Mizter T

Ryanair do seem to be up for such an arrangement, but it looks like the devil is in the detail, as they're evidently keen to insulate themselves from as much liability as possible when it comes to missed connections and push said liability over to the long haul carrier!

irishguy28

I'm amazed how frequently that point comes up.

But if you think about it, the liability can only lie with the longhaul party.

Ryanair are a point-to-point carrier, performing shorthaul flights only, and are offering other carriers the option to sell tickets on FR flights to allow those passengers to connect to long-haul services at those hubs.

Ryanair won't sell these tickets; their only responsibility is to bring the pax from origin to hub. Should something go wrong, then either the ticket-seller will rebook you after arrival at the hub, or more unlikely, arrange for alternate transport directly from the your origin.

If you were travelling on an Air France ticket with the first flight operated by CityJet/HOP! etc, you wouldn't ring up CityJet/HOP! asking for rerouting/rebooking, etc. You'd ring Air France.

rcspeirs

So Ryanair want the revenue that comes from additional bums on seats, but are unwilling to pick up any cost associated with delay / missed connection support - even if they're the cause of the delay? Perhaps they should get Messrs Johnson and Fox to negotiate the deal: sounds very much like a "have cake and eat it too" option.

irishguy28

No: they have said that they will pay EU261/2004 compensation where appropriate.

But as a point-to-point carrier, the handling of missed connections and rebooking to final destination will be the responsibility of the ticketing carrier.

If the other airline is not happy with this, they are not obliged to sell tickets on Ryanair.

rcspeirs

You can't sell a ticket as "interline" (which is what the headingon this thread says) and still be "point to point". Cake and eat it delusion.

NickB

Uh, no you don't: if your Cityjet flight is late, etc... it will be Cityjet's responsibility to rebook you. In case of schedule change in advance, it may well be that the passenger contacts AF for rebooking but it will typically be the carrier responsible for the change that will bear the rerouting cost.

When you think about it, what you are saying is that if a delay or cancellation is caused by Ryanair, they should still not be held responsible for it and it would still be the responsibility of the long-haul carrier to pick up the bill. I can see how that is what Ryanair would like but I can also see why it is going to be a tough one to negotiate.

irishguy28

Yes, by the letter of the law; however, I doubt that Cityjet, post-AF, has the ability to do such things, and would, in effect, pass such requests on to Air France.

I would imagine that the ongoing WX/AF relationship specifies how such cases are handled. On an AF ticket, where AF sold the ticket, and provides the longhaul sectors, it probably makes sense for AF to take over that responsibility, rather than giving WX the ability to rebook at will on any and all AF (or Skyteam? And non-Skyteam partners, too? Would it go that far? And would they then not be entitled to recoup some costs from AF? If not, then maybe WX wouldn't offer options that meet the standards required/expected by AF and/or AF customers?) services. By the letter of the law, it should, although WX have a business model whereby they only operate in a limited number of European markets and probably don't have systems that would enable them to access the required longhaul inventory.

There is certainly nothing in the regulation that mandates airline A to be the one that MUST handle EVERYTHING about the case. There is no reason why airline A cannot, in practice, escalate this up to airline B in all cases - whether by doing this as an agent on behalf of the passenger - so that the airline thinks they are dealing with airline A, but in fact airline B is the one doing the real work - or by directly passing the pax to the other airline).

No-one is being forced to sell seats for their connecting tickets on Ryanair. Ryanair are being up-front about how they wish the situation to be handled if something goes wrong. If an airline thinks that FR's on-time performance is too dodgy to be depended on that it offsets the potential gain of added customers, then that is their prerogative! Of course, we always hear of the "horror cases", but in general, I don't think FR's on time performance is something that any potential partner need be too worried about. In fact, many of these potential partners could perhaps learn a thing or two from them!

irishguy28