Blue Air

Chaos in Romania has emerged as Blue Air has been forced to suspend all operations until Monday over the non-payment of fines pertinent to flight ...

- The irresponsible statements and actions of a representative of the Romanian State, as well as the impetuous decision to block all the bank accounts of the company, brought Blue Air into the undesirable situation of reducing its operations for the next period, with the aim of facilitating the completion of the analysis of the impact of on the side of the investors and obtaining the necessary authorizations for discussions with the investors”. “Unfortunately, this blocking of all Blue Air bank accounts came shortly after public statements and direct incitements to “stop buying Blue Air tickets” propagated in the public space by a high-ranking representative of the Romanian State, namely the President of the Authority National for Consumer Protection (ANPC), led to: “Due to an unforeseen situation consisting in the seizure of all the accounts of the BlueAir company by the Ministry of the Environment for non-payment of a fine, the airline company BlueAir Aviation is forced, being unable to pay any supplier, to suspend all flights scheduled to depart from Romania, respectively from Bucharest Otopeni, Bacau, Cluj Napoca, and Iasi until Monday, September 12, 2022.”

Airlines - Based on the finalized MoU – the two airlines will launch as early as from 12 September 2022 onwards an extensive codesharing partnership aiming ...

“We are particularly pleased to begin an extended partnership cooperation with Blue Air allowing us to better and more efficiently “AirConnect” regions. “Air Connect offers a cost-efficient platform for operating this traffic and enables us to continue to offer a wide network and multiple frequencies to both our Romanian domestic customers and our passengers connecting through our main base in Bucharest to the Blue Air key markets in Europe” said Cristian Rada, Blue Air CEO. Commercial control and risk for these routes remains with Blue Air and it will continue to be responsible for sales, marketing and customer support, but it expects to achieve potential cost savings and rationalizations in excess of 15-20% as part of the cooperation by deploying the regional aircraft type on the regional and commuter services.

The airline has hit out at the Romanian consumer protection authority for instructing passengers not to buy its tickets.

The airline was in the process of seeking new investors, and had been holding discussions in London with two major investment firms to support its recovery from the pandemic. Blue Air is currently reeling from a €2 million ($1.98 million) fine imposed by the consumer protection authority ANPC back in July relating to its cancelations and repayment of customer funds. Blue Air intended to challenge the fine and the ruling, with Blue Air’s president Oana Petrescu claiming that the numbers were all wrong. ANPC further demanded that Blue Air repay its customers an estimated €13 million ($12.8 million) for the fares collected in respect of these canceled flights within 10 days of the order. “Due to an unforeseen situation consisting in the seizure of all the accounts of the company Blue Air Aviation S.A. The suspension will last until September 12th, and comes after the airline had its bank accounts frozen by the Ministry of the Environment.

All September 6 flights that are scheduled to operate from outside Romania to any airport in Romania will complete their planned itinerary, Blue Air added. This ...

«The irresponsible statements and actions of a representative of the Romanian State, as well as the impetuous decision to block all the bank accounts of the company, brought Blue Air into the undesirable situation of reducing its operations for the next period, in order to facilitate the completion of the impact analysis from the investors and obtaining the necessary authorizations for discussions with the investors», concluded the company representatives, without specifying the reason why the accounts were blocked. The conflict between Blue Air and the Romanian state began months ago, when the consumer protection authority took the company to task for successive flight cancellations, which left hundreds of passengers stranded. «Due to an unforeseen situation consisting in the seizure of all the accounts of the Blue Air Aviation SA company by the Ministry of the Environment, Blue Air is unable to pay the current costs, necessary for the operation of daily flights, which is why it is forced to stop all flights scheduled to depart from on Romanian Airports, until Monday, September 12, 2022», the company reports.

The government said its priority is bringing Romanian citizens back home and explained it can use planes of national carrier Tarom for repatriation flights. The ...

Blue Air owes more than 28 million lei (€5.8 million) to the Environment authorities as it did not buy the necessary emission certificates, Environment Minister Tánczos Barna said. He urged the company to respect its obligation to both its customers and the state budget, adding that Blue Air can request a rescheduling of its debt. Prime Minister Nicolae Ciuca said more than 3,000 Romanian passengers were affected on Tuesday evening.