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Booking a Ryanair flight via an online travel agent might hold a nasty surprise
- ggambetta 3y agoMore generally, "booking a Ryanair flight might hold a nasty surprise".
- timeon 3y agoSimilar with Wizzair.
- OfSanguineFire 3y agoI fly Wizzair at least a couple of times every year, and while both it and Ryanair are categorized as budget airlines, there are clearly two levels of budget airlines: WizzAir’s management has never pursued cutting every possible cost as singlemindedly as Mr. O’Leary famously has, and there is more flexibility possible, albeit at slightly higher fares.
- tagyro 3y agoHa, just last week I was on a Wizzair flight that had a one-hour delay. Because of the delay, rentalcars automatically cancelled my (already paid!) car rental booking and their agent tried to extort 400 (then later, 500) euros from me. In the end, my family and I, were left stranded on the airport, on a Sunday evening and had to pay double for another car rental. Of course, neither company wants to refund me, not to mention pay the difference of cost between the two rentals. I filed a complaint via ECC, let's see how it goes.
- ipython 3y agoIt can backfire on them every so often. I took a Ryanair flight for a short hop when on vacation in the eu back before COVID. My son had the vomits as the plane was set for landing. Apparently one of the “cost saving” measures was eliminating the seat back pocket and the barf bags. Well, Ryanair, jokes on you - vomit ended up everywhere in the aircraft cabin due to you saving a few cents.
- thinkingemote 3y agoHowever, jokes on us as they saved much more replacing the comfortable breathable cloth upholstery with the plastic non porous, sweaty but much easier to wipe seats.
- eatYourFood 3y ago[dead]
- walthamstow 3y agoRyanair have a bad name but I've flown with them possibly as many as 50 return flights from STN to wherever. I don't /love/ flying with them but it's cheap as chips, never an issue, never a delay longer than an hour. Emirates first class it ain't, but they always get the job done for me. I went to see my friend in Denmark the other week for £40 return! Beat that!
- veave 3y agoMost people who make jokes about ryanair are just mad that everybody can afford to fly now. They yearn for the days when flying was an exclusive activity and only they could do it.
- hutzlibu 3y agoSome people are also mad, because flying is somewhat bad for a stable climate.
- NoPie 3y agoI am too very happy with cheap airlines including Ryanair. It is true that their customer service may not be brilliant but they make it more affordable to travel. I think it is a reasonable compromise that benefits us all.
- fragmede 3y agoIt sucks to be treated poorly, and to get nickel and dimed on every little thing until you just end up paying more than flying a less shitty carrier. Framing it as the petit bourgeois are mad that the proles can afford to fly ignores who loses in a the race to the bottom, and the misery it begets.
- veave 3y agoWhich is why you can pay more to be treated better. But some are upset that paying more isn't the only option.
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- hashtag-til 3y agoI needed to do this a few days back and it was so annoying. It even makes you pay some 99p for the “service”. It is the kind of thing you do to save a few money. Annoying nonetheless.
- NoPie 3y agoThere is more to this story than it appears. If you book via a travel agency you sometimes may find poor service in case you need some changes. A friend needed to add a luggage to the booking and the travel agency refused to help. He had to do at the airport for double price. He couldn't do it online because making changes in Ryanair booking requires some information how the booking was made, for example, the email address. He was unable to obtain any of this information from the travel agency. If he had known that he was able to update booking's e-mail address though this process of online verification, he would have saved at least 40 euros (minus €0.59 online verification fee). Ryanair couldn't have made adding luggage without requiring at least some confirmation that it is done by the flyer. If you check online and proceed directly to the gate, you may not be aware that someone (a terrorist or drug smuggler) has added luggage to your reservation, checked it in luggage drop point and collected it at the destination airport without you being aware. Of course, Ryanair could have a different business model where they don't charge double price for adding luggage at the airport. But that's the whole point – their business model reduces need for staff at the airport and thus they can offer lower prices. But this would not be an issue, if travel agencies were providing better service too.
- dkjaudyeqooe 3y agoWhy do people use travel agencies? For me it would just be another layer adding expense, mistakes and complexities. I'm guessing people use them thinking they will reduce those things.
- NoPie 3y agoSometimes they do search on travel agency website and accept the option, not realizing that at this point they could have booked directly from an airline's website.
- bangkoksbest 3y agoThere are times when booking through Ryanair over their app gives €X price, but through some 3rd party like Kiwi I might find e.g. €(X*0.5). However, even though I almost always fly with just a small bag, I still might hesitate taking the 3rd party service because they insist on doing stuff like checking in "for me", which I don't need (since that is a trivial process), and I have experienced them not sending the boarding pass in the time I arrived at the airport.
- PrimeMcFly 3y agoRyanair is easily one of the worst airlines in the world, at least the western world. Booking with them in general is a nightmare. They broke my laptop one time, one of their staff dropped it. It wouldn't boot on afterwards, I took it back and the supervisor just said he stood by his colleague's story. I had a flight to catch and wasn't sure if I could have gotten any kind of proof so had to let it go. That's not even regarding their policies for flying.
