Ryanair asked to honour third-party bookings
The NCA has confirmed that it formally wrote to the no-frills carrier last week asking Ryanair to allow those who made such bookings before August 11 to fly.
“It would be unfair and unwarranted to cancel tickets bought before August 11 by people who were unaware that there was an issue between Ryanair and other websites,” said an NCA spokesperson.
Ryanair said yesterday it had begun taking steps that would see passengers who bought tickets via “screen scraper” websites having their bookings cancelled and refunded.
A Ryanair spokesperson said last night that the airline had cancelled bookings made by passengers due to travel yesterday who had booked their flights by third party websites.
“Ryanair has already begun to cancel bookings unlawfully made through the Bravofly website and will continue to do so until the unlawful activities of this internet ticket tout are brought to an end,” he said.
An NCA spokesperson said: “It’s disappointing that Ryanair seems to be targeting customers rather than taking the matter up directly with other websites or through the courts.”
The Consumers’ Association of Ireland also condemned Ryanair’s action, claiming the real issue was the airline’s concern that it was losing out on the sale of services such as car-hire, travel insurance and hotel accommodation.
