A lawyer working for a complaint portal raises serious allegations against Austrian Airlines, but the latter counters and assures that all inquiries will be processed.

An online portal specializing in bringing class action lawsuits raised serious allegations against Austrian Airlines in a media broadcast on Tuesday. The fact that the carrier offers flights and allows itself to be paid for, although - according to the Cobin Claims - the provider is aware that these will not be carried out has been criticized particularly fiercely. Austrian Airlines does not want to leave this criticism standing.

"We fully understand that the Covid pandemic has plunged the aviation industry into a crisis - but this must not be passed on to those paying customers who are now generating their first sales again for the airlines!" Said the chairman of the non-profit platform for class actions Cobin Claims, Oliver Jaindl, and the lawyer and Cobin Claims advisory board lawyer, Wolfgang Haslinger, who specializes in passenger rights.

The association criticizes the fact that bookings for some destinations have been accepted, but are not on the list of routes that will be served from June 15, 2020. It is accused that the carrier would send affected passengers on a veritable gauntlet and that accessibility is said to be poor. It is said that there are long waiting times at the hotline and that the service counters at the airport and at Wien-Landstraße train station should be closed. According to the broadcast, the hotline should not be able to offer any acceptable solutions.

Lawyer Haslinger says that he was forced to use real “compulsory vouchers”. After submitting the reimbursement application via the homepage, no money should have been paid out to date, but he had repeatedly received "only advertising e-mails asking for a voucher". “Unfortunately, such complaints are not unique; I have the impression that the AUA on the back of consumers violates clear provisions of the EU Air Passenger Rights Regulation - perhaps to keep the otherwise ailing company liquid. Because after a flight is canceled, AUA would be obliged to transfer the money back after seven days - even without being requested to do so; In any case, those affected should not accept a voucher. "

The legal situation, which Austrian Airlines and almost all other European carriers are currently disregarding, is clear. EU regulation 261/2004 stipulates that if the flight is canceled by the airline, replacement transport must be carried out and if this is not possible - currently during the corona pandemic, this is indeed not possible on many routes on the air. , still possible by land - a repayment must be made within seven days in the form of money and not in the form of vouchers. Practice shows, however, that most carriers do not even think about complying with their legal obligation and refer to "increased workload" and try to fob off their passengers with compulsory vouchers. This is only legally permissible if the passenger accepts it, which he does not have to.

AUA counters the allegations and ensures processing of all inquiries

Austrian Airlines does not want to leave the allegations raised by the Cobin complaint portal. A spokeswoman said: “The processing of inquiries in general, but also of reimbursement requests, unfortunately takes much longer than usual due to the current situation. We understand the passengers' anger, of course, but we still have to ask for a little patience. The temporary cessation of the entire flight operations in mid-March meant that the number of cases to be processed increased extremely within a very short period of time. We process the inquiries continuously and assure you: every inquiry will be processed. "

AUA group spokesman Peter Thier adds: “We are canceling 95 percent of the flights that are still in the system for June. This means that many passengers get a cancellation ”. Furthermore, Austrian Airlines recommends that the information published on the homepage be "read carefully". The synchronization of the “real flight plan” with the “published” flight plan would be a common process that all airlines worldwide do.