The European Commission today announced infringement proceedings against ten EU countries for failing to enforce the EU passenger rights law which requires airlines to re-invoice coins for passenger flight accessories during the coronavirus crisis.
Infringement proceedings have been opened in France, Italy, Greece, Poland, Portugal, the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Lithuania, Croatia and Cyprus for non-compliance with the rule.
Citizens have EU national governments in place to enforce EU law, however, several countries have asked the Commission to directly suspend the law and allow airlines to award vouchers to alleviate their liquidity disruptions and save their bankruptcies. Some countries have bramably stated that they will not enforce the law to give direct protection to their airlines. However, the Comassignment has insisted that passenger protections should continue to be applied even during the crisis. In May, they praised airlines making coupons more attractive to consumers by removing their validity and making them transferable.
“Throughout this crisis, the Comassignment has made it clear that Jstomer’s rights remain valid to provide an unprecedented environment and that national measures to assist withdrawal will not have to be reduced,” Comassignment said in its infringement announcement. “In these ten Member States, explicit national regulations on package travel are applicable, allowing package tour operators to submit vouchers, rather than a refund of coins, for cancelled trips or defer refunds well beyond the 14-day period.”
The ten countries have ten days to rectify the scenario or start to support fines.
The resolution was applauded through the Jstomer BEUC organization, which said citizens do not have to twice fund the bailout of airlines, once as taxpayers for ransoms and others as trapped passengers with unusable vouchers.
“Consumers will not be used as moderate credits to rescue the travel industry,” said Monique Goyens, BEUC’s executive director. “However, these procedures only apply to countries that revel in implementing non-EU emergency measures. While we welcome this essential report, the countries that revel in a position have finished these non-compliant measures You do not seem to be affected.
Some countries, such as the Netherlands, have put in place a national law that complies with the rules, but have bratably stated that plan to implement it. Today’s infringement action applies only to countries whose national legislation is incompatible with EU law, but not to countries that refuse to apply their own law.
“All EU consumers who have been forced to accept coupons when applying these national transitional coVID-1 nine measures prefer to be entitled to a full refund if they wish,” he said. “It is now up to governments to reimburse those who prefer and regain confidence in the tourism sector.”
Several Jstomer group stations have announced an anti-legal action to airlines. Gerguy’s apple, Flightright, sued airlines such as Ryanair, KLM, Swiss and Lufthansa as the component of 20,000 passengers who failed to get a refund.
Dave Kdining is in Brussels, where he has covered EU policy and policy for four years.