Scoot airlines in European Union-Schengen

Question

Has anyone flown with Scoot within the European Union? I have only travelled between Schengen countries and a national ID card is the only entry requirement. Scoot sent me an email saying a passport is required, which I find terribly misinformed. It's a flight between Athens and Berlin. Can they enforce this and deny me boarding with ID card?

Answer 1

Scoot sent me an email saying a passport is required, which I find terribly misinformed

It can happen that the flight you're taking is a connecting flight from outside Schengen, and therefore is parked in the non-Schengen zone of the airport, therefore requiring you to pass passport control, leave Schengen and re-enter in Berlin. Therefore inducing possible misconceptions

This seems to be the case with Scoot TR720 which is a Singapore-Athens-Berlin flight

Of course, you do not need a passport if you are a EU/EFTA/Swiss citizen to enter Germany, as laid out by @phoog in their answer

Answer 2

On their page for travel information, they don't even mention the word "passport"; they make it very clear that travel documentation is entirely the traveler's responsibility:

Entry Requirements for Independent Travellers

Whenever you travel, it is your responsibility to ensure that you are in possession of valid travel documentation and meet the entry requirements for all points of travel, including the country or countries you are visiting or transiting through. We recommend that you check with the relevant local authorities or tourism associations on the necessary entry requirements before your trip.

On the planning your trip page, they only link to IATA Travel Centre.

As a non-European airline, they likely employ a lot of people who are unfamiliar with the status of national identity cards in the EU and the Schengen area. Even if the author of the e-mail message is aware, it would be an easy thing to overlook when writing a communication for passengers of an airline that seems to have only one intra-Schengen route.

The staff handling flights in Berlin and Athens, however, will surely be aware, and you will surely have no trouble.

Can they enforce this and deny me boarding with ID card?

Probably not. As a private company, they have certain leeway to decide who they do business with, but as a common carrier they have certain obligations, for example, they probably cannot discriminate on the basis of race (I'm being a bit vague here because I don't know the details of the relevant EU law; I'm more familiar with these technicalities in the US).

In any event, if you're denied boarding solely because you presented an ID instead of a passport then you would be entitled to compensation, because regardless of the airline's policy, a national ID card is "correct documentation" as far as EU law is concerned. If somehow the ground staff you're dealing with is unaware of this, you will want to bring it to their attention. But the chance of this happening is pretty low.