Boryspil International Airport has paid a Hr 13 million fine to the state for abusing its monopoly of handling services, Yuriy Terentyev, the head of the Anti-Monopoly Committee of Ukraine, wrote on Facebook on Aug. 8.
Handling companies provide a range of services to the flights arriving at an airport: from delivering food and water to aircraft, to parking, fueling and repairing planes.
After an investigation, the Anti-Monopoly Committee discovered that the airport, the country’s largest and busiest, had set rent prices for airport equipment and infrastructure too high for competing handling companies, Terentyev said.
In January 2017 the committee ordered the airport to decrease its prices to a competitive level and pay an Hr 12.8 million fine to the state budget.
The airport paid the fine on Aug. 8, according to a picture of a bank receipt Terentyev posted on Facebook.
Although the airport had indeed paid the fine, the Boryspil Airport director Pavel Rjabikin hinted in an interview with the Kyiv Post on Aug. 9 that he considered the decision to have been unfair.
“But what can I say. You don’t wave your fists after a fight,” Rjabikin said.
Over 25 national and foreign airlines operate passenger and cargo services on 75 scheduled routes from Boryspil worldwide. The airport handles over 67 percent of the country’s air passenger traffic, servicing 10 million passengers a year.
According to Rjabikin only five handling companies service all of the planes at the airport.
The airport itself handles 15 percent of flights. Another three private companies together provide another 10 percent of the handling services. The company Interavia handles the remaining 75 percent.
Surprisingly, it was Interavia that initiated the anti-monopoly committee investigation against Boryspil.
“So it was a monopolist who filed the claim with the anti-monopoly committee,” Rjabikin said.
No representative of Interavia was available to comment for this story.
According to the Justice Ministry registry, the Interavia handling company is a subsidiary of Ukraine International Airlines, which is owned by the billionaire oligarch Ihor Kolomoisky.
