A few days ago, Austrian Airlines CCO Michael Trestl emphasized that regardless of the paid catering, free water will continue to be served to passengers. In practice, the announcements by the board of directors and the actual implementation seem to diverge widely.

On Sunday, Austrian Airlines flight OS187, operated with Embraer 195, did not offer free water. When asked by various passengers, it was said that snacks and drinks are only available for a fee. The supposedly free water was not available at least on this AUA flight. It remains to be seen whether the crew has misunderstood the current regulations of their employer or whether there is a system behind them.

A spokesman for Austrian Airlines told Aviation Direct that there was no free water available: “Water on board is and will remain free. We make it available on request ”. From this statement it can be interpreted that the travelers should not be offered the free drink proactively, but only when asked for it. This is exactly what some travelers did on the AUA flight, but were told that snacks and drinks are only available for a fee.

Holders of “old tickets” also have to pay

Another problem arises with tickets that were purchased before the switch to paid catering. During the booking process, drinks included were shown here - to a reduced extent under the guise of corona. These passengers, who actually have a legal right to water, tea or coffee without additional payment due to their contract of carriage, should also be asked to pay. The AUA is obviously speculating here on “forgetting”, because only if the travelers concerned actively complain will the “individual cases” be looked at. Since bookings have been made at short notice in recent months due to the pandemic, it seems quite possible that only a few AUA customers could actually be affected. The corona crisis meant that flight tickets were usually bought at very short notice.

“The snack promise was removed from our booking process some time ago due to the necessary service adjustments due to the pandemic. However, if there are occasional passengers who had included a snack promise when booking their flight, we will look at these cases individually ”, a spokesman for Austrian Airlines told Aviation Direct.

So it remains to be seen whether the affected travelers will accept the change or go to court. That actually happened in Germany, because the cut in the Smart tariff by Eurowings meant that an angry passenger who received neither bread nor drinks on board, although he had booked before the changeover, filed a lawsuit against the Lufthansa subsidiary. He prevailed in court and Eurowings had to reimburse him proportionately of the costs for snacks and drinks that were originally included in the ticket price.

AUA does not sell on its own account

Incidentally, on-board sales at Austrian Airlines are not for your own account. The small print on the menu states that this is done “in the name and for the account of Retail inMotion GmbH”. This means that the economic risk has been outsourced to the German company. In the sales catalog, it is also clearly indicated, albeit in small print, that any complaints regarding the quality of the food and drinks should only be sent to a German postal address and an email address from Retail inMotion. The Lufthansa subsidiary did not mention the fact that AUA does not sell its catering for its own account in the official communication.

Retail inMotion works as a catering seller for various airlines. Gate Gourmet also offers a similar business model. For example, Wizz Air uses their services. The Ryanair Group, on the other hand, acts as the seller of the food, drinks and goods in the cabin itself. Nevertheless, software from Retail inMotion runs on the sales devices of the crew, whereby the low-cost airline in this constellation only bought the software.