazilian flight, those supports come from the ANAC material-assistance ladder above, not from the DOT. And these federal rules are in active rulemaking, so we confirm the current position at the time of your call rather than treating them as fixed. For anyone flying between the United States and Brazil, that means two layers at once, and choosing well is knowing which one to invoke at which point of the trip.
The 24-hour regret refund, and where it lives
A Brazilian consumer-law right that is not a delay remedy, so we point you to the right page.
There is a separate Brazilian right people often reach for in a disruption that actually belongs to buying, not to delays: the 24-hour arrependimento, or regret, refund. Under Brazilian consumer law you can cancel for a full refund within 24 hours of buying, provided you bought the ticket at least 7 days before departure, and the refund must be paid within 7 days of your request. It does not apply to charter tickets bought through a travel agency. It is a genuine right, but it is about changing your mind after purchase, not about being delayed or cancelled on the day.
Because it is a refund rule rather than a delay remedy, we keep the full detail on the refund page rather than here, so the two do not get tangled. If your question is really about cancelling a ticket you just bought, see GOL's refund policy guide for how the 24-hour regret rule works and how it interacts with GOL's fare families. On this page, the point is simply that it exists and is different from everything above.
The part no ladder mentions: where's the next seat?
Why a GOL cancellation on a thin route is a different animal.
Every rung above answers what you get while you wait. The question that actually decides your day is what you are waiting for. GOL's network centers on rebooking you on GOL, and on a busy trunk route between Sao Paulo Guarulhos and Rio Galeao that may mean another flight within hours. On a thinner route flown once a day, a cancelled flight can mean the next GOL seat is not until tomorrow, and there is no global alliance handing you to a partner.
That is the honest reality worth naming: rebooking is only as fast as the next available flight on your route, whether that is GOL's own or another airline you are allowed onto. It is also the exact moment a phone desk earns its fee. While the gate queue inches toward one overwhelmed agent, we are weighing the alternates through Guarulhos, Congonhas or Brasilia, whether a full refund and a rebuilt itinerary beats waiting, and, on a trip to or from the United States or elsewhere in South America, what other routings actually exist that day. Sometimes the best outcome is the refund, a fresh plan, and a different way home. Knowing that menu exists is the difference between a bad afternoon and a lost weekend.
Before you call, have this ready
Sixty seconds of prep, a much faster rebooking.
- Your reservation code and the affected flight number
- Your timestamps: original departure, when the delay was announced, and each 30-minute update, since the ladder turns on the clock
- Which option you want if you're past 4 hours: free rebooking, a full refund, or alternate transport, and whether you were bumped from an overbooked flight
- Your real deadline, a shift, a wedding, an onward flight, so we rebuild around what actually matters
- The route, domestic within Brazil or international, and whether it touches the US, so we check every layer of rules that applies
Claim the entitlement before you leave the building, and don't accept a small voucher for a bump. Food, a hotel or the fixed SDR denied-boarding payment that nobody at the gate mentions is something you have to ask for by name, in writing. And if you are past 4 hours, the choice is real: free rebooking, a full refund, or alternate transport, plus the SDR payment on top if you were bumped. Which one wins depends on whether you still need to arrive today. If you call us mid-disruption, weighing that choice and chasing the paperwork is part of working the case, not an extra.
Frequently asked
What assistance does GOL owe for a delay?+
What happens if GOL cancels my flight or delays it more than 4 hours?+
What do I get if GOL bumps me from an overbooked flight?+
Does GOL's Mexico compensation policy apply to my Brazilian flight?+
Contact options
Reach GOL directly, or let us work the rebooking, the ANAC assistance and any denied-boarding payment.
Contact GOL directly
The airline's own channels, free.
These are GOL's own channels; the SAC line (0800 704 0465) is the one for complaints and cancellations, 24 hours. Confirm current delay and refund terms at voegol.com.br, where you can manage the rebooking yourself at no cost.