When easyJet released its trading figures for the fourth quarter of 2011, it reported a 16.7% increase in revenue, taking pride in the fact that its confident financial performance bucked the trend of poor sales across other UK airline carriers. However, while the company's bosses may be patting themselves on the back for a job well done in the face of economic gloom, news of its financial successes will be leaving a sour taste in the mouth of many disabled people.

News of the airline's profits comes just weeks after it was found guilty by a French court of discrimination against three disabled passengers. It was fined by the court for turning away three disabled customers at check-in during separate incidents, refusing to allow them to fly unaccompanied due to health and safety fears over evacuation of the aircraft. The airline also came under fire this month when a disabled businessman was forced off an aircraft in a humiliating scene in front of passengers, due to his inability to "walk to the emergency exit". The prosecution for the French case laid the blame squarely at the door of the airline's "aggressive commercial policy that consists of reducing operating costs as much as possible". Additional personnel on aircrafts to assist disabled, elderly or younger passengers certainly doesn't come for free.

It seems that taking on extra baggage handlers is also a cost that easyJet can quite happily do without. As a campaign group, the Muscular Dystrophy Campaign Trailblazers are regularly contacted by disabled travellers who have fallen foul of easyJet's policy on transporting electric wheelchairs. It is the only leading UK airline to restrict the weight of wheelchairs carried onboard to 60kg, unless the chair can be broken into several parts each weighing less than this amount. The airline says that the health and safety of its staff comes first and loading weights over 60kg poses risks.

Modern powered wheelchairs can cost up to £16,000 and are extremely specialist pieces of equipment – some people fundraise tirelessly to obtain them. For people with muscle-wasting and weakening conditions – some 70,000 people in the UK – wheelchairs are painstakingly designed to support an individual's body. Suggesting someone dismantle our wheelchairs before every flight we take is akin to suggesting we let an untrained mechanic loose on a brand new family car.

Yet, if we travel with budget airlines, whose very business models involve cutting costs wherever possible, can disabled people be surprised to encounter these kinds of policies? Well, yes. In the well-publicised case of holiday-makers Declan and Alexandra Spencer last summer who ran into easyJet's wheelchair policy, the family told of how they had flown from the same airport with an alternative budget airline without difficulty the previous year. Following the incident with easyJet they were able to rebook their flights within days with a similarly priced carrier. Trailblazers has written repeatedly to the carrier's head office, requesting the opportunity to discuss the policy's impact on many disabled travellers and possible resolutions, but without response.

Alongside chasing business travellers' sterling, easyJet chief executive Carolyn McCall attributes "firm control of costs" as at the heart of the airline's recent success. Yet in the eyes of many disabled passengers, this translates to a below industry standard service. It is true that few budget airlines boast a squeaky clean record when it comes to run-ins with their disabled customers. Yet it is increasingly grating to see Europe's second-largest low-cost carrier stubbornly hold a policy that look outdated alongside those of its competitors.

Those of us who have come unstuck due to easyJet's controversial policies and services for disabled travellers might be forgiven for thinking that those margins come at too high a price.

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