Panorama last night - The Ryanair Effect

Dids1 wrote:

Ian Wickham wrote:I think some of you guys must earn too much money, I do not think any of the budget airlines are cheap any more, the price has been creeping up over the last couple of years, and I never quite understand the " No frills " thing most of planes are new and comfortable and you no longer get a microwaved meal they are no different to any package carrier.
On what I saw last night as I have never seen " him " before, did I like him, was he carismatic, was he some one to look up to,would I trust him, I'm afaid the answer is no on all counts :evil:

Because I DON'T earn too much money I'd look at Ryanair to see if the flights were affordable.

If they were the cheapest I'd go with them. Simple.

Now we are cooking the word "affordable" is out ....... so they are now not cheap but affordable, I maybe agree with that one :wink:

No doubt O'Leary is a very shrewd businessman and has built up a very successful airline.

However, I believe he is very much in danger of shooting his golden egg laying goose by adding compulsory extras rather than increasing the base price. He is peeing off a large number of travellers with some of these:

eg Making the only free way to pay a card which almost no one holds and is frankly useless for anything else
Charging for home printed boarding passes - you can't board without one, so sorry Mr O'L, it's not an extra and you're probably in breach of trading standard type rules. Charge more for an airport issued one, maybe, but not the alternative
His luggage policy is a rip off - not allowing people to pool their allowance is purely a revenue raising measure and only likely to up the number of bags people carry.
His floating of the idea to charge to use the toilet is another example.

Having been ripped off a Girona airport on the luggage front, and subsequent refusal to provide refreshment when stuck onboard for 2 hours on the ground, I would try to avoid flying with his airline ever again.

I used to respect him, I don't now.

I don't think the Ryanair experience is all that great but I would not cut my nose off to spite my face by saying I'll NEVER (an awfully long time!) fly with them.

They're not always cheaper but they do fly to destinations that others don't. I can think of Biarritz, Santander, Treviso and Perpignan as places I've been with Ryanair that were not served by other airlines.

I've been with EasyJet, BMI Baby, Go (gone!) and Buzz (buzzed off!) as well as FlyBe; if they're going to the place I want to got to at the right price, I'll fly with them.

Now Aeroflot....don't get me started on Aeroflot )

Great till you get to the airport and find that the flight time they advertise and you have booked for (and says on your confirmation) isn't actually the slot they have, it's about 25 mins earlier so therefore check-in is closed when you arrive well within the 40 minutes before the ADVERTISED & CONFIRMED time of flight.

Yet this is my problem and they can't help - despite misleading me. I got my money back after a long fight but they won't get near a penny again.

Easyjet on the other hand, I screwed up - I went to the wrong airport (Luton instead of Stanstead) for a flight to Glasgow. They put me on standby, got me on the flight as there was a no show and din't take a penny of me when I'd happily have paid any price as it was ME that had screwed up.

That's my personal experience anyway.

When we were back home in UK for a vacation a couple of years ago, my wife decided to go to Poland. Ryan Air was very slightly cheaper than other airlines, so she went with them. I can see that if you are getting a great price for a flight, a totally crappy experience might be expected, but when you are paying full whack, it is not acceptable. Ryan Air should have a "before you buy" warning, so people who don't know how they operate, won't be traumatised by their experience.

Trencher

Am I the only person that's p*ssed off that Mr O'Neill has changed air travel forever? (And not in a good way in my opinion.)

Tony for the win!

Who is Mr O'Neill? I thought it was Stelios and O'Leary - the offspring of Freddie Laker - who changed air travel for ever!