Ryanair to cancel flights booked through intermediaries [MERGED]

cifpower

Up to 1,000 Ryanair passengers a day could find themselves stranded without flights as a result of an aggressive new policy at the airline to combat so-called 'screen scrapers'.

The low-cost airline is to start cancelling bookings which have been made using this method from Monday.

'We are free to cancel a booking,' Ryanair CEO Michael O'Leary said a press conference in London at which he announced a massive seat sale.

'We want to cause as much chaos for the screen scrapers as possible'

http://www.rte.ie/business/2008/0807/ryanair.html

So be warned - check prices with intermediaries but DO NOT book through them.

Old_Git

http://www.ryanair.com/site/EN/news.php?yr=08&month=jul&story=reg-en-100708

ynot2005

[FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif][SIZE=-1]Up to 1000 passengers a day could find their flights are cancelled by Ryanair as a result of its aggressive new policy to combat intermediary websites who offer to book its flights. The low-cost airline is to start cancelling bookings made on so called 'screen scrapers' from Monday (August 11), including those already made, and will only alert passengers by email if it has their address.[/SIZE][/FONT]
[FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif][SIZE=-1]Screen scrapers are websites which compare costs from different airlines by taking the information from an airline website and displaying it on their website in a different format. The can also be used to book flights, but often add a fee (making the flights more expensive than booking direct).[/SIZE][/FONT]
[FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif][SIZE=-1]Ryanair CEO Michael O'Leary said that about 1000 bookings are made with the budget airline via these websites each day. He said: 'We are free to cancel a booking. We want to cause as much chaos for the screen scrapers as possible.' Asked what will happen to people who have booked on these sites, he said: 'They won't be flying.' [/SIZE][/FONT]
[FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif][SIZE=-1]Mr O'Leary said that passengers are 'getting stiffed' on these sites, which usually charge more than fares quoted on Ryanair.com. Ryanair will refund the cost of the flight to the intermediary website, as the airline does not deal directly with passengers. Passing the refund on - and refunding the additional cost which the intermediary site charged - will be left up to the screen scraper site, he said.[/SIZE][/FONT]
[FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif][SIZE=-1]An ABTA spokesman said Ryanair’s threat to cancel individual bookings was unprecedented. He said: [/SIZE][/FONT][FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif][SIZE=-1]‘For Ryanair to take any such action is nonsensical and will damage them as an airline.' (Damage the Ryanair brand? How could it be more damaged?![/SIZE][/FONT]

leo1408

Hello I hope I am posting this correctly as I am new posting virgin :A
Ryanair have now said they will cancel all flights made via screen scrape sites the trade reports as follows
Ryanair will not honour screen-scraped bookings & I would hate any of hard working money savers to loose their holiday as a result

(08 August 2008)

Ryanair's ongoing battle with screen-scrapers has taken another twist this week, with the carrier saying it will "introduce new procedures to cancel all passenger bookings made through screen-scraping websites" starting next week.
The comments came in a statement from the airline confirming that bravofly.com had agreed to stop scraping the Ryanair site.
This follows an injunction in Germany against V-Tours for doing the same.
Howard Millar, the airline's chief financial officer, said: "Ryanair is continuing to work with our software providers, Navitaire and Microsoft, to proactively eliminate screen-scraping of Ryanair's website."
It is not known whether the site can be ring-fenced to prevent it from being accessed by screen scraping technology.
Similarly, the legal position of a customer who has booked a seat on Ryanair via an unauthorised third party link is unclear.
Millar added that the latest move is "a quicker and more effective way of discouraging this unlawful activity".

eslick

Hi All

Just been on the radio 5 live, cant see any links though , Ryanair are going to cancel flights booked through scraping websites. They say its because these sites cost more, use their own email addresses and the customers credit cards to book flights.

If someone has booked with a scraper and the website has told Ryanair the passengers email address they will receive a email telling them that its been cancelled, if the website has used their own email address it is up to the website to tell the passenger. If the website doesnt tell the passenger the flight has been cancelled when they get to the airport they wont be able to fly.

Incapuppy

Already posted here:

http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/showthread.html?t=1082611

Incapuppy

This is the 3rd/4th thread that has been started about this today.

Incapuppy

Useful info but this is the 3rd/4th thread that has been started about this today.

eslick

its amazing looked through them all and then posted. One of them posted at the same time as well hopefully someone will delete it.

dzug1

Denied boarding compensation under EU regs??

brodev

Does this include Skyscanner?