Flight delay and cancellation compensation, Ryanair ONLY

peterbaker

Tyzap wrote: »

You will definitely need to contact the airline if you intend using the return flight but not the outbound. Under normal circumstances you would be prevented from boarding the return if you did not fly on the first leg.

Sorry Tyzap but must correct that part - with Ryanair no action whatsoever is required to ues the return leg of any unused outbound booking. They have always treated each leg as a separate contract.

So that might save some unfortunate passengers one worry at least. I have flown Ryanair for donkeys years. What I say is gospel in this particular regard.

Ryanair are however absolutely worse than awful on days like today.


To assist any travellers still at the airport in gaining more accurate flight info on whether you aircraft is really likely to be avilable to fly, let me share some intelligence:

1. On days like today, the Departure and Arrival Airport websites and Ryanair's own website are often pretty useless and barely worth checking for the status of your flight. Having said that if they say "Go to Gate" then unfortunately you are best advised to do it, even though they frequently will shunt you there just to free up space in the main terminal (I have experienced it and had to gulp down my beer unnecessarily fast in the Windmill at Stansted and then found time to have two more near the gate!).

2. Ryanair's 400+ aircraft generally at busy times of the year are doing three or four return flights a day (that's six or eight legs). Many are based at Stansted, but they do have over 80 other bases where some of their aircraft spend the night. Stansted is their main base however. Base aircraft try to return to base on the last flight of the day. There are few if any Ryanair aircraft scheduled to be in the air over Europe after midnight or before 6 am.

3. This means that there are patterns of individual aircraft use that can be recognised daily. For example, the aircraft that operates the late flight from Stansted to Wroclaw is based at Wroclaw and it has to successfully arrive first from Wroclaw before you can get on it. If it doesn't arrive or perhaps doesn't even take off, sure as eggs is eggs, your flight from Stansted to that remote base destination will almost certainly be cancelled irrespective of what it says on the departure board or at the airport's websites at either end.

Using this method I predicted the cancellation of a flight two months ago an hour before passengers were informed by Ryanair. I was able to give a party of friends just arriving at Stansted by taxi a heads up.

4. You can view the progress inbound flights as in 3. above LIVE using FR24.com

5. You can often check official airline and airport updated flight planning type data on flightstats.com. If data appears there in the Flight Details section, you can take it as gospel at the time it says it was posted. Some airlines and Airports are better than others with updated data e.g. with Luftnansa you can expect very frequently updated data even down to Gate numbers. If it hasn't been updated for hours, then you are out of luck for the moment and might do better to go back to FR24.com to see whether the aircraft registration you expect is actually in the air and where it is. Yous use previous daily patterns of flights to forecast which individual aircraft you are expecting. You can search easily by FR flight number, EI-??? Irish aircraft registration number, and Airport. I appreciate this sounds complex to many, but it may assist some people who begin to understand how it works.

6. If you purchase a membership with FR24.com (I have silver membership) you can check the flight history of every flight number and every aircraft in their fleet for the past 60 days and you will notice other patterns such as one particular scheduled late flight back to Stansted every night has to get back to Stansted from Majorca before it leaves to go elsewhere in Euorpe and then comes back after 2300. The latest that one has got back in my experience is around 0100 but quite often, as in last night, some can't get back perhaps, and even if they do, the ground crews refuse to refuel them overnight if there's any risk of a lightning storm which causes a helluva backlog starting around 6am and from which Ryanair seems to choose not to recover - preferring to start again next day with a clean sheet and to dump all the risk of the bad day on you poor passengers.

When it is as bad as today was and that was repeated barely two months back, it is perhaps sensible to record evidence that you arrived at the airport, but it may not be wise to queue for the Ryanair desk - you could be queuing until the small hours of the next day and still get the bvm's rush as recorded above in this thread.

Often better to organise your own alternative, mitigate your losses, and keep all receipts and hand everything over to a specialist claims company.

SW-Flatshare

JPears wrote: »

Personally I would say don't go for the refund, its a small thing but doesn't allow them to wash their dirty theiving hands of you. Just ask for the difference from your rail tickets.

So: Are you saying that if I go for the refund, then I'm not elegible for my rail tickets price? I would have thought I can go for both, no?

JPears wrote: »

First stop would be to check with online companies such as Botts or EU claim to see if you have a valid compensation claim.

I've already been in touch with Botts. Sounds like Ryanair indeed are a very 'special' company to deal with.... Here's what Botts website said:

(...)you agreed to a term in Ryanair's General Conditions of Carriage which says, "Passengers must submit claims directly to Ryanair and allow Ryanair 28 days (...) to respond directly to them before engaging third parties to claim on their behalf."

