Hungarian Court annuls EUR 300 million fine imposed on Ryanair

Ryanair welcomes a ruling by the Metropolitan Court of Budapest, which annulled the bogus fine of EUR 763,000 raised by the Hungarian CPA in August 2022 after Ryanair passed the Hungarian Govt’s “excess profit” tax of EUR 10 per departing passenger to consumers. At the time, Ryanair condemned this “excess profit” tax when the main airlines in Hungary (including Ryanair) were reporting record Covid-related losses.

In a ruling last week, the Metropolitan Court of Budapest annulled this bogus fine, and confirmed that Ryanair could lawfully pass on this tax to consumers, and that Ryanair’s procedural rights had been “violated”. The Hungarian Court’s ruling is in line with EU law, which guarantees all airlines the freedom to set prices and pass on retrospective taxes to consumers.

Ryanair welcomes this ruling, which reverses this absurd and politically motivated fine.

Ryanair’s Chief Legal Officer, Juliusz Komorek, said: “We welcome this ruling by the Hungarian Courts, which properly reflects EU law, which guarantees airlines the freedom to set prices and pass on retrospective taxes, even in cases such as this where there was no lawful basis for the Hungarian Govt’s bogus “excess profits” tax of EUR 10 per departing passenger, at a time when all EU airlines were losing money due to Covid.

Ryanair believes that this Hungarian CPA fine was politically motivated, and calls on the Justice Minister, Judit Varga, to apologise for her Facebook post which welcomed the imposition of this politically motivated but bogus fine, which has now been annulled by the Hungarian Courts.

Ryanair continues to invest in Hungary, and continues to offer low fare air travel to/from Hungary for both Hungarian citizens and visitors. The clarity provided by this Hungarian Court ruling will help us to continue to invest in and grow our traffic in Hungary for the benefit of Hungarian citizens, their families, and the Hungarian tourism industry.”

Source: Press release