With the European Commission having given member States six months in which to comply with its regulations on protecting air passenger rights this week, a report commissioned by the EC has found Malta to have had the lowest actual number of passenger complaints.

The study found that of the 18,000 complaints from air passengers received by national authorities between February 2005 and September 2006, only 38 came from Malta. Most complaints related to the regulation on air passenger rights, on the other hand, came from the UK (6,154), France (2,034) and Italy (2,557).

Although Malta International Airport handles some 2.7 million passengers per year – a much smaller number than French, Italian and UK airports – the proportion is still remarkably low. Malta was also found to have had one of the lowest rates of complaints on a per million passenger basis, placing seventh in the EU.

Malta’s actual rate of complaint since the regulations came into force was just nine for every million passengers, far below the EU average of 30 per million passengers and the 78 and 46 per million passengers for Poland and Spain respectively.

The regulations, which had come into force just over two years ago, in February 2005, introduced new rules on compensation for air passengers in the event of denied boarding, cancellations, long delays and involuntary downgrading. Depending on the circumstances, the regulation requires airlines to provide passengers with assistance such as accommodation, refreshments and telephone calls; offer re-routing and/or a refund of the ticket; pay compensation of up to E600 per passenger; and proactively inform passengers about their rights under the regulation.

Of the 38 complaints of regulation violations received by the Maltese authorities, in this case Department of Civil Aviation, 17 were upheld. Of the 38, 24 concerned delayed flights, nine were flight cancellations, four involved denied boarding and two were unspecified. Although the DCA is empowered to enforce fines of up to Lm1,000, no such complaints resulted in any fines, prosecutions, or civil court actions. Complaints take some eight weeks to be decided upon.

While Malta’s maximum penalty of Lm1,000 is considerably higher than, for example, Latvia’s EUR218, the study does note that the Lm1,000 ceiling may be too low in that airlines might find the cost of compliance more excessive than the penalty itself in some cases.