Improvements to budget carrier Wizz Air’s customer performance, and payouts to passengers, have enabled it to emerge from enforcement measures imposed by the UK Civil Aviation Authority.
The UK regulator took action against the airline last year after it became increasingly concerned over a high volume of complaints about the carrier, particularly over its not paying passengers, or providing alternative routes, after flight delays or cancellations.
Wizz Air was instructed to change policies and procedures to ensure consistent compliance with care obligations, and was subject to sample checks by the regulator.
”These checks have provided confidence that Wizz Air has now met its air passenger rights obligations for these previously considered claims,” the CAA states. The authority says its enforcement measures have resulted in £1.24 million ($1.57 million) being paid to passengers.
The airline says it made undertakings to the regulator regarding handling of passengers’ disruption costs, and has since become “fully compliant” with commitments to customers.
Wizz says the CAA has “finalised its review of claims” and is “satisfied”. The carrier adds that it has invested £90 million to address the performance issues and improve reliability.
“We faced unprecedented operating challenges in the summer of 2022 but the improvements we put in place have led to a better customer experience,” says Wizz Air UK managing director Marion Geoffroy.
“Our performance in 2023 was among the strongest in the industry.”
She adds that the airline is recording a “significant uptick” in customer-satisfaction scores.
Wizz Air’s measures have included adding spare aircraft capacity to ease disruption, adjusting crew rosters and flight schedules to provide greater resilieance, enhancing disruption forecasting using artificial intelligence tools, and increasing personnel numbers at airports and claim centres.
More than 25,000 claims were re-examined by the CAA, resulting in additional payments for around 6,000 cases. The cases reviewed dated back to March 2022.
