12/02/12, 12:12:19 EST

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200 airline websites face closure

timesonline.co.uk

The EU is to announce tomorrow that half of all Europe's airline websites are breaking consumer law

More than half of Europe's airlines could have their websites shut down because of opaque fare conditions and pricing.

A European Union investigation to be published tomorrow shows that more than 50 per cent of all websites showed irregularities, according to a news report from Reuters.

The irregularities in particular relate to price indications, contract terms and clarity of proposed conditions, added the report.

The EU consumer affairs watchdog carried out a probe over one weekend in September, checking 400 airline websites with the help of 15 EU national authorities and Norway.

The checks followed another in Spain last month in which a consumer rights watchdog said it had found misleading information in seven of 12 airline ticket websites including Ryanair, Europe’s biggest low-cost airline.

The Spanish authorities also found faults with Spanish carriers Vueling, Iberia and Spainair. “Ryanair and those other companies in the Spanish investigation are on our radar,” a European Commission source told Reuters.

Those airlines at fault, according to the Spanish watchdog, were found guilty of practices including the following:

* the price of the ticket is first indicated without airport taxes and additional fees

* offers promising tickets free or at a low price but such tickets are unavailable when the consumer wants to buy them

* tick boxes for insurance or additional services are ticked “yes” by default, trapping the consumer into buying unwanted items or being included on spam mailing lists

* general terms of sales are not provided in the language version used by the consumer during the booking procedure - or not available at all in any language

* no information is given about the rights and procedures of cancellation, transferability and ability to change dates.

Belgium had the worst number of incidents, with 46 of 48 websites investigated found to be at fault. Of the 20 websites probed in Austria, none was found to break EU consumer rules.

Ahead of tomorrow's statement by the EU, Ryanair today moved to claim its innocence. “All prices advertised on www.ryanair.com’s homepage and all of Ryanair’s media advertising is fully tax inclusive,” Ryanair said in a statement.

Although tomorrow's results will not identify any airlines, the EC is set to publish a list of companies concerned in four months’ time. Helen Kears, a European Commission spokeswoman, told Thomson Financial News: “We have to carry out this investigation in two separate phases.

"The first phase, the results of which will be given tomorrow, are the facts and figures about the numbers of airline sites checked and how many were found with irregularities and how many were found to be fully compliant with EU law.

“After that there’s an enforcement phase, and during that time any company which is flagged as having irregularities on a website will be contacted by national enforcement authorities and given a right of reply.

"So there will be no names tomorrow because it’s logical that companies will have to be given an opportunity to either clarify their position or to correct their site.”

 Printable Version  | published Nov 13, 2007