Wednesday 21 April 2010

How do you solve a problem like RyanAir?

Might this even be a populist case of EU consumer protection?

True to form, RyanAir have decided to ignore their legal obligations to customers who were unable to fly this week, with Michael O'Leary deciding to rewrite the regulations in his favour.


"This legislation is not designed to cover a period of seven or eight days when passengers who paid us a fare of 20 or 30 euros are sitting in hotels for seven or eight days with their families and trying to recover a cost of over 1,000 euros from us. We will not be meeting those bills."


Andrew Adonis was clear that the government have told the airline that its responsibilities are very clear, speaking on Channel 4 News, though seemed slightly reluctant to take up Jon Snow's invitation to tell the airline to "pay up".

Individuals may have to take the airline to the small claims court.

RyanAir could be in line for a hefty fine too.

But shouldn't the refusal to meet legal obligations see the airline hit very hard - for example, when applying for landing slots - if the regulator could show this was a proportionate response to an airline which refuses its legal obligations.

2 comments:

Unknown said...

This is an area I'm totally ignorant about, but is it standard practice for airlines to be insured against this kind of thing? Or should people be covered by their own travel insurance?

The main failing was the complete incompetence of anyone to determine, in advance, how long it would last and what other travel options would be. I dislike Ryanair , and O'Leary, but have to say, it's very much 'one of those things'. I don't immediately see why they should be responsible for something utterly out of their control. Obviously dependent on insurance practices.

Diamond said...

ryanair is the worst thing I saw in my life.. its event not cheap flights but very expensive when you try to purchase tickets.. for many people this company makes the moral hazard/damage. I hope one day and I wish and this company will get big big financial damage.This company is in breach of human rights.and does not count the human as a human with. I can call by one name this airryan by one name its legal racket..