COMPETITION LAW: ONLINE TRAVEL AGENTS AND AIRLINES attempt by OTB to manage such bookings on their behalves. OTB is thus prevented from making any changes to bookings that those OTB customers might request. (ii) After completion of the online verification process, OTB is placed in, if anything, an even more difficult position. First, the position described at (i) above continues to apply unless and until the OTB customer informs OTB of the email address supplied by them during the process (and, if necessary, any changed password). Second, in requiring OTB customers to provide a personal email address to which all future communications will be sent, Ryanair creates a situation whereby OTB may not be aware of changes to a booking (for example, a flight cancellation or change) unless the customer takes additional steps to inform OTB of that change. As customers use package holiday providers to avoid the need to manage all aspects of the holiday, this additional burden on the customer degrades the customer experience and undermines confidence in OTB. It is fundamentally at odds with the reason why OTB customers use OTB as an agent or intermediary in the first place, as Ryanair is well aware. In the event that customers do not make OTB aware of a change, OTB would not be aware of changes to flights that require it to make amendments to other parts of the holiday: failure to make such amendments will, inevitably, degrade OTB customers’ holiday experience and further undermine trust and confidence in OTB. (4) Ryanair deliberately withholds refunds from OTB Customers. For the layperson, this is perhaps the allegation of greatest concern; and for the lawyer, it is a shocking assertion that an airline has deliberately breached its obligations to a particular class of consumer in furtherance of its own business strategy. According to OTB, Ryanair has unjustifiably sought to exploit the circumstances of the Covid-19 pandemic in order to exert financial pressure on OTB, and reduce its effectiveness as a competitor, by withholding refunds sought by OTB, where Ryanair has cancelled those customers’ flights. OTB has therefore, in accordance with its legal obligations as an organiser of package holidays itself been forced to fund refunds to its customers, totalling £48.7 million to date of issue. Of those sums, OTB has been able to recover approximately £43.5 million, primarily through the use of the chargeback facility of the credit cards it uses to book its customers’ flights. It alleges that Ryanair has sought to prevent such chargebacks, created further unnecessary obstacles to providing refunds, and generally refused constructively to engage
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