Facua-Consumidores en Acción (Facua) said it has now added Air Europa, KLM, Latam Airlines, Lufthansa, Transavia and United Airlines to its list after previously filing complaints against Air France and Vueling with the ministries of transport, health, consumption and welfare.It said it was calling on both ministries to put pressure on the airlines to ‘comply with the law and proceed with reimbursements’ and to order the country’s 17 regional consumer authorities to prepare to ‘sanction’ the airlines if they did not.

Facua said it had received ‘an avalanche’ of cancellations and requests for refunds since it began tracking the procedures of 22 airlines following the outbreak of Covid-19. Of these, 13 said they accepted reimbursements. Of the eight it is denouncing, six – Air Europa, KLM, Latam Airlines, Lufthansa, Transavia and Air France – are for only offering passengers a change of date or a voucher to use on a later flight. In the case of United Airlines, the airline said the tickets could be refundable ‘without clarifying the circumstances in which it would be allowed’. 

With Vueling, although it said on its website that it would allow reimbursements, several consumers complained to the consumer association that after submitting claims the airline had declined to return their money.

Facua said that the airlines were ‘violating’ European Union regulations on compensation and assistance for passengers affected by flight cancellations or major delays. Its move came after the Airlines Association (ALA) – which includes all the main domestic and foreign airlines flying into and out of Spain – called on the government to help them face up to the reimbursements.

“If the airlines find themselves obliged to reimburse the thousands of tickets of these thousands of cancelled flights as a consequence of the restrictions established for the coronavirus it could unleash the bankruptcy of many of them,” said ALA’s President, Javier Gándara.