BA and Iberia return to eDreams website

British Airways and Iberia are posting their fares again on the French and Spanish websites of online travel agency eDreams ODIGEO, after partially resolving a dispute over pricing.

Shares in eDreams were suspended on Friday after dropping 59% following an announcement by the two airlines that they would no longer promote their fares on three of its sites because it was not clear what the final price covered.

"After the measures adopted by ODIGEO to adjust their Spanish and French pages so that the final ticket price, including all obligatory charges for the client, is shown from the beginning of the reservation, all the Iberia and British Airways flights are once again available for sale on these sites," the airlines said in a joint statement on Saturday.

The airlines said their fares would be returned to eDreams.com when ODIGEO confirmed that the pages also comply with European regulation, reports Reuters.

eDreams ODIGEO said that BA and Iberia fares not being present on one site affects less than 0.2% of total eDreams ODIGEO bookings.

In a statement it said that it had seen no impact on its trading volumes, nor service delivery to consumers, in the period of less than a day when the fares were not available.

It added that it believed BA and Iberia’s actions were actually about non-compliance with a new distribution policy it claims the airlines are trying to impose on IATA travel agents.

eDreams ODIGEO said it has made contact with Competition Authorities over the terms which it believes would ‘reduce consumer choice and would reduce the ability of consumers to access better prices’.

British Airways said: "On August 5 British Airways and Iberia published an addendum to their terms and conditions (T&Cs) for the travel trade and travel agents to meet minimum common standards in order to meet our customers’ needs, consistent with our brand and distribution strategy.

"The new terms and conditions are good news for customers as the improved transparency ensured a standard approach for all trade agents – regardless of whether or not they had contracts with either carrier and establish retail standards to enable customers to make informed choices about our products and compare them to those offered by other airlines.

"As agents sell tickets to our customers, we believe the T&Cs set out a reasonable set of standards to achieve this. Where trade agents that have an existing bilateral agreement with BA/Iberia (such as a Sales and Marketing Agreement) in addition to the IATA/Airport Reporting Corporation Governing Travel Agency Agreements (as defined in the T&Cs), the terms of such a bilateral agreement are not changed by the introduction of these T&Cs."