Budget airline Ryanair has suspended its inflight phone service after the Swiss firm that was providing the service terminated its contract. Ryanair announced back in February 2009 that it was partnering with OnAir to become Europe’s first airliner to offer inflight mobile services across its fleet.
However, the airline said today that OnAir had terminated its contract to provide the service as the operator did not wish to commit to expanding the service across Ryanair’s entire fleet of planes.
Ryanair said it would be offering other operators the opportunity to tender for the contract to offer inflight phone services to its passengers.
OnAir said in a statement that it could not reach an agreement with Ryanair on the process and timing of a fleet rollout, but that its experience of the trial had been “extremely positive”.
The OnAir inflight mobile service was first rolled out on 20 Dublin-based aircraft in February 2009 and allowed passengers to make and receive voice calls at international (non-EU) roaming rates of €2 to €3 per minute and more than 50 cents per text message.
Article courtesy of Businessandleadership.com
Photo: Ryanair has said that OnAir has terminated its contract to provide inflight mobile services across its fleet
