A volcano blows up and everyone points fingers

23. Apr, 2010 1 Comment

So a volcano erupted in Iceland and caused huge delays for all of Europe. That sucks.

What’s annoying for me is all the political bullshit and finger pointing that is going on. Here some stuff from a news article I read this morning.

1. Legislation that means airlines have to pay for the expenses of disrupted passengers

“Ryanair confirmed this morning that it will comply with EU261 regulations under which EU airlines are required to reimburse the reasonable receipted expenses (as set out in EU261) of disrupted passengers”…

Ryanair would continue its efforts to change “absurd” EU legislation so reimbursements were “limited to the ticket price paid in the same way they are for train, coach and ferry operators”.

Why is there legislation that airlines have to pay for hotel expenses for a delay they have no control in?

2. Airlines want the government to pick up some of the bill

Airlines, many already in difficulties during the downturn, want governments to pick up part of the bill after haemorrhaging money during the crisis.

Why do airlines think the government should pick up the bill? Governments are elected to handle defence, education, etc. What has losses suffered from a volcano erupting got to do with the government picking up the bill for airlines?

3. Insurance companies not paying out

“We took out top-level insurance thinking that whatever happened, we’d be covered,” holidaymaker Andrew Widgery told reporters after disembarking in Portsmouth with his wife and four children.

“But in fact, in this situation when I telephoned our insurance company, they said ‘No, I’m sorry, it’s act of God, natural disaster,’ so we felt very isolated and very on our own.”

Ok so what the hell is happening in the world. Why is everybody trying to shift their losses onto somebody else?

Last I checked, Volcanoes happen naturally. It’s nobodies fault that a volcano erupted and sent ash into the sky.

It’s not the airlines fault that the volcano erupted and that passengers can’t fly. Why should they have to pay the hotel expenses of their passengers? Passengers should eat their part of the (unavoidable and uncontrollable) loss.

It’s not the governments fault that the volcano erupted and that the airlines lost heaps of money. Why should they have to bailout the airlines? Airlines should eat their part of the (unavoidable and uncontrollable) loss.

And the one industry that is meant to bend over and take it in these times is the insurance industry. People get insurance to cover them from stuff like this happening. Why are they not paying out the passengers expenses instead of the airlines?

Insurance companies get away with not covering “acts of god” (What constitutes an act of god? What about if you’re an atheist? Why would god care about causing a volcano to erupt?) because they happen so rarely and everybody understands that if one happens, they just have to eat it. Insurance companies not covering acts of god is wrong. It’s a market failure caused by the infrequency of these types of events.

Everyone hates losing, but I think everyone needs to take a step back and realise that this stuff is unavoidable, nobody is responsible for it, and nobody is responsible for any losses that it caused. The only people that should be paying out money are insurance companies, and instead, they’re the ones keeping it.

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