Ryanair! Swines!

budgetflyer

Carrliadiere
Well half the time the "extra" you pay BA comes back to you in the form of meal vouchers, compensation or overnight accom for the delays or cancelations you generally suffer (trying to) flying BA.

We normally also have fun , while delayed, playing the "Will my luggage be on the same flight as me?" guessing game too.

Another fun one is the early Monday morning "will I get bumped off my flight, and miss my important meeting due to overbooking ?" game. The winner of this one often loses a major contract but gets a cool 250 euro compensation.

carrliadiere

budgetflyer wrote: »

Carrliadiere
Well half the time the "extra" you pay BA comes back to you in the form of meal vouchers, compensation or overnight accom for the delays or cancelations you generally suffer (trying to) flying BA.

We normally also have fun , while delayed, playing the "Will my luggage be on the same flight as me?" guessing game too.

Another fun one is the early Monday morning "will I get bumped off my flight, and miss my important meeting due to overbooking ?" game. The winner of this one often loses a major contract but gets a cool 250 euro compensation.

Hmm. I think my opinion comes from having flown four faultless and quite fantastic BA flights, and having had one horrible and awful easyjet experience. You know, how they pack you on a bus and make you battle other people to get the holy grail which is a seat next to the person you're flying with.

peterbaker

For budgetflyer re:

I have bought a number of one legged return sectors from Europe over the months and years, and found that Ryanair more often than not use something called Dynamic Currency Conversion without my permission to convert the foreign currency to GBP before they bill my credit card. Because I use Nationwide, it costs me at least 3% more when they do that. On principle I get Nationwide to complain to VISA about it and meantime Nationwide refund my account with the illicit overcharges. You can search the forums for 'Dynamic Currency Conversion' for more information about this 3 year old (at least) third-party-hand in your wallet phenomenum.

Do you have a standard template letter for this Peter ? Could you maybe post it for others to copy ? (omitting personal details obviously)

No letter required, just a simple transaction dispute form (put all your disputed DCC transactions on one form).

To get a form (or a stack of them - Nationwide were in an anti-Ryanair mood last time I complained about it:T) then just call Nationwide or your bank.

Remember that the amount you may have lost with DCC is less significant if your bank charges you 2.75% or more for foreign currency transactions anyway.

Nationwide doesn't charge of course so it is worth complaining.

p1an0player

Very interesting, I checked a recent flight that should have been in Euros. I paid using my Nationwide card and effectively I have paid £1.62 more as a result of DCC.

If I'd known, I'd have used my Electron card (which is not Nationwide) and saved the 1 euro debit card charge. Although the Electron card has a 2.75% foreign loading charge which I would have avoided as a result of the DCC.

budgetflyer

peterbaker wrote: »

For budgetflyer re:
No letter required, just a simple transaction dispute form (put all your disputed DCC transactions on one form).

To get a form (or a stack of them - Nationwide were in an anti-Ryanair mood last time I complained about it:T) then just call Nationwide or your bank.

Remember that the amount you may have lost with DCC is less significant if your bank charges you 2.75% or more for foreign currency transactions anyway.

Nationwide doesn't charge of course so it is worth complaining.

Yes, In my case, HBOS I think the difference is 0.25% so not worth losing sleep over.
HBOS serve my routine banking needs best with their Premier Acc as my wife has medical conditions and the included Travel Insurance covers her when others wont, as well as the RAC cover, phone insurance etc etc

I could have a seperate Nationwide acc I suppose, but its only benefit would be foreign money.

In Ryanairs case, DCC could come to 10 or 20 million euro extra.

As I have said before Peter, its all these little charges towards their overall profit that keep their base fares so low.

peterbaker

Well I think there are other ways that they make bigger savings, and it wouldn't hurt if they were more up front about the way they see the world rather than brushing stuff under the carpet...did you ever watch this one?:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZkKPirksymQ

tcluk

The problem is they change their terms and conditions at a whim. If you read them carefully, there is a a get-out clause saying that they can change them at any time, affecting past bookings as well as future ones. But let the passenger step a fraction out of line, ie being one minute late to check in, and the full weight of the T&Cs comes down on them. How is that fair?

A case in point, early last year they changed the rules about baggage pooling. People agreed to T&Cs saying that they could combine their (then-free) baggage allowance into one bag if they were on the same booking. They then changed it (in anticipation of charging per bag) to say you couldn't. People turned up at check in with one 20 or 25kg bag between two only to be told, "Oh no, the rules have changed. Your bag is overweight. You have to pay excess." And the agent pointed to the get-out clause saying the T&Cs could be changed by Ryanair at any time.

It is because of tactics like this that Ryanair are indeed swine, and I have stopped flying with them after years of loyal custom. I'd rather pay a bit more and know where I stand.

Sam_Bee

I wanted to highlight this story (particularly as I knew PeterBaker would be interested in it) without starting YET ANOTHER Ryanair thread. It appears that people NOT flying Ryanair is one of their most profitable sidelines

http://www.uk-airport-news.info/stansted-airport-news-081007.htm
[FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif][SIZE=+1]Ryanair makes €60m by not refunding taxes[/SIZE][/FONT]

[FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif][SIZE=-1]08.10.07[/SIZE][/FONT]
[FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif][SIZE=-1]Ryanair, Europe's biggest budget airline, earned about €60 million (£42m) last year by not refunding taxes and airport levies to customers who booked but did not fly, the Times reports. The newspaper says that the figure comes from filings with the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). [/SIZE][/FONT]
[FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif][SIZE=-1]It adds that almost 3.2 million people booked flights with Dublin-based Ryanair that were not subsequently taken. The airline will refund taxes but, like most other airlines, it charges an administration fee to do so. Given that APD is £10 on short haul flights and Ryanair's administration fee is £15, unless the flight cancelled is a return journey within the UK (where two lots of £10 is payable), the passenger will not receive a refund.[/SIZE][/FONT]
[FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif][SIZE=-1]However, Ryanair does not pay the tax over to the UK Government on flights that are not taken, even where it does not refund the money to its passengers. This has allowed the airline to make around €60 million in additional profits last year, if the Times' calculations are correct.[/SIZE][/FONT]

richardw

BUT it is revenue and they will pay corporation taxes on it, so the government gets a bit of tax, which is why they may not rule out the scam.

alared

It`s hardly Ryanair`s fault if people choose not to fly after booking flights with them.