Exclusive: Ryanair facing legal action over 'intimidating' passengers who try to claim compensation

Ryanair is facing legal action after being accused of intimidating passengers attempting to claim hundreds of pounds worth of flight delay compensation from the airline.

Law firm FairPlane, which specialises in claims for flight delays, has written to the Irish carrier asking for an apology and damages after the airline sent letters to its customers who had instructed it to obtain compensation due under EU legislation.

Debenhams Ottaway, acting on behalf of FairPlane, has accused Ryanair of “defamation, harrassment and unlawful interference” after Ryanair questioned in a letter to passengers using the firm whether they had “actually agreed to assign [their] claim”. The solicitors say the airline is wrongly telling passengers that FairPlane is claiming to own their compensation claim.

FairPlane said it did not know how many of its clients had been sent the letter, which has been seen by Telegraph Travel.

Ryanair then informs the passenger that they “appear… to have a valid claim” and that they would receive “100 per cent of [their] compensation… without deducting any legal fees or taking a cut” if they stopped using FairPlane and instead contacted the airline direct.

Daniel Morris, director of FairPlane, which charges a 25 per cent fee for any compensation won, which can total up to €600 (￡531), accused Ryanair of “bamboozling” his clients.

“They’re trying to disrupt the client’s relations with us. At this point, it’s a bit late [for Ryanair to offer compensation] because the client has already come to us,” he said. “In many cases the main reason Ryanair pays up is because we get involved.

“They reject the vast majority of claims, then the client comes to us and we write to the airline. We have a 94 per cent success rate in court proceedings. They’re not allowed to stop a person going to get legal representation.

“They know we force them to pay and if we get removed from that equation it saves them money.”

At a glance | EU Regulation 261/2004

Though Ryanair is accurate in informing the customer they will receive the full compensation by going direct to the airline and, according to the Civil Aviation Authority, passengers have a duty to contact the airline direct in the first instance when trying to claim compensation after a flight delay, Mr Morris says it is not right that the airline is contacting passengers behind FairPlane’s back.

Mr Morris said FairPlane’s figures show that it is forced to issue proceedings against Ryanair on 45 per cent of claims and of those it has a 94 per cent success rate but “our success rate may be higher because Ryanair deliberately causes confusion by sending money directly to our clients”.

Mr Morris accused Ryanair of paying claimants less compensation than due under EU law, by “￡30, ￡40 or ￡50”, as a “deliberate tactic” to save money. “Not huge sums but it saves them money as the client then just accepts that amount,” he said.

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Luke Harrison, lead commercial litigation partner at Debenhams Ottaway, said: “Ryanair is able to disrupt a solicitor’s business model and potentially make it ineffective by interfering with the claims process.

“There are common law rules which prevent this, particularly those relating to agreements in relation to the solicitors’ costs for dealing with a claim against the airline. Further persistent direct contact of customers represented by solicitors is arguably harassment.”

A spokesperson for Ryanair said: “We don’t comment on the false claims of ‘claims chaser’ firms who are ripping off consumers by charging up to 50 per cent of their compensation, by forcing them to sign liens and deliberately bringing them through the courts. We urge all customers with valid EU261 compensation claims to submit their claims directly to Ryanair. Customers with valid claims who claim directly from Ryanair will receive 100 per cent of their EU261 compensation entitlement without the deduction of these excessive ‘claims chaser’ fees.”

A spokesperson for the Civil Aviation Authority (CAA) confirmed that airlines are not obliged to pay compensation if they have not been contacted first by the passenger. However, Mr Morris said FairPlane does not collect information on whether its clients have approached the airline in the first instance.

Consumer groups encourage passengers to attempt to claim compensation for flight delays themselves, without the need of going through a law firm that would charge a fee. However, travellers might turn to the solicitors if an initial claim is rejected.

Earlier this year a study by Which? into whether airlines are correctly paying out compensation found that the CAA disagreed with Ryanair’s refusal to pay on 77 per cent of cases it was asked to arbitrate, the second highest behind Norwegian.

Last week the CAA announced threatened Ryanair with legal action for “persistently misleading passengers”. Ryanair agreed to meet with the regulatory and to comply with its requests.