- eatYourFood 3y ago[dead]
- stavros 3y agoNoyb are doing great work, they've been filing much-needed lawsuits. I get a lot of bang for my donation buck from them, I definitely recommend donating.
- wdb 3y agoMore reasons not to fly with Ryanair. In the past they were the only airline that flown to the closest airport (half hour drive vs 2 hours) were my parents lived. Not an issue anymore. This sounds horrible and unnecessary
- dkjaudyeqooe 3y agoThe general rule is only fly Ryanair if you have no other choice. They are decidedly low rent. Recently a friend tried to drop her bags at a Ryanair counter with an incredibly long line, 3 hours before the flight. As she got to the front the staff member closed the counter, saying she had to get on a flight, because she was the flight attendant.
- YeGoblynQueenne 3y ago>> She was even charged a small fee for the “verification process”. The Ryanair exec who thought this up gave herself a big bonus for being smart and adding value to the company.
- codeulike 3y agoRyanairs Twitter account is hilariously brutal and I don't generally like them but have to hand it to them for that. https://twitter.com/Ryanair/status/1684158478871404544 https://twitter.com/Ryanair/status/1684158478871404544
- YeGoblynQueenne 3y agoEvidently some passengers fail to find the humour in every situation: >> Stop tweeting crap like this and get me mine and my families luggage. Useless airline https://twitter.com/maximus_mass/status/1684167578820677632 https://twitter.com/maximus_mass/status/1684167578820677632
- davotoula 3y agoFunny story. I have an email that keeps being flagged as "booked through an agent" even though I book directly through ryanair official app. 3 last bookings were flagged. Only found out after numerous online chats and a call after 40 minute hold. Ryanair has some of the best direct routes in Europe and often you get a bargain price. You get what you pay for.
- londgine 3y agoI used to like booking though kiwi, but last time I booked with them, I wanted to add a suitcase later, and I was unable to add it through the airlines website, since kiwi refused to expose what email address they used. The only way to add a suitcase was through their site, but that cost more than double.
- coldcode 3y agoI worked for an OTA (currently a brand owned by Expedia, like most of them, but a real company back then) and we always had issues with airline bookings, as the airlines did not want to expose all of their offerings to us so they could make extra money later. We always got yelled at by people who booked Spirit, as their "price" in our system was always the lowest, but after booking, the airline would add on fees for so many things that the flight was no longer cheap, but it was somehow our fault. Airlines also give up almost no commission to anyone, local travel agencies or online, so it's generally profitless to book them for someone other than hoping you get to book a hotel as well, which is negotiated to provide profit. Airlines also hate comparison shopping; they want you to book on their website so you can't see what someone else might charge for the same flight. Southwest was/is the king of that; they allowed no sales elsewhere, so you could never tell if they were cheaper/cost more. It's like insisting that a monopoly view on prices is best for the customer.
- CaptainZapp 3y agoI book all my flights via the airlines web site. No exceptions and no matter which airline. If something goes wrong it's cumbersome and agonizing enough to deal with the airline. You won't, however, be hung out to dry by two entities wanting nothing to do with you and sticking their fingers into their ears going LALALA! at the top of their voice and shifting responsibility to each other. This was (and is) different with physical travel agents who will support you, if necessary, but OTAs? No thanks! Forget it! Never, when it comes to booking flights.
- mathverse 3y agoThis happened to me recently. My company books biz trips through an agent called TravelPerk. I've done the same route couple of times and there's absolutely no reason for RyanAir to trigger this verification process. It's absolutely a malpractice and should be investigated.
- nness 3y agoThis is short on info -- but are we talking about a verification process that is separate to the "passport check" which Ryanair requires for all non-UK/EU passport holders? Unlike many other UK/EU budget airlines, Ryanair requires a passport check to issue your boarding pass... and this kind of sounds like that? If this is the "passport check," I wouldn't be surprised if Ryanair is doing it to avoid the check-in lines at the airport. They are particularly cost and efficiencies focused, after all.
- imglorp 3y agoSo we've arrived at the point where companies collecting verified biometrics under flimsy pretense is so valuable as a revenue stream, they're happy to eat the reputation hit and the fines. Who would pay so much for it? "All participants in the room must drink a verification can before the movie can start. Good job, Alice! Bob and Carly, you're holding up the show! And I see Dave has left the room, will he be coming back?"
- killingtime74 3y agoRyanair and reputation hit do not belong in the same sentence. People already expect the worst.
- joker_minmax 3y agoDelta airlines used my face as a boarding pass for flight to Canada out of Detroit Wayne Airport earlier this year. I scanned nothing, they made me take a picture, and then said "Enjoy your flight [name]." Delta did not even ask to see my Passport. I'm a little confused if the issue here the facial recognition itself or the layers of bureaucratic nonsense? Because Ryanair is not the only one applying facial rec in a disturbing way.