Low cost airline Ryanair is taking legal action against On The Beach after accusing the agent of screen scraping its fares without permission and breaching the terms of use of its website.

Ryanair claims it has received calls from over 300 passengers in recent months who have experienced problems after booking Ryanair flights with the agent who it claims was selling Ryanair seats at inflated prices.

Ryanair’s Stephen McNamara said: “Online travel agents or “screenscraper” websites continue to cause problems for passengers with their non-existent or inadequate after-sale service.

“Many of these sites fail to pass on vital information to both passengers and Ryanair regarding issues such as flight changes, web check-in, special needs assistance and contact details, which has resulted in missed flights and repeated problems for their misguided customers.

“Our message to passengers is simple: book directly on www.ryanair.com for the guaranteed lowest fares and best customer care.”
On the Beach has denied the claims made by Ryanair and stated that within the past four years, it had issued proceedings with the Dublin High Court.

But On the Beach chief marketing officer Alistair Daly said:“We are disputing Irish Jurisdiction and in any event will robustly refute the allegations made by RyanAir.

On the subject of the customer queries Daly went on to say: “We categorically deny that there is any basis to these allegations and believe we have fully dealt with all the issues outlined in our correspondence with them.”