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Code
Share Flights - Interpretation by Aer Lingus in relation to
Baggage charges introduced in January 2007
Aer
Lingus takes nearly six months to reply to customer complaint
letter
The
following is about a situation whereby a large airline introduces
a new policy, announces there will be exceptions, but in reality
does not do what it has said it will do. There is not normally
any real problem when an airline introduces a different fare
structure, however as the case below illustrates stating one
thing and doing another is not fair practice
In
August 2006 it was announced that Aer Lingus will be charging
for carrying luggage -"The
Irish airline Aer Lingus has followed Ryanair and FlyBe in
announcing that it will charge passengers extra for baggage
it carries in the aircraft hold. This will be from the 17th
January 2007. They will levy a fee 8.00 / £5.50 for each bag
carried for short haul flights or half if it is booked on
line in advance. This fee policy reflects the moves among
some low cost airlines like Irish competitor Ryanair to apportion
costs for optional services. The company has abolished complimentary
catering on its European network. The policy will not affect
British Airways passengers who are booked on "code share flights"
(EI127 /BA329 for example) that operated from London Heathrow
to Dublin, Cork and Shannon. British Airways has negotiated
for its passengers to be exempt from the charge
"
In
January 2007 the charges fell into place. On the 3rd February
2007 this was tested on a flight from London Heathrow to Dublin.
It was classified as a "Code share flight".
What
is a code share flight? It
is a business term in the airline industry dating back to
1990 when American Airlines and Qantas combined their service
to and from cities in Australia and the USA. It means that
a flight operand by airline a) is marketed in addition by
airline b) or even C) & d). It is very common these days.
The
booking Was made on line and when the passenger arrived at
Heathrow airport had to pay an extra £5.00 E1163 is
a code share flight with British Airways.
The
Aer Lingus website was stating"
Baggage Policy Changes Short-haul Flights (UK/Europe): If
you are travelling on a shorthaul flight on or after the 17th
January 2007 and your original booking was made after the
9th August 2006 then new baggage fees and rules will apply
to your journey*. Details are as follows: Checked-In Baggage:Pay
online prior to day of departure: €4 fee for every bag checked
in for each flight. Pay at the airport on day of departure:
€8 fee for every bag checked in for each flight. Excess Check-In
Baggage: A maximum of 20kgs (44lbs) in total weight per passenger
is permitted. Bags in excess of this weight will be charged
an excess baggage fee at an additional €8 or equivalent per
kilogram at the airport. Cabin Baggage Allowance (no change):
A maximum of 1 Bag per passenger weighing no more than 6 kgs.
See all other information on Baggage here. *Codeshare passengers
(AA, BA, or KLM flight number) travelling on Aer Lingus operated
flights will not be subject to these baggage fees.
They
even issued this leaflet in Dublin 
Click on image to open
It
is rather difficult to contact Aer Lingus by email. You can
do this via some of their central European offices, but not
in the UK or Ireland.
Three
offices were contacted advising the passenger would be returning
and would there be a baggage charge because of the "Code
share" arrangements.Two offices actually replied.
Thank
you for your inquiry. You have booked the flight on our homepage
and it is a "pure" Aerlingus flight and the ticketnr. is also
Aerlingus. I cannot recognise a BA flight nr. nor a BA ticketnr.
The checked-in baggage was not paid online or in advance and
therefore the check-in agent from Aerlingus charged EUR8 on
the day of departure. You can pre-book your baggages online
and the fee is EUR4/segment and baggage. If not Mrs..... will
be charged EUR8 at the airport. mit freundlichen Grüssen -
with best regards i. A. Gerelynn Maliksi-Trisl Reservation
& Ticketing Aer Lingus
I
am sorry to tell you that she is going to be charged again.
I have seen her booking, and she has a flight operated by
Aer Lingus, the code is EI, so she is going to be charged.
Kind regards, AER LINGUS
Hello,
As fas as I am concerned you can only book Aerlingus flights
from our website (www.flyaerlingus.com) and not Codeshares.
The message from our website regarding codeshare passengers
are exempt from the baggage fees is correct but your flight
is not a codeshare that's why your wife has been charged for
the baggage fee. I attached 2 screenshots from our website
containing that the flights you have booked is Aerlingus and
not a codeshare@EI 192 Z THU 8FEB DUBLHR HK1 2050 2205 LK-
/ETK 3 HT 6 Y SUN 8APR ETKTTT HK1 1111 1212 PNR REF-236VZB
.
Yes,
it is Aer Lingus flight so we charge for baggage. But you
can pay for baggage in advence by internet at our webside
pls choose MANAGE BOOKING and then Book your bags in advance.
By internet it costs 4EUR Iwona Nagraba Aer Lingus Al.Ujazdowskie
20.
Letter
faxed to AER LINGUS Dublin 11th February 2007
Good
morning
I
refer to our exchange of emails last week regarding being
charged for baggage on Aer lingus flights. I collected my
wife from London - Heathrow on Thursday evening 8th February.
She had to pay for baggage.
The
overhead signs at Dublin said EI 192 was BA5992 (the same
at Heathrow as you will see from attached photos). She then
phoned me to say she could get on an earlier flight E1 184
or known as BA5984.
When
I arrived at Heathrow, as it was quiet I went up to the check
in and asked them about charging for baggage. I said on the
Aer Lingus website you state that you do not share on code
share flights and the two Aer Lingus people said they were
unaware of this and had been taking money since the rules
came in.
