OK Ryanair, I’ll pay your blood money

VfM4meplse

BarryBlue wrote: »

I actually wouldn't be bothered about the seating policy. If I don't sit next to the wife for a couple of hours - so what!

Agreed, for adults. However it becomes problematic when travelling on a budget as a single adult with young children, and someone refuses to budge despite your obvious predicament. I find less experienced travellers [STRIKE]the most selfish of the lot[/STRIKE] far less willing to help others. Swapping more than once per flight is highly unlikely anyway.

peachyprice

VfM4meplse wrote: »

Is Sleazyjet that much better? I wish Southend Airport had decent airlines, ie ones that actually give a stuff about their customers. Until then I'll keep making the trek to LHR (being stuck on the M25 / A406 is all part of the fun).

Sleazy don't deliberately separate families, so yes, they are better from that POV. Flybe are pretty good, I fly with them a lot too, they also fly out of LCY which is a dream of an airport and easy for you to get to. BA fly out of LCY too.

peachyprice

NoodleDoodleMan wrote: »

Can you please advise which of the other broadly comparable airlines allows punters to choose their seats at no additional charge?

Then we can all fly with these carriers - problem solved.

AFAIK Thomas Cook, TUI, Jet2 and EasyJet all charge over and above the basic ticket price for pre-booking seats of choice.

Difference is Easyjet don't deliberately split you up if you don't pre-pay. Don't know about the others you mention as I never fly with them.

jpsartre

NoodleDoodleMan wrote: »

Can you please advise which of the other broadly comparable airlines allows punters to choose their seats at no additional charge?

You don't need an airline to offer free seat selection to get what you want, just an airline that allocates seats together for passengers on the same booking (to the extent it's possible). And that's pretty much all of them (aside from Ryanair and Jet2).

stoneman

The point I was making was that it never really dawned on me the safety issue and of course how scared someone might get while sitting separated until it happened to us.

It's only about £8 extra to sit together, so its not about the money, its the damn despicable practice of, now this is the word that has to be emphasized "DELIBERATE act of seating apart. It's a b100dy safety issue!

So today we returned from DUB, I paid the extra, all good. But if I could have taken a picture at the bottom of the steps of the plane there must have been 20 people milling around waiting for the rest of their party to appear.

And to those that say "well just fly with someone else" what if there is no one else?

Look I have no real issue with RA, I've probably used them 8 times alone this year, they offer decent fares (sometimes), they are on time (mostly), they seem to have upped their game on customer service, they have made taking luggage even a bit cheaper, but this is a new low.

budgetflyer

VfM4meplse wrote: »

Agreed, for adults. However it becomes problematic when travelling on a budget as a single adult with young children, and someone refuses to budge despite your obvious predicament. I find less experienced travellers [STRIKE]the most selfish of the lot[/STRIKE] far less willing to help others. Swapping more than once per flight is highly unlikely anyway.

Its not a problem on Ryanair as families with children MUST pre book seats so that they are sitting together.

jpsartre

stoneman wrote: »

And to those that say "well just fly with someone else" what if there is no one else?

Don't fly? It's not a human right to be able to use air transport to every destination.

holidaysforme

We fly with Ryanair a lot. We have rarely encountered any problems.
Yes they are deliberately splitting people up if they haven’t pre paid for seats.

Three of us flew recently on a short flight and we each had a row to ourselves.:D

As far as i’m Aware, you have to select seats to sit with young children.

Great idea in my opinion. It’s put paid to the cheeky sods asking people to move for them when they were too tight to fork out to ensure their family are sitting together.

NoodleDoodleMan

You don't need an airline to offer free seat selection to get what you want, just an airline that allocates seats together for passengers on the same booking (to the extent it's possible). And that's pretty much all of them (aside from Ryanair and Jet2).

I wasn't clear if this were an anti Ryanair issue, or include a wider target spectrum.

I have limited experience of Ryanair - flew once to Denmark in a group and we sat where we liked, presumably they did not implement a deliberate spread of seating for us.

Second and last time was as a couple and we sat together both ways.

Have been flying to popular Med and Canaries etc. resorts since primary school, never in 60 years have I been separated.

One of the carriers quoted wanted to sell pre-allocated seating when we were a party of 4 adults plus 2 young children - I challenged the top management on this and got the usual "to sit together" nonsense - after asking for an explanation on how they justified this they eventually gave us 6 seats together at no extra charge as a goodwill gesture.

So far it's worked on three consecutive deals with them.

Have been flying to popular Med and Canaries etc. resorts since primary school, never in 60 years have I been separated.

Which makes us old enough (plus some) to remember when we were allocated seats at airport check in on the traditional first come, first served basis, long before these airlines twigged that there was more money to be made by manipulating seating allocations in the way we now experience.

On a few occasions we were well up the queue and got extra legroom seats that were unallocated - there were smoking and no smoking sections in those days and we always chose the former - not sure if that had any bearing, perhaps it was just luck.

I still and firmly believe the first come, first served basis for standard seating is the only fair approach, with extra legroom seats at an added cost.

Other opinions obviously differ.

cubegame

They are a headline price business. If you don't want the basic offering with the "risks" it entails then you've got to accept paying more to subsidise those who do.

Same as car hire, if you are naive to the ways of how it works you will pay.