The European Commission is conducting an investigation into Ryanair’s refusal to honour tickets that passengers have bought from third-party online agents, as to whether the carrier has broken EU law.

The regulatory agency has sent a letter to the Irish budget airline asking for “clarification” regarding its actions.

Earlier in August Ryanair announced that it would be cancelling all tickets booked through ’screenscraping’ online travel agents, saying that it considering the sales to be illegal.

The commission is investigating to determine whether Ryanair’s policy is in compliance with EU regulations relative to compensation for passengers who have been stranded due to flight cancellations or overbooking, according to a commission spokesman.

Ryanair said that it had not yet received the letter from the commission.

The low-cost carrier has already instituted legal action against Spanish online bookers to stop them from selling Ryanair tickets. Action has also been initiated against the Irish site BravoFly and the German online booker, Vtours.

Last week, Ryanair was contacted by the Spanish ministry of public works, which demanded information about threatened cancellation of tickets booked on the Spanish sites Atrapolo, eDreams and Rumbo.

Ryanair’s justification for its action is that the websites provide “no useful service,” caused a slowing of the Ryanair.com website and hit consumers with “hidden fees and mark-ups.”

“In all cases this scraping activity is unlawful and in breach of both Ryanair.com’s copyright and terms of use,” Ryanair added.

www.ryanair.com