When you’re going to put an advert out, always make sure your backside isn’t going to be sued. Although Ryanair tends to “Shove ’em out, worry about it later” attitude doesn’t overly help in this direction.
Yesterday Michael O’Leary had apologised “unreservedly” to Easyjet founder Stelios Haji-Ioannou.
Ryanair decided it would be good for business to run adverts depicting Stelios as Pinocchio – and implying he was lying about Easyjet’s punctuality.
O’Leary has apologised to Stelious as he is not personally responsible for Easyjet not publishing weekly details of their on-time performance.
The libel suit was settled out of court.
Or to put in a blunt way from Stelios himself:
“It is not very often that someone as arrogant and as powerful as O’Leary is forced to apologise to someone else in public and in writing”
“I took this legal action to protect my reputation. I am not a liar and that statement was libellous.
Ryanair ran of series of Pinocchio adverts regarding EasyJets’s ontime performance stats, calling him “Easyjet’s – Mr Late Again” in the Daily Telegraph and the Guardian during the beginning of the year. In the end, Ryanair has been forced to to run full page apologies, and not use this advert again
Of course, O’Leary was in court to apologise for once. To quote to ODM:
“We are happy to apologise to Stelios for including his photograph and referring to him personally in the advert about Easyjet’s missing weekly punctuality stats,”
“Since he was not responsible for Easyjet’s decision to stop publishing these on-time statistics, I think it is only fair and reasonable that we say sorry and pay him damages and his legal costs, rather than waste court time on this issue.”
Sometimes, people have to remember that sorry is the hardest word – especially in the spats that they enjoy having in the airline industry between two of it’s eagerest rivals.
Will it stop Ryanair’s behaviour though? I very much doubt it…
