Ryanair oh dear

Locornwall

I get the feeling I won’t be the only one in this situation.

I booked 4 return ticket flights from stansted to budapest this July. My partner later decided she wanted to stay a week longer and we therefore booked 3 additional return flights, understanding we would lose 3 of the original tickets without the option to get anything back.

Last week we received an email from Ryanair stating hungary had decided to introduce a tax on flights. They gave us the option to cancel specific flights and obtain a refund. I therefore decided to apply to have the 3 original return flights, as they were no longer needed. My partner was next to me when I did this and check I did it correctly.

I think you know where this is going, but I received an email yesterday stating all of the original flights have been refunded, which I never requested. I have also booked hotels which can’t be refunded. Suspiciously I did not receive an email confirming what had been cancelled when I did this. I contacted Ryanair today and they told me I requested to cancel all flights and this was checked by a supervisor. Yes you can feel my frustration. Continently for them those same tickets that cost on average £30 are now £160, which I cannot afford and refuse to do so anyhow on principal.

I advice or comments welcome.

jon81uk

It is common that if a return flight is cancelled then both legs of the booking are cancelled I think.

If wanting to cancel just one leg of a booking then I would have done it by phone to ensure the request was properly understood.

But also if you booked non-refundable flights and then a refund is being authorised only due to a change in taxes then it does seem likely that the offer to cancel is the entire booking or nothing.

Locornwall

That’s not what was specified. The link on the email sent you to a page that allowed you to enter specific flight details and request a refund for them.

Aylesbury_Duck

Specific flight details could mean several things.  Have you got the exact email wording you can paste here?  For example, you might be able to cancel one passenger's outward and return flights, or as you interpreted it, cancel all passengers' return leg flights.  The two are clearly different but was the wording on the email clear enough?

Olinda99

if the outward and return are effectively singles and not linked then cancelling the return does not cancel the outbound

if however they are 'return' tickets ie linked then cancelling one leg cancels the other leg

Locornwall

Here are the details of the email I received:

”On 4 June 2022, Hungary introduced a new air travel tax on passengers departing Hungary on or after 1 July 2022. This means that even if a passenger booked a flight before 4 June, which is due to depart Hungary on or after 1 July, this new tax must be paid to the Hungarian government.

This new tax is charged at a rate of HUF 3900 (approx. €10). The applicable tax in respect of your flight is HUF 3900 per passenger.

In accordance with Ryanair's General Terms and Conditions of Carriage (Article 4.2.2), and taking into consideration that airlines and passengers were not given sufficient notice of this tax, we hereby advise you that we will debit your payment card for amount of the tax due in respect of your booking ref ICYNYJ
. 
Passengers not wishing to accept the tax have the option to cancel their reservation and receive a full refund. If you wish to cancel your reservation you must do so on or before 16 June 2022. Otherwise, you will be deemed to have given consent to your payment card being debited for the amount of the tax.

If you wish to cancel your reservation and claim a full refund of the unused flight(s) click on the link below and enter your booking details. Refunds will be processed in 7 working days back to the form of payment that was used to pay for the original booking.”

when I clicked on the attached link I had the option of inputting the names of the passengers names and selecting which flights I would like to claim a refund.

jon81uk

There is nothing in that wording which suggests you can only cancel one leg.
It sounds like you can cancel the entire reservation, or pay the tax.

photome

jon81uk said:

There is nothing in that wording which suggests you can only cancel one leg.
It sounds like you can cancel the entire reservation, or pay the tax.

there is nothing in that wording suggesting you cant either. OP has said they had the option of choosing which floights they wanted a refund on, assuming the flights were bought as singles rather than reurns it should have been simple for Ryanair to cancel 3 single tickets

Aylesbury_Duck

Locornwall said:

Here are the details of the email I received:

”On 4 June 2022, Hungary introduced a new air travel tax on passengers departing Hungary on or after 1 July 2022. This means that even if a passenger booked a flight before 4 June, which is due to depart Hungary on or after 1 July, this new tax must be paid to the Hungarian government.

This new tax is charged at a rate of HUF 3900 (approx. €10). The applicable tax in respect of your flight is HUF 3900 per passenger.

In accordance with Ryanair's General Terms and Conditions of Carriage (Article 4.2.2), and taking into consideration that airlines and passengers were not given sufficient notice of this tax, we hereby advise you that we will debit your payment card for amount of the tax due in respect of your booking ref ICYNYJ
. 
Passengers not wishing to accept the tax have the option to cancel their reservation and receive a full refund. If you wish to cancel your reservation you must do so on or before 16 June 2022. Otherwise, you will be deemed to have given consent to your payment card being debited for the amount of the tax.

If you wish to cancel your reservation and claim a full refund of the unused flight(s) click on the link below and enter your booking details. Refunds will be processed in 7 working days back to the form of payment that was used to pay for the original booking.”

when I clicked on the attached link I had the option of inputting the names of the passengers names and selecting which flights I would like to claim a refund.

The bolded bit suggests it's the whole reservation that can be cancelled - which I'd take to be the out-and-back tickets, i.e. both legs.  I agree with jon81uk that it seems to be an all-or-nothing situation.  I suspect the ability to selected individual flights only gave the impression you could cancel one leg only.  What's more important is the wording of the email and any pertinent parts of the booking terms and conditions.  

I think you're out of luck on this one.

Jumblebumble

jon81uk said:

It is common that if a return flight is cancelled then both legs of the booking are cancelled I think.

This is not relevant in Ryanairs case
https://help.ryanair.com/hc/en-gb/articles/360017824978-Refund-Policy

Can I cancel my Ryanair flight?

Once a Ryanair flight is operational, and does not have a delay exceeding 5 hours, then it is not possible to get a refund. All Ryanair flights are changeable but they cannot be cancelled.

Flight dates/times/routes can be changed up to 2.5 hours before the flight departure time (name changes can be changed up to 2 hours before the flight) via 'My Bookings' unless you have already checked in, in which case please contact one of our agents using our live chat.

You don't need to notify us if you are unable to travel and if you can’t use your outbound flight, you can still use your return flight.

Locornwall

Don’t agree. Out of luck suggests you’re not looking at this from a legal perspective. My view is that it should be down to Ryanair to put in clear intelligible language what would happen. Stating one thing in an email, which I still see as unclear and then allowing individual flights to be cancelled is their error. Having contacted them to clear this up at the earliest opportunity I gave them a chance to rectify this. I think that’s reasonable and they refused, probably because they are now charging 6 times the price I originally paid for the ticket.