Ryanair to cancel thousands of 'illegal' bookings made through price comparison websites

As many as 1,000 people a day could be turned away at airport check-in desks next week despite having paid for their tickets.

The move could ruin the holiday plans of thousands of families who have booked cheap flights during the school summer break.

Ryanair: The new move could leave thousands of passengers with cancelled flights

A number of travel websites allow consumers to run price comparisons to find the cheapest flights before booking tickets.

Ryanair bosses want travellers to book directly with the airline's own website.

They claim the activities of these third party websites, known as 'screen scrapers', are slowing down the operation of the Ryanair website.

However, their decision has been condemned by the consumer group Which? and the Association of British Travel Agents.

Rochelle Turner of Which? Holiday said: 'We are stunned that Ryanair is treating its customers in this way.

'At a time when many people are struggling to afford holidays overseas, airlines should be finding ways to make it easier for families to book and travel in the way that is convenient for them, not making it even harder.'

A spokesman for ABTA said the airline was being 'foolish' and 'unreasonable'.

Details of the plans to cancel tickets emerged at a London press conference to announce a series of price cuts, hosted by the company's fiery chief executive, Michael O'Leary.

He said: 'We are free to cancel a booking, we want to cause as much chaos for the screen scrapers as possible.'

The screen scraping websites account for about 0.5 per cent of Ryanair's bookings, which is equivalent to 1,000 a day.

Michael O'Leary, chief executive of Ryanair

These sites use a technology that allows their booking tools to marry up with those of Ryanair and other low-cost airlines, and carry out a sale.

The customer, however, never leaves the original price comparison site.

Ryanair insists these sites' activities are illegal and that passengers using them are being forced to pay more for fares and other services.

The airline has taken legal action against Italian company BravoFly to force it to stop screen scraping its website, having previously taken similar steps against German firm V-tours.

Ryanair defended its decision to cancel bookings made in this way for trips from Monday onwards, saying it was 'a quicker and more effective way of discouraging this unlawful activity'.

Spokesman Howard Miller said: 'We hope that by getting rid of screen scrapers we will speed up passenger processing times on Ryanair.com as well as ensuring that Ryanair passengers are not paying unnecessary handling charges or higher fares.'

Passengers whose bookings have been cancelled will be compensated.

However, if the price comparison websites fail to tell passengers that their flights have been cancelled, there is little to prevent those affected turning up at airports all over Europe only to be told they have no booking.

This is because Ryanair often does not have the contact details for passengers who book their tickets using these sites.

As a result it is unable to let them know directly of any cancellation or changes to their flights.