EU Invited Low – Cost Air Carriers to Stop Misleading Customers

On Tuesday the EC invited air carriers to add tax and surtax amounts to the ticket prices which they regularly communicate to the passengers in order to prevent their customers from reaching wrong conclusions when it comes to airfare costs.

The EC adopted a corresponding proposal which is its latest step in securing the protection of consumer wrights. Last week the EC published a plan on the lowering of roaming prices in the mobile telephony.

The general belief is that the latest efforts are mostly targeting low-cost air carriers like for example Ryanair, companies which tend to base their marketing massage on promoting very low prices. Those prices are much higher once the above mentioned tax and surtax amounts are included.

'The citizens have to enjoy all the advantages of a common market which gives them the possibility of different choices and high quality. They have to be given the possibility of comparing ticket prices of different air carriers’, as was pointed out by Jaques Barrot, the EU Commissioner in charge of Transport. 

With this proposal the EC gained the authority to recall or suspend air carriers’ permissions in case of disrespecting the new EU regulation. The EC will also have the possibility to demand ‘more precise financial information’ in order to reduce the number of numerous bankruptcies of these new air carriers.  

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