The Spanish low cost airline carrier Vueling (now majority owned by Iberia and therefore in turn a part of IAG who also own British Airways) are now operating a number of routes from UK to Spain including the new one of interest to me and my relatives of London Heathrow to Palma (Mallorca).

Whilst most things about Vueling are good compared to its other low cost rivals (eg a standard hold bag is 23kg normally only available from non low cost airlines like BA and only costs 10 Euros per sector compared to 50 Euros per sector for 15kg at Ryanair) one thing they have not got right as yet is the situation for wheelchair passengers.

Ryanair fought a long and unsuccessful legal action some years ago to try to charge wheelchair users extra to reach the aircraft in a wheelchair and since that time not even the lowest of low costs has been allowed to charge extra to book a wheelchair at the airport.

Unfortunately Vueling seem to be trying to circumvent the EU anti disability discrimination provisions by expressly stipulating on their English language website at www.vueling.com/en/vueling-services/prepare-your-trip/passengers-with-special-ne... that "If you booked through our website, you must notify us at least 48 hours before your flight departs by calling the Vueling Reservation Centre and we'll take care of forwarding your request to those in charge of the service at the corresponding airport." if you want to book a wheelchair.  The number then listed for the Vueling Reservation Centre is +44 906 7547541 a number charged at 77.34p per minute plus your phone operator's network connection charge (and that is from a landline - mobiles will be higher).

Eager to avoid my older relative suffering unfair discrimination on pricing due to their need to book a wheelchair I therefore visited the Spanish alternative to this website at www.nomasnumeros900.com and the sub page for Vueling at http://wiki.nmn900.net/Vueling  On looking at that web page and testing various numbers using my free inclusive calls alowance at the weekend (with PostOffice HomePhone) for calls of up to 60 minutes to ordinary Spanish landline numbers I managed to identify +34 931 518 158 as a normal landline rate alternative to the Spanish premium rate number of  807 001 717 (the Spanish number system is rather like our own in having both freephone and premium rate numbers in the same 8 prefixed range).  I then successfully called this number and after waiting a couple of minutes was connected to a Spanish lady who spoke perfect English who told me my relative could indeed book a wheelchair for her two flights on this phone line.

Previously I had also tested 933 787 878 listed for the "Oficina Central" (Central Office) for Vueling at http://wiki.nmn900.net/Vueling and whilst this also answers and has a complex menu system alternatively in English and Spanish it eventually becomes obvious that you cannot get through to customer services on this number.  As I also initially listed this number as a geographic alternative in error for the 0906 number I would be grateful if Dave could remove this alternative but leave in place +34 931 518 158  which does work and has an option to get you through to "Customer Service" where a wheelchair can be booked for a flight already booked online.

Whilst I know this site has strict views on not providing alternatives to 0906 numbers that constitute a legitimate service in their own right such as legal advice lines, weather lines or alternative ways to make cheaper overseas calls to mobiles etc without using a subscription service I do not think it should have any such problems for listing a geographic alternative for an 0906 number that is being used to access a customer service line used to book a wheelchair.  Especially when there is EU Human Rights legislation and/or EU Directives in place both making it illegal to charge extra for disabled passengers to book a wheelchair to reach their flight and a soon to be implemented EU directive that will it make illegal to use Premium Rate numbers for customer service lines.

It should be noted that Vueling do not provide any means to book a wheelchair for passengers at the time of online booking and nor do they provide such a facility through the subsequent online portal for maintaining or altering a website booking.  Instead they specifically require that you call their Premium Rate reservations 0906 number.  Yet the 0906 number is only primarily intended for telephone bookings on the basis that you can book online on their website for free instead.  Yet the same is not true of booking a wheelchair where the website cannot be used.

