Beat Budget Airline Charges Article Discussion

monsoon13

Meant to include the info that the Visa Electron card I got was a Post Office Travel card.

PolishBigSpender

monsoon13 wrote: »

Meant to include the info that the Visa Electron card I got was a Post Office Travel card.

Which the terms and conditions clearly state isn't accepted.

If anyone's ripping you off, it's the Post Office for not informing you that the card is not a 'true' Visa Electron card and thus isn't suitable for booking many things.

millsey1509

Flew easyjet in the summer. They all musical instruments on as hand luggage (Cabin crew don't like it). Had 2 Guitars with the party, but on return trip there was more than just the guitars in the cases, so avoided excess baggage.

Don't be stupid though as they are still xrayed.

treaclebob

lindo wrote: »

Please do not try the scam where one person in a group of passengers pays for priority boarding then keeps seats for their friends.

I always pay for priority boarding as I am a tall person and have come across people trying this one.

If I want one of the seats that they are trying to reserve for friends who are not on board, then I take it.

I have payed for this privalage and do not appreciate being put in this confrontational situation by someone trying swindle me out of what I should have.

The possibility of an air rage incident could be quite high if people try this dodge which only works if the legitimate passengers let them away with it.

I was on a Ryanair flight from Karlsruhe to Dublin when someone did this. It is very annoying not to say rude and arrogant! I thought that the flight crew should have put a stop to it - many of the passengers were grumbling loudly to no avail. I'm sure Mr O'Leary would not be pleased!

abpmale

Martin mentions that the payment charge can be called an 'extra' as you have the option to pay by fee-free Electron card.

What about people in the Republic of Ireland?

Wikipedia, Electron cards are not available in Ireland - so if this is the case, I wonder how this could be an 'extra' for those living in the Republic, as they have no choice here.

Apologies if this has been raised before.

PolishBigSpender

abpmale wrote: »

Martin mentions that the payment charge can be called an 'extra' as you have the option to pay by fee-free Electron card.

What about people in the Republic of Ireland?

Wikipedia, Electron cards are not available in Ireland - so if this is the case, I wonder how this could be an 'extra' for those living in the Republic, as they have no choice here.

Apologies if this has been raised before.

Nothing to do with Ryanair - it's a commercial decision by Irish banks not to offer Visa Electron.

A quick google reveals that Lloyds TSB Spain offer Visa Electron cards to Irish residents - so they *are* available.

yorkshireman99_2

To be honest, I now just can't be bothered with calculating all the extra charges. So often, in the past, i've found it is actually significantly cheaper to use an established carrier than to book with a so-called budget airline, that i now go direct to the national carrier(s), and, provided the fare is reasonable, book directly with them. No hassle, and some food/drink included for no extra charge. i'm surprised more people don't do the same.

My last excercise was for travel to Pisa. Jet 2 £94 (Plus other unknown extras?), BA £88 return (all inclusive). It's time more people recognised how they are being ripped-off by the 'budget' airlines.

alwill

I just bought a flight on FlyBe and it automatically took me to a page to pre-book my seat. This page talks about making sure you sit together and it shows the seat that's allocated for you, charging an extra £6 each leg of the journey. As I am travelling alone it doesn't matter to me. If you just click continue it allocates the seat and charges the £6. It took some working out to try to avoid this but you need to select change seat and then continue. It comes up with a warning that your seat is unassigned but you can OK this and avoid the extra £6.

PolishBigSpender

Flybe are notorious for being absolutely misleading - they're far worse than Ryanair in this respect.

MidlandsTel

Hope this info helps all travellers reading this post not to get caught as we did with Ryanair.

Just returned from Faro in Portugal, before we went we had scrutinised the paperwork issued and checked Ryanairs website and had measured and weighed all our cases and hand luggage...plus printed off boarding passes.

Outgoing...no problems, smooth with no hitches, but loads of people at the airport queues were being turned away as luggage was over weight or they hadn't checked in online. There were a lot of upset people.

Return trip...got to check in, we hadn't printed boarding passes for the return journey and the Portuguese handling agent stung us for £40 X3 =£120 before we could get our boarding passes.

When we had originally printed the outgoing boarding passes, it did not then prompt us, at any point, to then go and print the return journey boarding passes, we just assumed it was dealt with differently as it was handled by a foreign airport agent. Wrong! And they have facilities to collect all extra fees and charges [in cash only] through the foreign airport handling agents now too.

I also tried to print off the return boading passes before we left our hotel for the return journey, after I had realised my mistake, but I couldn't. The system shuts you out 4hrs before flying, so you can't check-in or print boarding passes, so they get you for 40 quid each!!

I am very computer savvy and use the web all the time and book/order stuff online all the time, but I missed this. The whole process is geared up, both at the UK airports and abroad, to screw the customer for every penny possible. Likewise, online, there are obvious on screen reminders missing so you get caught out, printing return boading passes is one such example of this.

Take the prices on Ryanair flights of refreshments as another example of their ridiculous policies, how about £5.20 for a small can of cider, or £4.20 for a small can of lager, outrageous. Or how about the ridiculously low 15Kg luggage weight allowance, 5kg less than Easyjet and others.

I have vowed never to fly Ryanair again, I am sticking with Monarch or Easyjet in future, may be more expensive but worth it my opinion.

So, in summary, if you re flying Ryanair, make sure you print off both sets of boarding passes, for outward and inward journeys, but people, if you can avoid it at all, just do not fly Ryanair!! They now claim to be the worlds favourite airline on their paperwork...more like the worlds most arrogant airline.

Ryanair...if you are reading...on this one trip, all I observed was people who were disgruntled and felt ripped off by the stealth charges you impose; you may be the worlds favourite airline [by numbers of travellers] now, but it won't last for long if you continue down this road...