Ryanair slams ‘ambulance chasing’ flight compensation firms
Ryanair has renewed its call for the Competition and Markets Authority to enforce better regulation against ‘claims chasing’ companies, which charge customers up to 50% of the compensation they receive for delayed or cancelled flights.
The airline insisted there was no need for passengers to use companies like FlightDelays.co.uk to process claims made under EU compensation laws.
Ryanair said customers with valid EU261 claims would receive 100% of the compensation due from the airline if they applied directly to the airline.
However, Ryanair was among a number of airlines criticised recently by compensation firm EUclaim for making it difficult for customers to make compensation claims.
It does have a compensation claim form on its website, but it isn’t easy to find and customers have to click on four links to access it.
Nevertheless, Ryanair has accused FlightDelays of inducing customers to start ‘unnecessary’ legal proceedings against airlines, which it said had been criticised by Liverpool County Court.
"Flight Delays is deliberately issuing court proceedings early to establish its ‘lien’ over customers in order to secure its excessive (up to 50%) cut of compensation due, a practice Liverpool County Court found ‘unreasonable’", it said.
The airline’s spokesman Kenny Jacobs added: "As Europe’s most reliable airline, Ryanair has the most on-time flights, the fewest cancellations, and in the rare event of delays or cancellations, Ryanair complies with all EU261 legislation, where customers with valid claims for compensation can simply process their claim via the Ryanair.com website, free of charge or deduction.
"These ‘ambulance chasers’ of the aviation industry are deliberately misleading customers to sign liens in order to feather their own nests and then charging up to 50% of the compensation due for simply submitting a claim that can be made free of charge on the Ryanair.com website.
"In an effort to prevent customers being misled and ‘scammed’ in this manner, Ryanair has offered to pay Flight Delays the €25 admin fee it charges customers for every claim settled, on condition they do not deduct any fees from the compensation paid to customers. Ryanair has also offered to indemnify Flight Delays for the payment of their fees in cases where we have paid compensation directly to the customer following the issuing of proceedings.
"These offers have to date been rejected because firms such as Flight Delays are only interested in scamming customers for their grossly excessive fees.
"The anti-consumer fee practices of these ‘claims chasing’ firms is nothing short of a scam and it’s time these legal vultures were stopped. We call on the CMA to enforce better regulation and we urge all customers with valid claims to avoid being ripped off, by simply submitting their claims directly on the Ryanair.com website and avoid Flight Delays’ excessive fees."
Linsey McNeill
Editor Linsey McNeill has been writing about travel for more than three decades. Bylines include The Times, Telegraph, Observer, Guardian and Which? plus the South China Morning Post. She also shares insider tips on thetraveljournalist.co.uk
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