I therefore trust that Dave will have no problem leaving in place my correct alternative of 931 518 158 to the monstrous 0906 Vueling 77.34p per minute wheelchair booking hidden surcharge line.  It does not exactly take a genius to work out that a 20 minute call (think possible call queuing time and then also long and potentially complicated discussions with an elderly person to identify their two different flights and add the wheelchair request) to book a wheelchair on this 0906 line could cost as much as the direct wheelchair surcharge being levied by Ryanair that they were banned from continuing to charge in court

Dave wrote on May 10^th, 2013 at 5:53pm:


Having recently finally mastered the art of Tweeting (mostly it seems a rather primitive and annoying technology with a ludicrously short message length limit but it does seem to be a good way of publicly getting the attention of senior corporate executives on embarassing customer service issues) I also sent a few Tweets to Alex Cruz (@alex_cruz), CEO of Vueling in relation to this issue yesterday evening.

As I had also Followed him he was then able to send me a direct reply not publicly visible on Twitter saying "you are right and I will look into it" and giving me his email address for any further points I had to make.

I have responded to him by email saying that for now they need to very rapidly change their help page for disabled passengers telling them to use the online messaging and online live chat facilities to book a wheel chair and not the 0906 number although that in the longer run they need to change their online flight booking process to include requesting a wheelchair for any passenger in the booking who needs one.  They also need to change their online booking alteration facilities to add a wheelchair request later.

One point that is of interest is that the Spanish equivalent Premium Rate number for making reservations but also booking wheelchairs (the former use is legitimate as you can avoid it by booking online but the latter is not as you cannot book a wheelchair online and so amounts to discrimination under the DDA and relevant EU directives) of 807 200 100 (see http://www.vueling.com/es/somos-vueling/contacto/preguntas-frecuentes/?categoryI...) costs an equally expensive 91 cents per minute.  The Spanish situation on mobile costs also seems clearer than our own as there only appears to be one rate allowed for PNS numbers and this is also quoted as 1.27 Euros per minute.

As this is such a clear cut abuse of a PNS I have also lodged a complaint with PhonePayPlus (about the 0906 UK number) that the use of this number for wheelchair booking when there is no online alternative amounts to a misuse of a PNS number that is illegal under the DDA.  Given the usual wimpishness of PhonePayPlus I am not hopeful of much action but perhaps they might at least write to Vueling about it.

A last point of interest is that as of late April Vueling became 100% a owned subsidiary of Iberia (after a long and complicated process of mergers and capital restructuring that included also taking over Clickair and at one stage being majority owned by venture capitalists) and therefore in effect is also now indirectly owned by IAG, the holding company of British Airways.  This would make its current discrimination against disabled people   
needing to book a wheelchair potentially all the more embarassing for it.

Vueling in many ways amounts to an attempt by IAG to reform the high quality BA created low cost carrier Go Fly (eventually sold to Easyjet in what is now widely regarded as being a major business mistake by BA) in Spanish clothing and many of its operating methods and better treatment of passengers (other than on wheelchairs) are very reminiscent of that airline.  Iberia was told by the EU to cease operating many domestic routes because of the losses they were making and it was at that point that Vueling (then not majority Iberia owned) or ClickAir took them over and began running them at a profit on a "low cost" basis.  This avoided the problems inherent in massively cutting the wages of existing Iberia staff.  Now Vueling is starting to fly in to normally very hard to access Heathrow, apparently using former BMI slots handed over to it by IAG.

And on yet further research I see that those latter day bandits otherwise known as Wizz Air (the only airline in Europe to so far copy the example of US low cost carrier Spirit by levying a charge for hand luggage larger than a handbag or small laptop bag) do follow Vueling's disgusting ripoff practice of penalising the disabled for booking a wheelchair by making them call an 0906 number.  See http://wizzair.com/en-GB/useful_information/how_to_book and http://wizzair.com/en-GB/about_us/contact_us

My question to Alex Cruz, CEO of Vueling is does he want his airline mentioned in the same same breath as WizzAir when I thought what he was trying to do was create a top quality reputable Spanish low cost carrier (and now a wholly owned subsidiary within the IAG group via Iberia) more or less modelled on BA's old Go Fly operation that it so sadly and misguidedly sold off to Easyjet.

Also Wizzair being Hungarian no doubt probably thinks it will be quite some time before the EU gets round to worrying about enforcment of its disability discrimination directives in that country.  Whereas Vueling in being part of the same group as BA and based in a mature EU nation surely needs to give fully respect to DDA and equivalent EU directive compliance?