Ways to increase responsibility of air carriers for violation of airtraveller-consumers’ rights were considered during the round table discussion in the Committee on Transport and Communications
19 June 2013, 17:55
People’s deputies, representatives of state bodies and services, as well as airline-carriers participated in the event.
Opening the meeting, Chairman of the subcommittee on aviation transport Volodymyr Shulha noted that discussion of the issue was caused by numerous appeals to the Committee, Ministry of Infrastructure and other state bodies on the part of airtraveller-consumers complaining about the work of air line companies.
Chairman of the Committee informed that a lot of appeals pertained to flight cancellation, which poses lots of problems for passengers.
V.Shulha suggested amend the Air Traffic Rules by excluding the clause “flight cancellation for commercial reasons”, for there is no such definition in the Air Code.
Apart form this, air line companies delay time for ticket refund to the maximum possible and in some cases funds are returned only by the decision of a court.
V.Shulha informed that the Ministry of Infrastructure has referred the conclusion regarding one of such bills (Reg. No. 2632), which was considered in the Committee and the Committee members recommended the Verkhovna Rada recommit it.
Participants of the round table discussion expressed their view of legislative initiatives.
Representatives of air line companies noted that compensations increase means increase of their expenditures.
Representatives of airline-carriers and other economic entities upheld the applicable legislation in general and stood for strict adherence to it.
Following the results of discussion, participants of the event supported the necessity of increasing responsibility for fulfillment of the existing laws that regulate air traffic and deem amendments to legislation inexpedient.