You book a flight, think you got a great deal, and then the baggage fees hit. It's a routine every budget traveler knows too well. But the Italian antitrust authority just decided that EasyJet went a step too far with its digital layout.
On May 26, 2026, Italy's competition watchdog, the Autorità Garante della Concorrenza e del Mercato (AGCM), launched a formal investigation into EasyJet. The issue doesn't lie in the actual cost of checking a bag. Instead, it centers on how those fees show up on your screen when you buy a return ticket. The regulator calls it a misleading and aggressive commercial practice.
If you've flown on a low-cost carrier recently, you know the drill. Airlines rely heavily on ancillary revenue. That's the industry term for everything that isn't the base seat price—things like picking your seat, getting priority boarding, or adding a suitcase. The AGCM argues that EasyJet designed its checkout pipeline to trick you into paying for extra weight you don't actually need.
The Sneaky Mechanics of the Average Price Trick
What exactly caught the eye of the Italian regulators? It comes down to default options and opaque math.
When you book a round-trip flight through EasyJet’s website or mobile app, the system automatically selects a checked bag bundle for both legs of the trip. It doesn't matter if you only need that heavy suitcase on the way back because you plan to buy souvenirs. The app assumes you want it both ways.
Worse, the system hides the individual price of each leg. Instead, it displays a single, combined average price for the round-trip service. Because budget airlines use dynamic pricing, a checked bag might cost £25 on a Tuesday morning outbound flight but jump to £45 on a busy Sunday night return. By averaging the two out on screen, EasyJet masks the actual cost of each flight segment.
To opt out of this pre-selected bundle and buy baggage for just one leg, you have to actively halt the booking process, click through extra menus, and override the default settings. The AGCM rightly points out that the vast majority of travelers either miss this completely or find the manual override too convoluted to finish. You end up paying for a return bag allowance by default.
A History of Stepping on Regulatory Toes
This isn't an isolated incident or a minor glitch in the system. It's part of a broader corporate pattern across the European aviation sector. EasyJet tried to brush this off initially, claiming it always acts transparently. The airline issued a statement saying it will fully cooperate with the AGCM while reviewing the notice.
But European regulators aren't giving airlines the benefit of the doubt anymore. Look at EasyJet's recent track record. Just a few months ago, in January 2026, the UK's Advertising Standards Authority reprimanded the carrier for running misleading ads. EasyJet had blasted claims that passengers could buy large cabin bag allowances "from £5.99." The problem? The airline couldn't provide a single shred of evidence showing what routes actually offered that price, or how often real humans ever saw it.
Italy has been an even tougher battleground for the carrier. Back in May 2021, the AGCM slapped a €2.8 million fine on EasyJet, Ryanair, and Volotea. The airlines had refused to give cash refunds for flights canceled during the tail end of pandemic travel restrictions, forcing passengers to accept vouchers instead. EasyJet fought that penalty for years until the Lazio Regional Administrative Court in Rome flatly dismissed their appeal in February 2025.
The AGCM is on a tear. In late 2025, the same Italian watchdog hit Ryanair with a record-breaking €255 million fine for squeezing third-party travel agencies out of the market. The message from Rome is loud and clear: if you manipulate the digital booking pipeline to extract more cash from consumers, you will face consequences.
How Low Cost Carriers Weaponize Interface Design
Airlines don't build these interfaces by accident. They employ entire teams of UX designers to optimize conversion rates. Sometimes, that optimization crosses the line into what consumer advocates call dark patterns. These are user interfaces meticulously designed to trick people into doing things they might not otherwise do, like buying extra insurance or opting into a recurring subscription.
Pre-ticking boxes and forcing users to actively opt out of a service is a textbook dark pattern. When you combine that with dynamic pricing where the true cost is hidden behind a generic average, it becomes nearly impossible for a consumer to make an informed financial choice.
Airlines argue that bundling saves passengers money and speeds up the checkout process. They claim they're just giving people what they want. But if that were true, they wouldn't need to hide the individual breakdown of costs or make the opt-out button so hard to find.
What to Do Before Clicking Pay on Your Next Flight
The Italian investigation will take months to resolve. If the AGCM finds EasyJet guilty of violating consumer protection laws, the airline will face another massive financial penalty and will be forced to redesign its booking platform for Italian flights.
In the meantime, you still have to travel. Don't rely on the airlines to look out for your wallet. You need to manage the booking screen aggressively.
First, never accept the default packages. When an airline app offers you a "Standard Plus" or "Essentials" bundle that includes bags and seats, decline it. Always choose the bare-minimum seat-only option first, then manually add your extras later in the process. It takes an extra two minutes, but it prevents the system from sneaking unwanted fees into your cart.
Second, audit your total before entering your credit card details. Look closely at the final breakdown. If you see a charge for a return bag but you're backpacking home, go back to the luggage selection screen. Look for the small, grayed-out text or the dropdown menus that separate the outbound leg from the return leg.
Third, if an airline makes it impossible to split your baggage selection online, consider booking your outbound and return journeys as two separate one-way tickets. Thanks to modern search engines, buying two one-way tickets on different airlines—or even the same airline—is sometimes cheaper than buying a round trip, and it completely bypasses the automated return bundling trick. Keep your eyes open, read the fine print, and don't let the interface rush your decision.
