FOUR past and present British Airways executives could face up to five years in jail after they were charged with price-fixing over fuel surcharges.
The move against Andrew Crawley, the airline's head of sales, and three former executives, follows an Office of Fair Trading (OFT) investigation into illegal agreements between BA and its rival, Virgin Atlantic, between 2004 and 2006.
The others a
re Martin George, a former commercial director, Iain Burns, a former head of communications, and Alan Burnett, a former UK and Ireland sales chief. They are due to appear at City of London Magistrates' Court on 24 September.
George and Burns resigned from BA in 2006, while Burnett retired in the same year.
The OFT said the four were charged with "having dishonestly agreed with others to make or implement arrangements which directly or indirectly fixed the price for the supply in the UK of passenger air transport services by British Airways and Virgin Atlantic Airways".
Authorities in the UK and US have already fined BA a total of some £270 million over the fuel-surcharge offences.
Virgin was granted immunity after bringing the matter to the attention of the OFT. The airlines have agreed to refund affected passengers, who are expected to receive about £20 per flight.
A spokesman for Burns said: "At the time of these events, he was the head of PR at British Airways with no responsibility for pricing decisions."
Catriona Munro, an EU and competition partner at the Glasgow-based law firm Maclay Murray & Spens, said: "There is still a widespread view that sharing commercial information exchange is not a 'real' cartel – a view clearly not shared by competition regulators."
The full article contains 286 words and appears in The Scotsman newspaper.
