Ryanair has given 30 days notice to Expedia that its hotel contract will end following Expedia’s failure to honour payment terms.  Ryanair entered into the agreement with Travelscape LLC (the parent of Expedia) on the 21st March 2007.  This agreement gave Expedia exclusive rights to sell hotel accommodation on Ryanair.com and gave Expedia on-line access to Ryanair’s 58m annual passengers.

While the contract operated satisfactorily in its early stages, Ryanair claims that Expedia has been in breach of a number of its payment obligations in recent months and that despite strenuous efforts on the company’s part to resolve the situation, particularly to regularise the agreed payments, Expedia has “failed to remedy its defaults or honour these contractual obligations”.  Consequently, Ryanair has now given Expedia notice of its intention to end the contract with effect from the 8th November 2008.

 

Commenting on this decision, Ryanair’s Michael Cawley, said:

 

“Ryanair offered Expedia the unique opportunity to exclusively access its 58 million passengers through Europe’s largest travel website, Ryanair.com.  Regrettably, Expedia has failed to honour key obligations under this agreement, in particular its payment terms, and our attempts in recent months to get Expedia to resolve these breaches, have failed so we now have no alternative but to give them notice.

 

“We have already received approaches from a number of other hotel providers across Europe and expect to have a replacement partner up and running before the end of the year so that hotel accommodation can continue to be available on Europe’s biggest travel website, www.Ryanair.com, at the lowest prices to 58m consumers who already enjoy Europe’s guaranteed lowest fares.

 

“Should Expedia remedy its breach within the 30 day period, Ryanair will continue the partnership”.
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