Complaints and enquiries - Air Transport Users Council

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baggage. Last year, Regulation EC 1008/2008 (“the third package”) came
into force. This includes provisions that should in effect bring in clarity and
commonsense to airline pricing. In addition, we can use other generic
consumer protection legislation to address areas of consumer detriment in air
transport. For example, we frequently challenge airlines’ conditions of carriage
by reference to the Unfair Terms in Consumer Contracts Regulations.
But we continue to receive large numbers of complaints about alleged
infringements of Regulation EC 261/2004. We also believe that the Montreal
Convention has not brought about the benefits, in terms of settlements of
claims for mishandled baggage, that we had hoped for. In addition, we note
that many airlines have yet to fully comply with the provisions of the “third
package”. And a number of airlines continue to include what appear unfair to
us to be terms in their conditions of carriage.
We believe that the priority now is for us to do as much as we can to ensure
that the legislation in place is enforced by the relevant bodies to the benefit of
passengers. In general, that means a greater emphasis on our advocacy work
directed at individual carriers and at enforcement bodies, rather than at
legislators or industry trade associations. We therefore see much of our role
as increasingly being to identify issues of detriment as they arise and to feed
this intelligence to enforcement bodies.
Last year we continued to work with the CAA, the designated National
Enforcement Bodies in EU Member States, and the European Commission on
enforcement of Regulation EC261/2004. And we presented them with
evidence of instances from our complaints where we considered that airlines
had not complied with the rules. We also published a report on mishandled
baggage settlements under the Montreal Convention. “The luggage lottery –
an AUC report into compensation payments to passengers for mishandled
baggage” concluded that the Convention had not brought about the benefits
to passengers in terms of settlements for mishandled baggage that we had
hoped for when it came into force in 2005. This report has since prompted the
European Commission to consider an EU wide investigation of airline
mishandled baggage settlements.
So it has again been another packed year for the Council. I would like to thank
my fellow Members of the Council, and also the executive team, for their
support they have given me over the year. Their expertise and hard work has
been invaluable to me in what has been a challenging, but ultimately
productive, year for the AUC.
Tina Tietjen