Invia Flights Germany GmbH, which is behind the portals Fluege.de, Flug.de and Billigfluege.de, among other things, is to be sued by the Verbraucherzentrale Bundesverband eV. The consumer advocates want to bring a class action lawsuit against the company.

The background is that the consumer advice center accuses the company of charging illegal credit card fees. Specifically, a so-called “service fee” is charged, which is only waived when using a special, in-house credit card that is issued in cooperation with a Luxembourg bank.

Consumer advocates are of the opinion that this should be an inadmissible course of action. Previous warnings have not brought the desired success, so that one now wants to go to court. Payment fees are actually forbidden by law, but the operator of the brokerage portals is of the opinion that it is a booking fee that does not apply when using the in-house credit card as a kind of benefit.

The Federation of Consumer Organizations has now set up a contact option on its website for those affected who had to pay a service fee of up to 100 euros. The consumer advocates want to collate the cases and bring them to court as part of a model declaratory action.