Where should you buy your flight tickets? – Good to know when buying airline tickets through a ticket broker

Your legal position is significantly worse in the event of flight cancellations when you buy your flight tickets through a ticket agent, e.g. Flybillet.dk, Travellink, etc.

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At Flyadvokaten, we recommend that you buy your flight tickets directly from the airlines themselves.

Flybillet.dk, Travellink, Expedia, Flight Network etc. are independent ticket brokers or so-called “OTAs” (where “OTA” stands for “Online Travel Agency”).

The ticket brokers get a kind of “purchasing authorization” from you to buy your airline tickets and act as a kind of intermediary between the airline and yourself. This complicates your legal position.

In the current Airline Regulation, it is not regulated against which of the two you should make a claim for e.g. flight compensation or reimbursement of your flight tickets. However, as we have described earlier, changes are – perhaps – on the way – you can read more about it here: NEW rules on the way – Flyadvokaten ApS. However, it is not expected that new rules will be introduced within the next few years.

Flyadvokaten’s EIGHTH ADVICE for you:

1. Be aware that airlines can often sell the same tickets cheaper! Remember to compare apples and apples – not apples and pears. The price advertised by the ticket agent may not include baggage and extra fees etc. can quickly appear as you move through the website to book.
2. Use the agent’s website to inform yourself about your options; which airlines fly to your desired destination and are there times that work better than others? Once you know your options, you can go to the airlines’ own websites and book your flights directly.
3. In the event that you need to rebook your trip, for example, you’ll typically find greater flexibility and better service with the airline itself than with a random middleman.
4. In addition, there is a risk that the ticket agent may not provide the airline with your correct contact details (because the ticket agent is the only one who wants to have direct contact with you). This can delay notifications from the airline about, for example, cancellations or delays, or – in the worst case – mean that such notifications never reach you.
5. The ticket agent often offers services that are not necessary and this can be difficult to understand. For example, it is not necessary to buy “bankruptcy insurance” if you buy a ticket from and to a Danish airport – a so-called “domestic ticket”.
6. If you can find a cheaper trip with the ticket broker, it may be because the ticket broker combines your trip by purchasing separate flight tickets from the same airline or different airlines (with different reservation numbers). This reduces your options for assistance from the airline if, for example, your first flight in a group trip is canceled and you miss your next flight (your connecting flight).
   If you have a stopover and have purchased the flight tickets together as one trip under the same reservation number, the airline is obligated to help you on your way.
7. The way the Airline Regulations are currently worded, it can be difficult to assign responsibility if something doesn’t go as planned. The airline will usually refer you to the ticket agent if you ask for a refund for a canceled flight, while the ticket agent will refer you to the airline. Neither will take responsibility for getting your money back, which can be very frustrating!
8. In many situations, we can’t pursue the claim at all because the ticket agent doesn’t have jurisdiction in Denmark (i.e. we can’t bring the case in this country). Your money will therefore be lost.

If you are unsure about who to file a claim for flight compensation or reimbursement of airline tickets against, we would be happy to help you. We have conducted a large number of cases in this area – including in the High Courts and the Supreme Court – and have considerable experience with these types of cases.