Ryanair slams German ‘screenscraper’ website after court win

Ryanair slams German ‘screenscraper’ website after court win

Low cost carrier Ryanair has accused German flight search website CheapTickets.de of “unlawful and misleading pricing” after a court ruled it could no longer display inflated prices for checked baggage and an ‘airline fee’. The Regional Court of Hamburg (Landgericht Hamburg) ruled … Continue reading

Low cost carrier Ryanair has accused German flight search website CheapTickets.de of “unlawful and misleading pricing” after a court ruled it could no longer display inflated prices for checked baggage and an ‘airline fee’.

The Regional Court of Hamburg (Landgericht Hamburg) ruled against Travix, parent company of CheapTickets.de, today – which Ryanair called “an important victory”.

The court decided that it was not allowed to display pricing for checked baggage which is higher than the fee charged by Ryanair and banned Travix from referring to an ‘airline fee’ – something Ryanair says “does not in fact exist”.

Ryanair has no commercial agreement with Travix/CheapTickets.de, which still advertises Ryanair’s flights. The Irish airline said it has “no issue” with OTAs which display Ryanair’s fares “in a transparent manner” and licences several OTAs to display its fares on price comparison sites.

Ryanair’s head of communications Robin Kiely said: “We welcome this Regional Court of Hamburg decision ordering CheapTickets.de to stop its unlawful and misleading pricing baggage practices, where it attempted to pass off its own surcharges as Ryanair’s.

“This is an important victory for consumers, particularly those who have been subjected to additional fees from screenscraper websites such as CheapTickets.de and we will continue to take action to prevent Europe’s consumers from being misled.”