Home » Technology » The head of Ryanair leaned against Kiwi. You’re undermining our business, says Oliver Dlouhý

The head of Ryanair leaned against Kiwi. You’re undermining our business, says Oliver Dlouhý

Ryanair airline on its YouTube channel on Thursday released a video, where its CEO (not the whole group, that’s still Michael O’Leary) Eddie Wilson explains to customers how to get a refund for flights that did not occur due to the pandemic. In the first minute, he also relies on the Czech Kiwi.com.

“Many of you turn to our customer service for help with a reservation you have made through sites such as Kiwi or On the Beach. However, none of these services (Wilson uses “screen scrapers”) have a license or permission to sell our flights, “explains Wilson.

According to him, Ryanair cannot contact these customers on the part of the refund, because it does not have their real e-mail addresses and bank accounts – Kiwi.com allegedly states that they are false or do not own to real passengers when booking. Kiwi.com and others allegedly do so because they stick their own surcharges to Ryanair’s taxes, the amount of which they want to hide from the customer.


“Ryanair has all the information we need to make a refund. The fact that they cannot refund money due to booking through third parties is complete nonsense, “Oliver Dlouhý tells Forbes. The proof is also the fact that 10 percent of refunds have already taken place. “Ninety percent are kept and held hostage by customers,” adds Dlouhý.

He does not explicitly refute or confirm the question of the parties to the unrealistic data, but says that if Ryanair wanted to, he could probably return the money to Kiwi.com without any problems. This would then transfer them to customers, which would be the standard transaction route at entry, only the other way around.

“Ryanair’s latest tactic – withholding refunds from our customers in order to undermine Kiwi.com’s business model – is now public thanks to Eddie Wilson’s video,” Dlouhy continues. Wilson, on the other hand, recommends at the end of the video that customers make all other reservations directly through Ryanair’s website or their mobile application.

The management of Europe’s largest airline has said in the past that it considers third parties to be “unnecessary”. Last year, the Czech company entered into a strategic partnership with the German airport Kolín / Bonn, on the basis of which Ryanair even challenged both players in court.

Kiwi.com is still waiting for billions of crowns in refunds from airlines that customers request directly from the Brno company through which they bought tickets.

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