Diritti dei passeggeri nel mercato aereo tra libera concorrenza e trasparenza tariffaria: brevi note a margine del caso Ryanair c. AGCM

The purpose of this Highlight is to illustrate the recent Ryanair Ltd. v. AGCM judgment (Court of Justice, judgement of 23 April 2020, case C-28/19), in which the Court of Justice has ruled on pricing policies of air transport in the internal market. The Italian Antitrust Authority sanctioned the Irish low-cost airline due to a lack of transparency in the advertised pricing. In the present case, the final price to be paid did not contain any of the additional charges (web check-in fees, payment card surcharge and VAT) which were communicated to the passenger only at the end of the booking procedure. The Court, interpreting the Community Regulation on internal aviation market, clarified the concept of "unavoidable and foreseeable elements of price" and its difference with optional costs. Low-cost carriers have based their commercial strategies on the cheapness of fares to easily reach price-sensitive customers. This decision put an end to an unfair advertising practice that created an indirect distortion of competition. The Court's intervention contrib-uted to reduce the informative gap that afflicted customers while allowing them to effective-ly compare prices of different airlines that can be found on the web.