Reacting to the Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy Committee hearing on Tuesday (14 June) the OTA’s chief executive Simon Cooper said he believed carriers held a “crazy” amount of power over consumers due to a lack of competition on certain routes.
Executives from British Airways, Tui, and easyJet were among those giving evidence during sessions earlier today, while head of consumer rights at Which? Sue Davies said airlines were "blatantly flouting" consumer rights.
“It’s a total disgrace that you can have your flight cancelled and holiday ruined, then can’t even spend your cash with someone else because you have no other option,” said Cooper in a statement reacting to the hearing.
“Flight cancellations from time to time are understandable, but giving 24 hours’ notice or less is unnecessary and unforgivable. In no other industry would businesses be allowed to treat their customers this badly and get away with it.”
Cooper argued the level of disruption caused by recent disruption and flight cancellations was causing a “ripple effect on the rest of the industry” and made it “very difficult” for other travel companies to maintain high levels of service.
“Our customer-support colleagues are working to their absolute maximum to help people whose plans have been dashed – we can’t just bring in more people to manage disruption of this scale at the drop of a hat.
“We’re at the tip of the iceberg of consumer exploitation at the hands of some of these misbehaving airlines,” Cooper added.
He stressed how it was integral the industry worked to restore customer confidence as it recovered post-pandemic and called on the Competition and Markets Authority to launch a market review and “police the industry properly”.
