Commercial Fixed Wing
Flight Crew Instrument; Flight Crew Air Transport Pilot (ATP); Flight Crew Multiengine
Aircraft Equipment Problem Critical
Air Traffic Control Provided Assistance; Flight Crew Landed in Emergency Condition; Flight Crew Returned To Departure Airport; General Maintenance Action
Aircraft
After takeoff; pressure controller 1 failed followed by controller 2. We leveled the aircraft off at 12;000 feet. Tried to reset the controllers. Then tried to control the pressure manually. Cabin pressure stabilized at 7;500 and we thought we might have had it under control. We then climbed to 14;000 and the cabin pressure started to climb. We returned to ZZZ. Landing was uneventful.
Departing ZZZ we were climbing through approximately 6;000 feet we received a SYS1 pressurization controller fault ECAM. Just as soon as we were about to address the ECAM; we got another ECAM indicating SYS1&2 failure requiring us to revert to manual control of the pressurization controller and cabin altitude. We immediately leveled off at 12;000 feet (terrain was below us) and the cabin altitude stabilized at 7;600 feet. I was PM and in accordance with the ECAM/FCOM procedure attempted to hold down the manual VS control; but could not get the cabin to descend at all.As we continued northbound we notified Dispatch of our situation and I attempted a phone patch. Due to our low altitude we could not hear each other but they did receive our ACARS messages. We checked en-route MSAs and fuel burn and determined that we could continue to destination at 12;000 feet as need be. We were then notified by ATC that we would be in uncontrolled airspace and out of radar contact if we continued any further north. It was at that point we elected to return to ZZZ for repairs. After making a 180 turn back to ZZZ we asked for and received a hold to burn the fuel necessary to avoid an overweight landing. We landed at ZZZ below max landing weight without further incident.
Air carrier flight crew reported pressurization issues during departure prompting a return to departure airport.