3 ms·

The amount of people (willfully?) trying to haggle with Ryanair is probably the most detrimental to their experience. My latest flight about 40% (yes, I’m count

by wjnc 3y ago

The amount of people (willfully?) trying to haggle with Ryanair is probably the most detrimental to their experience. My latest flight about 40% (yes, I’m counting) of the waits were for people discussing non-booked preferences (suitcases, seats, priority). They should accept any customer wish (except seating) and charge afterwards. That would be great. “Oh here we see you had a overhead and stood in the priority lane. That’ll be € 400 extra.” Off course their pricing is obnoxious, intransparant and pretty much in opposite of good customer service, but that is their good right. They fly safe, on time and have the best network.

makingstuffs 3y ago
One thing I am guilty of is trying to get an extra legroom seat for free. I’m 6ft5 and feel like my choice is between being forced to pay for something which I cannot help or be placed in a seat which is so small I end up damaging body. However, this is usually something which takes up a few seconds of me just asking and moving on if they can’t. While I have no data and this is just logical assessment I’d bet a lot of reason for the increase in these incidents is the way in which airlines have drastically increased fares and lowered services since the pandemic. Since the pandemic airfares have doubled across the board and, with that, things like a complimentary checkin bag on an 8 hour flight have been removed. Atop of that other complimentary things such as alcoholic drinks and meals have also been removed from many airlines. All the while operators have been implementing algorithms which force you to pay to sit next to the person with whom you are travelling. It’s not an excuse for people to start abusing staff as that is unacceptable no matter the reasoning. Just trying to add some perspective
- wjnc 3y ago
  I feel for you (6ft2 myself and I fit exactly) and other customer irritations as well. When I first flew thirty years ago (getting older here) it was half a monthly average paycheck for one kid Amsterdam - US. I remember, since I had to do chores and save my allowance for half the ticket. Currently I fly five pax Amsterdam - Spain on a holiday for not even a third of an average paycheck. People got richer and flying got massively more efficient. We are just undergoing the pains of how to treat flying like trains or buses where the individual passenger is not the primary customer. (This is only relatable for people in places with working mass transit. Obviously you are the customer, but the timetable and procedures couldn’t care. It’s the bureaucratic approach to business. The free drinks and suitcases in legacy flying are another model, that incidentally failed on shorter flights.)
malux85 3y ago
So financially incentivise the airline to make their processes unclear so the customer accidentally spends a bunch more? Sounds like that would cause more rage.
- wjnc 3y ago
  The thing is that I think rage Billing Afterwards is better than the current practice of extra billing before you go which leads to haggling and queueing for the rest of us.
  - wkat4242 3y ago
    It's just that it's very hard to do. A customer can always contest the charge and many customers pay with payment methods that don't allow rebilling.
- wkat4242 3y ago
  It's not unclear, all the options are offered during the booking process. In fact they are crystal clear and you have to choose "nope" several times to get past it, they really want to sell their addons :) But then going to the plane and demanding the things you wouldn't pay for is just disingenious IMO. And rude to the other passengers who did.
wkat4242 3y ago
> They should accept any customer wish (except seating) and charge afterwards. That would be great. “Oh here we see you had a overhead and stood in the priority lane. That’ll be € 400 extra.” That's kinda what they do actually. They charge if you insist on bringing your carryon. However this is what causes the arguments because people don't want to pay. I don't really get it. They want to fly to Barcelona for 29 euro but the 9 euro for priority + carryon is too much :/ If you fly KLM you get this for free but you will be paying more than 100. Just pay for the extras and you're still way cheaper off. What I also like about Ryanair is that you can just choose if/what you want to eat on board. At KLM they will give you usually a cheese sandwich which I can't eat (lactose) and only a tiny cup of drink. With Ryanair you can just buy what you want for a price that's similar to a big city coffeeshop on the ground. I tend to avoid the legacy airlines for this reason.

by wjnc 3y ago

makingstuffs 3y ago

One thing I am guilty of is trying to get an extra legroom seat for free. I’m 6ft5 and feel like my choice is between being forced to pay for something which I cannot help or be placed in a seat which is so small I end up damaging body. However, this is usually something which takes up a few seconds of me just asking and moving on if they can’t. While I have no data and this is just logical assessment I’d bet a lot of reason for the increase in these incidents is the way in which airlines have drastically increased fares and lowered services since the pandemic. Since the pandemic airfares have doubled across the board and, with that, things like a complimentary checkin bag on an 8 hour flight have been removed. Atop of that other complimentary things such as alcoholic drinks and meals have also been removed from many airlines. All the while operators have been implementing algorithms which force you to pay to sit next to the person with whom you are travelling. It’s not an excuse for people to start abusing staff as that is unacceptable no matter the reasoning. Just trying to add some perspective

wjnc 3y ago
I feel for you (6ft2 myself and I fit exactly) and other customer irritations as well. When I first flew thirty years ago (getting older here) it was half a monthly average paycheck for one kid Amsterdam - US. I remember, since I had to do chores and save my allowance for half the ticket. Currently I fly five pax Amsterdam - Spain on a holiday for not even a third of an average paycheck. People got richer and flying got massively more efficient. We are just undergoing the pains of how to treat flying like trains or buses where the individual passenger is not the primary customer. (This is only relatable for people in places with working mass transit. Obviously you are the customer, but the timetable and procedures couldn’t care. It’s the bureaucratic approach to business. The free drinks and suitcases in legacy flying are another model, that incidentally failed on shorter flights.)

malux85 3y ago

So financially incentivise the airline to make their processes unclear so the customer accidentally spends a bunch more? Sounds like that would cause more rage.

wjnc 3y ago
The thing is that I think rage Billing Afterwards is better than the current practice of extra billing before you go which leads to haggling and queueing for the rest of us.
- wkat4242 3y ago
  It's just that it's very hard to do. A customer can always contest the charge and many customers pay with payment methods that don't allow rebilling.
wkat4242 3y ago
It's not unclear, all the options are offered during the booking process. In fact they are crystal clear and you have to choose "nope" several times to get past it, they really want to sell their addons :) But then going to the plane and demanding the things you wouldn't pay for is just disingenious IMO. And rude to the other passengers who did.

wkat4242 3y ago

> They should accept any customer wish (except seating) and charge afterwards. That would be great. “Oh here we see you had a overhead and stood in the priority lane. That’ll be € 400 extra.” That's kinda what they do actually. They charge if you insist on bringing your carryon. However this is what causes the arguments because people don't want to pay. I don't really get it. They want to fly to Barcelona for 29 euro but the 9 euro for priority + carryon is too much :/ If you fly KLM you get this for free but you will be paying more than 100. Just pay for the extras and you're still way cheaper off. What I also like about Ryanair is that you can just choose if/what you want to eat on board. At KLM they will give you usually a cheese sandwich which I can't eat (lactose) and only a tiny cup of drink. With Ryanair you can just buy what you want for a price that's similar to a big city coffeeshop on the ground. I tend to avoid the legacy airlines for this reason.