Wizz Air: 'All you can fly' subscription fills up, but consumer associations are sceptical

It was really the surprise of the summer that the Hungarian airline Wizz Air came up with the idea of offering a "all you can fly" card, a subscription allowing booking all flights at no extra cost, or almost. A proposal that turned into a real success: 10 thousand seats, all sold in a few days. The initial offer included the purchase of this special flight pass for €499 until midnight on 15 August, when the price rose to €599. Reservations, however, have very precise prices: each must be made within 72 hours (3 days) of departure, at a cost of EUR 9.99 each. Each one is also subject to availability and has no surcharge included: no choice of seat, no luggage in the hold or in the overhead compartment, only a small purse is allowed to be stowed under the seat. And the destinations for which you can avail yourself only concern international connections.

These are the critical points that have raised the most perplexity, indeed: for Federconsumatori, the Wizz Air proposal is 'a contract that is unbalanced in favour of the company, and that borders on misleading advertising'. Association president Michele Carrus points out: 'The user is not buying a right or a service, but a promise of service. We are a long way from a truly all-you-can-fly service'. Not to mention that, 'if the user wants access to all the ancillary services (seat reservation, hand or hold baggage, priority boarding), prices rise exorbitantly. Attention then must be paid to booking: one can book a single route at a time, with the risk of not being able to find the same return flight, perhaps forcing one to take alternative routes: thus,' he continues, 'package prices multiply.

Stefano Zerbi, Codacons spokesperson, is also on the same wavelength: "This initiative reflects the trend in air transport in recent times, which aims to offer very low fares but with supplements that cost more than the flight itself," inviting people to assess "whether every customer really has a convenience in buying such a pass: the real convenience would have been to be able to use this promotion for domestic travel, I am thinking immediately of students and workers away from home who see fares often swell, especially during holiday periods. Zerbi then points to another trend in the airline sector: "We are seeing a significant drop in last-minute flights compared to those booked months in advance. A real anomaly, which 'led to a 15% drop in prices in July compared to last year. We will have to see - concludes the Codacons spokesperson - how the market will evolve'.

The specialised portal The Points Guy draws a balance on the convenience of the offer: 'To get maximum value from your membership, you should fly more than 60 times with the airline in 12 months', which means an average of five flights per month. Beware then of the fixed fee per booking of €9.99: "It might not seem like a big amount," the site explains, "but given that Wizz is an ultra-low-cost airline that often advertises flights for just over twice that amount, you're not saving much. Reading the terms and conditions on the Wizz Air website carefully, one reads how the flight subscription is renewed 'automatically every year. All You Can Fly can be cancelled within the withdrawal period (at the beginning, within 14 calendar days of registration) or discontinued each year before the end of the mandatory subscription period'.