It is not unusual for travel agencies to use Google Ads for advertisements. In fact, these are one of the most efficient tools of search engine marketing. These ads are useful for generating a quick visibility on the search engine which has a dominant position.
Airlines list their inventories with the travel agencies for sale for which the latter take out the ad campaigns. However, while doing so, the agencies are required to observe that there is no copyright or trademark usage violation. While creating the ad as well as the landing pages, it is pertinent to ensure that the customers are not misled in any way.
In this particular case, the online travel agency, eDreams, put up Google Ads for Ryan Air tickets using its own branding material and misled customers into believing that they are booking tickets on the Ryan Air platform. Ryan Air received many complaints which prompted the airline to take eDreams to the regulator in United Kingdom, Advertising Standards Authority (ASA).
ASA has upheld the complaint. However, the regulator has also noted that eDreams is within its right to use relevant search terms for becoming visible on Google result pages using methods of search engine optimization.
