Fines for a gross amount of € 1,050,000 (€ 850,000 to Ryanair and € 200,000 to EasyJet) for the lack of transparency of travel insurance policies offered during the on line purchase of air-tickets and for the obstacles created in case of refund. These fines have been established by Antitrust at the conclusion of two distinct procedures of unfair commercial practices. The Authority has given Ryanair 30 days’ time to communicate the initiatives to remove this unfair behaviour. In the case of EasyJet, the Authority has taken into account the changes made during the administrative procedure both to the information provided to consumers in the on-line booking process and to the refund procedure: consequently, a lower fine has been applied.
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In Italy, Ryanair was fined € 850,000 for its famously hard to find to find “don’t insure me” dark pattern.
The Authority has also considered unfair, cumbersome and misleading, the mechanism imposed to consumers in order to select the no-purchase option of the travel insurance policy: in the Ryanair booking process it is necessary to go through the window of Country of Residence and select the option “refuse insurance”, positioned – in the Italian website - between Netherlands and Norway.