After Hungary, Ryanair will withdraw from some Romanian routes
Aviation portal Ryanair will withdraw from four Romanian airports in the spring of 2023 boardingpass.ro was reported.
According to the portal, the low-cost airline is suspending all flights from the airports of three Transylvanian cities – Nagyvárad (Nagyvard), Temesvár (Temesvár), Nagyszeben (Nagisceben) – and Northeastern Szucsáva. Ryanair is not completely withdrawing from Romania, after March it will operate a total of 41 flights from the airports of Bucharest, Cluj (Cluj) and Iași in the northeast.
When asked, the airline provided an explanation
Four airports were forced to leave due to the “lack of long-planned incentives”.
According to the portal Ebihoreanul.ro, the city of Nagyvárad agreed to operate four international flights from the airport in the fall of 2020, in exchange for the 800,000 euros needed for the modernization at that time. Half of the amount was paid when the contract was signed, and the other half during the procedure. Three months after the subsidy expired, Ryanair’s contract announced its withdrawal.
CBU Airport Director Marius Gidia told the local portal Turnulsfatului.ro that the airline had asked for a higher subsidy than the airport provided, but it was not possible. “We are trying to negotiate with other providers to close the gap,” he said.
Ryanair also had a problem with the “lack of incentives” in Hungary. The Hungarian government recently introduced an extra profit tax in the summer, which Ryanair immediately passed on to the customer. For this reason, a consumer protection procedure is initiated against the airline.
In a statement, the CEO of the airline, Michael O’Leary, reiterated that the “special taxes” are nonsense, and the disputes between Ryanair and the government escalated to the point that O’Leary called Minister of Economic Development Márton. Nagy is an idiot for criticizing Ryanair’s operations.
Finally, O’Leary announced that the number of flights will be reduced, so that eight cities will not be served from Budapest until October. As a result, the number of Ryanair flights in Hungary decreased from 53 to 45.
This article originally appeared on our sister site Hungarian Heute.
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