[Culturechat] Banned airlines

[Vance Roy]

The Federal Office for Civil Aviation (FOCA) in Bern has announced that 
it will make the name of an airline banned in CH known to anyone who 
can prove (they don't say how) that they are to travel on that airline. 
The person must write or email the FOCA to ask. A travel agent can do 
this too. The office will respond ONLY if the airline is NOT on the 
"black list". If it is on the list, you get no answer. FOCA continues 
to refuse to name all the banned airlines.

If this isn't the most cockamammie example of CH bureaucratic horse 
feathers, I have never heard of it. Can't you see a travel agent 
sending in a request to Bern for each one of the world's airlines and 
then making a list of the ones to which FOCA replies?

As a crumb to the peons, the FOCA says that they will take this up with 
the European Civil Aviation Conference at their next meeting. This is 
the group that set up the "gentleman's agreement" to not disclose the 
names of airlines banned from EU countries.

The CH consumer watchdog group isn't going to buy this and will 
continue its pressure on the FOCA to come clean. Classic CH attitude of 
not stepping on toes but it won't fly this time (pun intended).


Vance Roy
gigli.saw@dplanet.ch
http://homepage.mac.com

Americans always get it right, after they've exhausted all the other 
possibilities--Winston Churchill