“Most of the larger Online Travel Agencies Pirates” abruptly ceased selling Ryanair’s flights in early December, the airline said on Wednesday. However, today at least one of them—Booking.com—was once again providing Ryanair’s flights.
The biggest airline in Europe said that Booking.com, Kiwi, and sibling firm Kayak were some of the well-known online travel companies who removed Ryanair tickets from their websites in the first few days of December. Therefore, in December and January, the carrier would observe a 1% to 2% decrease in load factors. The airline does not anticipate a significant impact on its traffic or guidance for 2024 from the loss of these bookings.
Ryanair calls the online travel companies “pirates” because they are allegedly stealing its intellectual property and private information. The online travel agents argue that Ryanair is acting anti-consumer by withholding flight information, and they are attempting to provide their consumers with an extensive picture of all available flights.
Following an Irish High Court ruling in early December awarding the airline a permanent injunction against a screen-scraper who was attempting to obtain the carrier’s flight and fare information without authorization, some online travel agents decided to discontinue offering Ryanair flights. Online travel businesses most likely receive Ryanair flight information through screen scraping or by partnering with another online travel agency, even if they are not authorized to do so.
Ryanair’s Prolonged Conflict With Internet Travel Companies
Ryanair was relieved to lose those reservations for flights made through online travel agencies, as doing away with them has long been a priority. Ryanair claims that they increase its tickets and other taxes, including as baggage fees, and cause havoc with customer service because they frequently receive “fake contact info.”
This is a result of online travel companies booking Ryanair tickets rather than individual travelers. Because the online travel firms held the client connection, Ryanair might not have the passenger’s details if they want a refund, as countless numbers of them did during the pandemic.
Online travel agencies offering flights on Ryanair as well as those that don’t
On Wednesday, Skift looked through the websites of several online travel agencies in an attempt to find Ryanair tickets from London to Barcelona. Skift discovered that, out of the three online travel agencies that Ryanair mentioned as stopping to offer its flights in early December, the following:
Booking.com was once again marketing those flights through OneTravel.com, an online travel firm owned by Fareportal. Booking may contend that it accesses Ryanair flights via OneTravel.com rather than via a screen scraper. An inquiry for comments was not immediately answered by Booking.com.
Ryanair.com was linked to by Kayak, a service that directs travelers to other websites for bookings instead of selling tickets itself.
Kiwi did not market the airline’s travel options.
Indeed, Ryanair flights were still available on Wednesday through eDreams Odigeo, a significant European flight seller, and Opodo.
The following internet travel companies didn’t seem to be offering Ryanair tickets:
Trip.com and Expedia
Lastminute.com
“Ryanair does not have a commercial relationship with any OTA or screenscraper and we strongly object to OTAs mis-selling our flights and overcharging consumers,” Ryanair said in a statement following the Irish court’s verdict against a screen-scraper early in December. We advise clients to make direct reservations with us via our mobile app or ryanair.com.
At the time, the airline released the following graphic, which purportedly illustrated the amount that certain internet travel “pirates” overcharged for Ryanair services including seat assignments, priority boarding, and bag fees.
The airline praised Google Flights on Wednesday.
“Ryanair continues to make its fares available to honest/transparent OTA’s such as Google Flights, who do not add hidden mark ups to Ryanair prices and who direct passengers to make their bookings directly on the Ryanair.com website.”