Following rulings in the Gothenburg and Nyköping district courts, the airline Ryanair is forced to compensate travelers who were affected by a pilot strike in 2018. The rulings put pressure on SAS, which has refused to compensate travelers who were affected by the spring strike chaos.
At least that's what the flight compensation company Airhelp thinks, which has taken SAS to court to force the airline to pay compensation to the thousands of travelers who were affected by the week-long pilot strike at the turn of April/May.
SAS has refused to pay, citing the strike as an "extraordinary event".
”"Our assessment is that such a conflict is to be considered an extraordinary event and therefore EC 261 is not applicable. It is the same assessment that ARN made in connection with Norwegian's conflict, and so we will see how this is assessed this time. In other countries, they have made a different interpretation and therefore it is important that the EU now puts its foot down and tells us how the law should be interpreted," SAS CEO Rickard Gustafson told Di in August.
Exactly what impact the Ryanair rulings have on SAS remains to be seen, but in comparison, the Ryanair strike only lasted 24 hours. However, it affected 40,000 travelers worldwide, of which 22 flights in Sweden were affected.
The sentences were handed down in October in Nyköping and in July in Gothenburg.
The Irish airline opposed the obligation to pay and argued that the flight chaos was an extraordinary circumstance, which the district courts did not buy.
Ryanair will now pay between 250-400 euros, equivalent to approximately 2,700-4,300 SEK, to a number of affected passengers.
”"Our ambition is to do everything we can to ensure that travelers receive the compensation they deserve for delayed and canceled flights. The rulings against Ryanair now show that our customers can feel confident that we are pursuing the matter as far as necessary," says Marie Bexelius, Sweden Manager at Airhelp.
Airhelp believes that the likelihood of SAS being found guilty in court has increased with the rulings against Ryanair.
”"We believe that SAS should take its responsibility and compensate travelers affected by the company's internal conflicts. We believe that the European Court of Justice will come to the same conclusion," says Marie Bexelius.
