Passengers booked at Ryanair whose British passports comply with European validity rules will no longer have to face a refusal to board.
Europe’s largest budget airline told The Independent that airport agents had been informed to follow both conditions for holders of British passports traveling to the EU:
- Date of issue: less than 10 years on the date of accession to the EU.
- Expiry date: at least three months until the scheduled day of departure.
Earlier, the Irish airline insisted: “If you use a British travel passport, it must be valid for at least six months from the date of entry into each EU Member State.
“If your passport is valid for more than 10 years, exceeding the validity period will not help meet the requirements for travel to an EU Member State.
Ryanair now accepts that these conditions are incorrect.
In addition, the carrier withdrew its claim that “the child’s passport must be no more than five years old at the date of travel”.
The airline turned down 15-year-old Zack Shawnville at Glasgow Prestwick Airport on Sunday. He has a valid British passport, issued a little over five years ago, with five months to expire.
The Schoneville family was booked to fly with his Ryanair family to Tenerife. Subsequently, they flew with Jet2.
A Ryanair spokesman told The Independent: “Our immigration department has already clarified this case with the European Commission.
“We now accept that our processing agents at Glasgow Prestwick Airport mistakenly thought that this teenager’s passport was not valid for travel, as they mistakenly believed that the child’s passport should be no more than five years old. the date of travel, while in fact all UK citizens traveling to the EU, regardless of age, must meet the same entry requirements for travel to the EU, which are:
- Passports must be issued within 10 years of arrival in the EU.
- The passport must be valid for at least three months from the date of return of the trip from the EU, unless the passenger has a Schengen residence permit or a Schengen long-term visa.
In light of this obvious mistake on our part, we wrote to his family and returned a full refund of £ 413.24 and as a gesture of goodwill we also gave them a travel voucher for another £ 415, which we hope to use to book more Ryanair flights for the family in the very near future.
“We sincerely apologize for the mistake we made in this case and have updated our information notes to all our airport service agents.”
Last November, The Independent informed all the leading airlines flying from the UK to Europe about the exact rules for holders of British passports after Brexit, but some instead imposed their own, stricter policies.
Last week, easyJet complied with European rules and is now paying compensation to passengers who have been wrongly denied boarding. Ryanair is expected to face even more lawsuits.
Under the rules on air passenger rights, duly documented passengers who are rejected from flights to Europe are owed either £ 220 or £ 350 in cash (depending on distance) in addition to replacement tickets and other costs.
The current increase in passport applications is due in part to airlines and holiday companies that misrepresent European requirements, leading many passengers to apply for renewals unnecessarily early.
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