London - In the busiest summer ever for UK aviation, airlines are extracting maximum revenue by selling seats that don't exist - and then flouting European rules on overbooking.
Britain's biggest budget airline, easyJet, is overselling thousands of peak-season flights, breaking up family groups and telling some holidaymakers who bought tickets months ahead they must travel by circuitous routes to reach their destination.
European legislation stipulates that anyone denied boarding against their will must be paid immediate compensation - ranging from €250 (about R4 00)) for short flights to €600 for long-haul trips.
The tennis player, Annabel Croft, tweeted from the Algarve: “Have arrived Portugal minus our daughter. Not a great start to our family holiday - no idea buying a ticket didn't guarantee a seat. I asked easyJet if I could stay with her and they said yes, but we will charge you £60. Unbelievable.”
Andrew Whelan, a financial services executive from Warwick, booked a family holiday in Spain for six. But when they turned up at Luton airport for the easyJet flight to Barcelona, they were told that his daughter and her schoolfriend, both aged 15, would be offloaded. Mr Whelan negotiated for his two sons, aged 18 and 26, to miss the flight instead.
No attempt was made to persuade other passengers to take a later flight in return for cash or vouchers, even though EU rules stipulate airlines must seek volunteers.
An easyJet spokesperson said: “Unfortunately this process wasn't followed in this particular case and this issue is being addressed with the ground team who looked after that particular flight.”
European regulations also require airlines to get offloaded passengers to their destination “at the earliest opportunity”. Mr Whelan asked for his sons to be booked on the next available British Airways flight from Heathrow to Barcelona. But easyJet refused, insisting they must fly 32 hours later from Bristol.
The airline describes the Sunday evening flight from an airport 120 miles away as a “reasonable alternative” to the Saturday morning departure for which they had tickets. So Mr Whelan paid £640 for the BA flight from Heathrow, and £45 for a taxi from Luton.
Mr Whelan said it appeared more than half that day's flights from Luton were overbooked; a departure to Amsterdam was oversold by 12 passengers. He described his treatment by easyJet as “truly shocking service - honestly the worst I've ever experienced, and I've travelled widely”.
A spokesperson for the airline said cases of denied boarding due to overbooking were “extremely rare”. He said 2.6 million easyJet passengers a year fail to turn up for booked flights. “A flight will only be overbooked after reviewing the no-show rate for the last three months. On average, across our flights we will only overbook by one or two passengers per flight,” he said.
Citing “better-than-expected revenue per seat,” easyJet has raised its profits forecast to around £640m for the year to September.
British Airways failed to follow EU rules when it overbooked a flight to Split in Croatia. Hilary Owen from Buckinghamshire had a confirmed booking. But at check-in at Heathrow she waited in vain for two hours, finally being told she would travel the next day via Zagreb. The airline initially refused to pay for her taxi home. After The Independent intervened, the airline agreed to meet the cost.
Virgin Atlantic stranded a woman from Dorset in Havana for four extra days due to overbooking. Anne Tapley, from Poole, said: “I felt very confused, upset, alone and vulnerable.” It took the airline eight weeks to pay compensation.
The Independent