No-frills airline Ryanair has applauded a decision by the European Ombudsman to ask the European Commission to amend publicity material about new European rules on air passenger rights.
Ryanair said it was "a welcome development" that Nikiforos Diamandouros had identified certain "inaccurate and misleading" statements in the leaflets, posters and video presentations and asked the commission to put them right.
The commission published publicity material in February, 2005, telling travellers about new EU rules governing compensation and help if their flights were delayed or cancelled, or if they were not allowed to board their aircraft.
However, two airline associations complained that a number of statements in the material were inaccurate and misleading.
One of the statements said: "If you are denied boarding or your flight is cancelled, the airline operating your flight must offer you financial compensation and assistance."
The ombudsman said he considered this sentence "wrongly suggests that compensation has to be paid in every case where a flight is cancelled". He said he also agreed with some other complaints made by the associations, although he said he did not find all their allegations to be justified.
Dublin-based Ryanair said it had asked for the legislation itself to be dropped.
It claims the new rules force airlines to compensate and assist passengers for delays and cancellations even in cases where the airlines were not responsible for the problems.
"The cost of this compensation and assistance is often several times the amount of the original fare. Other competing forms of transportation have no such requirements," Ryanair said in a statement.