THE WEATHER
See page 2 for the week´s forecast
Edition 340
www.thecourier.es Friday 22nd September 2017
RYANAIR'S PR DISASTER
J
ust days after lambasting French controllers over strike action that forced Ryanair flights to and from Spain to be either delayed or cancelled, the budget airline shocked travellers on booked services by saying last weekend that it would cancel up to 50 flights a day until the end of October. The good news locally is that dispute a couple of services being disrupted last weekend at Alicante-Elche airport, the six week cancellation schedule does not feature that airport or the facility at San Javier, with Barcelona the worst hit of the Spanish airports. The need to keep up high punctuality rates was initially offered as the main excuse by Ryanair's PR department, but the company changed tack and was forced to admit that the cancellations have been forced on it by a backlog of staff leave which has seen large numbers of the airline's staff book holidays towards the end of the year. A key factor as well is the company losing pilots to a rival operator in Dublin and struggling to recruit replacements. The surprise announcement came on the back of new onboard luggage restrictions that the company is bringing into force at the beginning of November, and now 400 thousand passengers are having their journeys disrupted over a six week period, which the company says accounts for only two percent of its flights. Europe’s largest airline by
passenger numbers sent emails to the first affected passengers last Friday, giving them the choice of a refund or an alternative flight, but the UK Consumer Association said that passengers needed more notice, as notice of cancellations at the start of this week appeared to be still only two days in advance. That forced a big backtrack from Ryanair, who late on Monday published a full list of the cancellation schedule, as they faced a media backlash, along with a flood of complaints from passengers. Customers whose flights have been axed will still also receive an email, chief executive Michael O'Leary has said, with the Ryanair boss admitting that it had "messed up" the planning of pilot holidays. Other reports suggested that the company was losing pilots which has contributed to the problem, with Norweigian Air opening a new base in Dublin and signing up 140 ex-Ryanair pilots. Ryanair airline has now started to offer a 10 thousand euro signing-on fee for pilots joining the company As for the cancellations through to the end of October, Mr O'Leary said most people would be transferred to an alternative Ryanair flight on the same day. If not, they would be moved to flights the day before or the day after, and the airline would meet its
obligations over compensation. The airline said it was cancelling flights at airports where it ran the busiest schedules, so it would be easier to accommodate passengers on alternative flights. Mr O'Leary said Ryanair would honour all of its obligations to compensate passengers under EU regulations but would not book passengers onto flights with rival carriers. "We will not pay for flights on other airlines, no. It is not part of the EU261 entitlement," he said, referring to European passenger rights legislation. He denied reports that the airline had an overall shortage of pilots, but said they had "messed up" the rosters for September and October. "This is our mess-up. When we make a mess in Ryanair we come out with our hands up," he said. "We try to explain why we've made the mess and we will pay compensation to those passengers who are entitled to compensation,
which will be those flights that are cancelled over the next two weeks." If passengers are given more than 14 days' notice of a cancellation, they are not entitled to compensation, which explained Monday's decision to publish a six week cancellation schedule. In an ironic twist this week, the airline has been celebrating the fourth anniversary of its Always Getting Better campaign, which Michael O’Leary described as an effort to stop “unnecessarily p*****g people off.” Some customers have reacted furiously to the cancellations, claiming holiday plans have been ruined by the decision, as well as asking why Ryanair carried on taking bookings for flights just days before they knew would be cancelled. In spite of the problems, Ryanair launched a cutprice fares promotion last weekend on services from November onwards, whilst their share price fell by three percent on Monday.