DUBLIN, June 8 (Xinhua) -- The Ireland-headquartered Ryanair was fined 1.85 million euros (2.18 million U.S. dollars) by Itlian Competition Authority (ICA) over Ryanair's failure to provide adequate information to customers when the airline cancelled thousands of flights last year due to pilot strikes, local media RTE reported on Friday.
Ryanair has not made any response to the fine yet. An unidentified source from Ryanair told local media that the airline has noticed the ruling by the ICA and the ruling is being reviewed by its lawyers.
Last year about 400,000 passengers were reportedly affected due to the cancellation of more than 20,000 Ryanair flights, which was caused by the strikes of the Ryanair pilots over the rostering issue.
The ICA said that the cancellations of Ryanair's flights in September and October 2017, which had caused significant inconveniences to consumers, were not due to unforeseeable causes or problems beyond the airline's control, but rather were triggered by organizational and management problems.
It said that Ryanair had initially failed to correctly inform passengers of the existence of their rights to financial compensation as provided for under the European Union legislation.
However, following the opening of the ICA's investigation, Ryanair had altered its procedures by updating passenger information on its website and by sending individual communications to affected consumers on how to exercise their rights, it said, adding that otherwise a higher fine would have been imposed on the airline.
Ryanair is the largest budget airline in Europe with a fleet size of about 430 planes, all sourced from Boeing.
