Ryanair blames EU rules for €2 levy

RYANAIR is to charge €2 extra per passenger from Monday in a move the airline says was forced on it by unfair EU rules.

The airline said it had incurred costs of more than €100 million arising from flight cancellations, delays and providing right to care, compensation and legal expenses from more than 15,000 flight cancellations and more than 2.4m disrupted passengers.

Ryanair said the majority of these claims came from three periods when it was not responsible for disruption — the Icelandic ash cloud last April and May, the snow closures during last November and December and air traffic control strikes across Europe last summer.

The airline called for changes in what it described as “unfair and discriminatory elements” of the EU rules.

Ryanair’s Stephen McNamara said the airline should not have to pay the cost of cancellations that were not the fault of the airline.

“It is clearly unfair that airlines are obliged to provide meals and accommodation for passengers, for days and weeks in some cases, simply because governments close their airspace or air traffic controllers walk off the job, or incompetent airports fail to clear their runways of snow.

“It’s a crazy situation that travel insurance companies paid out nothing during the volcanic ash crisis last year because it was an ‘act of God’, yet the airlines were forced to pick up weeks of delays, cancellations, hotel and restaurant costs,” he said.

“We hope that we will ultimately succeed in removing the discriminatory provisions of the EU 261 regulations which oblige airlines to suffer millions of euro in delays, cancellations and care expenses, even during ‘force majeure’ events which are clearly beyond our control,” he said.

“We are also seeking to have any EU 261 compensation linked to the air fare paid, as is the case for competing rail, ferry and coach transport, so that there is a level playing field between transport providers across Europe.”

Ryanair said the expense incurred as a result of the EU regulations cannot be loaded onto airlines without being passed on to passengers.

It also confirmed that should the EU rules be reformed, to include and effective right of recovery clause and a non-discriminatory force majeure clause, it would reduce or eliminate the charge altogether.