(Click
on image for larger picture)
My wife brought back a leaflet from Dublin - various languages
(scan attached) again stating no charge on code shares. I
am also attaching an item on code sharing off the internet.
If you are being paid by the other partner air lines is this
not wrong that you still show these flights as code share
flights on the overhead timetables (as per photos) and probably
take money from two sources? I am sure one of your major shareholders
Rynair of course would welcome the extra dividend. I am copying
this email to Mr Simon Calder travel writer at The Independent
in the UK who I am sure would be interested in this story,
in the same week that BA has started charging for additional
luggage. I would appreciate if you can forward this to your
head office as I do not appear to be able to communicate directly
with them. Regards ......
(Click
on images for larger picture)
Aer
Lingus posted out an acknowledgement on the 21st February
saying: "Thank you for your
letter. Your letter has been assigned to a member of our Customer
Care team and you will be contacted shortly. In the meantime,
I thank you for your patience. etc". At the
5th April 2007 when this page on this website was created
no further communication has been received. See
This
situation was reported to "Which" The Consumer Magazine
in the UK who replied
" I can appreciate your frustration
at being unable to get a satisfactory response to your emails
to Aer Lingus about the charge for baggage checked into the
hold.
I've checked the Aer Lingus website help section and it quotes
a charge of 4 Euros if baggage booked in advance, 8 Euros
is checked in on the day, no mention is made there of the
charge being waived on particular shared flights and it seems
that the definition of a shared flight needs to be clarified.
I will make sure that your comments are passed on. We have
a complaints database where we can record incidents like this
and generate a monthly report of the companies we have received
the most complaints about. This will help us determine if
this is a large problem and helps greatly when planning future
reports and campaigns. Regards, Diane Hacker Which?
Many
thanks for your email this is the section of the Aer Lingus
Website: Please see bottom line.I found it by following the
New Checked in Baggage Charges on the Home page. I think it
is very important that they clarify this. I also attach their
leaflet they give out and the flight timetable showing code
sharing If they are going to charge fine, however if they
say they don;t on a code share and still do I belive that
is againt the Misdicription act or similar legislation. I
look forward to hearing from you
Thank
you for emailing Diane again, with additional information.
I am replying on behalf of Diane this morning. We have all
of the details and we will keep these on record. You may also
wish to put in a complaint to the Air Transport Users Council
to draw their attention to the issue. Here is a link to their
website: http://www.caa.co.uk/default.aspx?catid=306
Regards, Susanne Long Which?
As
this is an Irish Airline, The Consumers' Association of Ireland
was contacted
HI
I refer to your query regarding Aer Lingus charging for baggage
on code share flights.
Unfortunately
it seems Aer Lingus are within their rights to do this and
you maybe should have booked through BA. We agree that it
is confusing and we will be highlighting this confusion in
our upcoming piece in monthly Consumer Choice magazine about
airline extras.
If you have any other experiences that you would like to relate
or any other questions, feel free to give me a shout. Many
thanks John Cradden The Consumers' Association of Ireland
43-44 Chelmsford Road Ranelagh Dublin 6
The
issue has been passed to the Trading Standards authority in
the UK.
The
Aer Lingus website no longer appears to have the words "Codeshare
passengers (AA, BA, or KLM flight number) travelling on Aer
Lingus operated flights will not be subject
to these baggage fees"
However
in March 2007 charges for baggage were increased again "
Both Aer Lingus and
Ryanair have defended increases of up to 33 per cent in charges
levied on air passengers carrying baggage that is not hand
baggage. Aer Lingus first introduced baggage charges in January
2007 with the online price for baggage being €4.00 and it
is going up to €5.00 - a 25% increase per flight. The
Consumers' Association of Ireland has denounced the increased
baggage charges as "a scandalous rip-off of the traveeling
public". Rynair's online baggage charges have risen by
over 71 per cent in the the year since they were introduced.
The British airline BMIBaby ( the budget airline of British
Midland) has also increased it's baggage rates. Online they
have increased
from €4.00 to €4.95"
At
least they do not appear to be stating that code share flights
will not be charged!
©
jml Property Services April 2007
August
2007
Letter
sent 11th February 2007 - Acknowledged 21st February and on
the 31st July Aer Lingus finally replies. "Thank
you for your correspondence. Aer Lingus are committed tp offering
our customers low fares on an increasing network of routes.
By reducing our costs, we are now in a position to offer our
customers fares to the UK starting at 1.00 and to Europe
from 19.00.
As
you are aware, we have now implemented a charge for checked
luggage. This is 5.00 per bag if paid in advance online
or 8.00 per bag if paid on the day of travel. We appreciate
that such an initiative may not be attractive to all customers.
However, we feel this is keeping costs low for customers travelling
with only hand luggage.
Code
share passengers travelling on Aer Lingus flights are not
charged baggage fees. However, on this occasion, your wife
was an Aer Lingus passenger with an EI ticket. Some of our
flights are stated EI192?BA... The BA flight number is for
the benefit of British Airways passengers with a connecting
flight on Aer Lingus to Ireland and travelling on a British
Airways ticket. As your wife was not travelling on a British
Airways ticket, she was charged the baggage fee.
If
I can be of any further assistance to you, please do not hesitate
to contact me in writing quoting the above reference. Yours
sincerely S C W...Customer Care.
©
jml Property Services August 2007
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