The High Court has recently ruled that this is an enforceable term and as such you have a contractual obligation to contact Ryanair yourself first and give them 28 days to respond, before engaging the services of a third party.

Ryanair is the only airline that has incorporated this restriction in their terms and conditions and we are currently appealing the decision of the High Court in order to ensure that passengers can benefit from the freedom to use a lawyer should they wish to do so.

In the meantime however the term is enforceable and you should be aware that Ryanair could try and claim damages from you if you breach their terms and conditions.

Tyzap

peterbaker wrote: »

Sorry Tyzap but must correct that part - with Ryanair no action whatsoever is required to ues the return leg of any unused outbound booking. They have always treated each leg as a separate contract.

Thanks for that peterbaker,

I wasn't aware that 1st and 2nd legs were not connected so far as FR are concerned. Perhaps that's also applies to all the LoCo airlines.

It is not the case with the mainline scheduled airlines where you must use the 1st leg which is, I believe, due to the cost of tickets being priced differently, depending on which country they are booked from.

peterbaker

Tyzap wrote: »

Thanks for that peterbaker,

I wasn't aware that 1st and 2nd legs were not connected so far as FR are concerned. Perhaps that's also applies to all the LoCo airlines.

It is not the case with the mainline scheduled airlines where you must use the 1st leg which is, I believe, due to the cost of tickets being priced differently, depending on which country they are booked from.

Yes definitely Ryanair and maybe the other Locos - it is extremely handy (when they are flying reliably!) to be able to exploit their cheaper fares to give yourself flexibility of travelling on a range of dates just by buying extra single or return flights around your most likely dates, and just discarding the ones you don't use! You might say that if the long range forecast predicts thunderstorms that if your flights are cheap enough, as a 'lightning insurance' you can pre-buy some emergency extra flights for next day. When on a day like today others might be told that they might not be on their way by Ryanair for three or four days, you might be laughing knowing you are guaranteed a flight next day (if tomorrow is a normal Ryanair day!)

The Ryanair segregation of outbound and return legs as if completely separate tickets has been like that for 18+ years I believe with them, so I am slightly puzzled if most of the other airlines have not followed suit, at least on direct flights. I suppose where they codeshare, and offer indirect flights and transfers, it could mess up their and their other airline partners' projections a bit, but all they really perhaps need is a computer just a bit more powerful than Ryanair's to plot their profit with each novel new scenario!

Right now for example, there are many cheap flights from Stansted coming up in a week or two, but the return legs are not cheap for another couple of weeks beyond that. Sometimes looks a bit odd when trying to book and finding £20 out and £200 back - so who might be cheapest then?

I blame their computer for being too darn clever.

Oh and a touch of bare-faced ruthlessness always helps the bottom line at least in the short term ... :mad:

Oasis1

This might be useful - after the last Live Chat I had with Ryanair, I asked them to send me a transcript of the conversation to my e-mail address and was very surprised that they did indeed do this. Might be useful as evidence of what their representatives have agreed?


Update


I've also managed to get them to send me transcripts of all previous chats too, so worth trying to get hold of if you're going to dispute something later.

curlyshirl76

Hi just to update you that I eventually got my reimbursement back from Ryanair. Although they worded it as compensation which it isn't as I hadn't claimed for compensation as yet.

JPears

Hi, curly.
Well done. Did you put your claim in at the end of May of end of June when you first posted?
Good response from RA if the latter, poor if the former date.

Tyzap

Tyzap wrote: »

Well I cannot complain having just received an email from Ryanair stating that they have accepted my claim in full and that a cheque should arrive in 21-25 days.

Credit where it is due:T

Please stand down Dr Watson, your services may not be required, for now, after all.

I received a cheque in the post today in 'full and final settlement' for my claim.

Well done Ryanair, it was all very straightforward.

It's just a shame they sent me a cheque and not a bank transfer!

NoviceAngel

Tyzap wrote: »

I received a cheque in the post today in 'full and final settlement' for my claim.

Well done Ryanair, it was all very straightforward.

It's just a shame they sent me a cheque and not a bank transfer!

I’m glad you got your £££ in the end, I’d frame that cheque then put it on the wall. I’m getting quite a little collection myself. You don’t even have to go to the bank to deposit cheques anymore, it’s all electronic these days.

Ohh the benefits of unexpected windfalls!

Justice13075

You would sue them through the ESCP (European small claims) not MCOL.