Ryanair-excess baggage payment

Iona_Penny

Any suggestions/comments on the following:

My family and friends were returning from holidayin France flying Ryanair from Montpelier. My luggage was deemed 5kg overweight.(funnily there were several people in this situation all from the same check-in queue)
Anyway my husband had no hand luggage so we wanted to remove items from the case but woman wouldnt let us, and off the case went. I was given a slip of paper and sent to another line to pay. The charge was E35 and I had 40 euros cash left but they wouldnt take cash. I had an HSBC debit card but they wouldn't take this and said payment must be on a credit card.
I DON'T HAVE ONE!

Several minutes later a friend came to see what the hold-up was; he offered to pay on his credit card BUT he was not asked to enter a pin number, asked to sign anything and only given a piece of paper as proof of transaction. When he said this wasn't right the woman just shrugged. OH, all the card stuff went on under the high counter and she would not allow him to see what she had done.

How do I lodge a complaint with Ryanair? Do they respond to letter and where do I send it? I think I should have been allowed to pay cash but I hope I haven't allowed a good friends card to be compromised.

Advice please.

ultrak3wl

Iona_Penny wrote:

How do I lodge a complaint with Ryanair?

I recall reading an article in the FT about the Irish bloke who runs (owns?) Ryanair. Some of his quotes are not suitable for a family audience but let's say that he does not seem to care much about anything except making money and company policy is certainly not receptive to people who write in with complaints.

I flew with them once (also from Montpelier) and although it was a rubbish expensive flight nothing tremendously bad happened. So it's the luck of the draw really and the ground staff obviously had a bad day when you met up with them. Which helps you out really, sounds as though it's your word against theirs as to whether your bags really were overweight and your friend's word against theirs as to whether he really agreed to let them charge his card.

I would wait and see if anything actually appears on your friend's card. If it does then if I was your friend I would think carefully about what I had really agreed about the card transaction and consider asking card issuer for a chargeback. You could also write to Ryanair short and to the point explaining that you don't agree you were overweight. Not that Ryanair would bother two hoots about your letter but it might help out your friend later.

scheming_gypsy

if he hasn't signed or entered a pin number then there's no proof he authorised a transaction. I'd wait for the bill and say it never happened.

Altarf

scheming_gypsy wrote:

if he hasn't signed or entered a pin number then there's no proof he authorised a transaction. I'd wait for the bill and say it never happened.

Recommending fraud. A marvellous solution.

iceliquid

Iona_Penny wrote:

Any suggestions/comments on the following:

My family and friends were returning from holidayin France flying Ryanair from Montpelier. My luggage was deemed 5kg overweight.(funnily there were several people in this situation all from the same check-in queue)
Anyway my husband had no hand luggage so we wanted to remove items from the case but woman wouldnt let us, and off the case went. I was given a slip of paper and sent to another line to pay. The charge was E35 and I had 40 euros cash left but they wouldnt take cash. I had an HSBC debit card but they wouldn't take this and said payment must be on a credit card.
I DON'T HAVE ONE!

Several minutes later a friend came to see what the hold-up was; he offered to pay on his credit card BUT he was not asked to enter a pin number, asked to sign anything and only given a piece of paper as proof of transaction. When he said this wasn't right the woman just shrugged. OH, all the card stuff went on under the high counter and she would not allow him to see what she had done.

How do I lodge a complaint with Ryanair? Do they respond to letter and where do I send it? I think I should have been allowed to pay cash but I hope I haven't allowed a good friends card to be compromised.

Advice please.

I am quite shocked at this whole incident.

Firstly I got this from Ryanair....

Checked baggage allowance is 15kg per person (no infant allowance). Passengers may not use the unused allowances of others. Only passengers travelling within the same reservation may pool their baggage allowance. For health and safety reasons Ryanair will not accept any individual item exceeding 32 kilos

So....if you and your husband were on seperate bookings....then the check in lady was right :mad: as you wouldn't be allowed to pool your baggage.
But I can't imagine you had seperate bookings....so we'll assume the check-in lady was wrong.....HERE GOES......

Obviously the lady wasn't Ryanair staff, rather, working for a contractor such as Servis air/aviance. From my experiance- these sort of staff don't give two "hoots" about anything or anyone and in terms of customer care....from me at least.....get ZERO points!

Airline staff can use their discretion when allowing for excess- this depends on whether or not the flight is full. I would say by the sound of it...she had a chip on her shoulder and was being "nasty"

I wouldn't bother writing to Ryanair to complain...it will have ZERO impact! I would imagine they also have a ZERO tolerance policy and CHARGE CHARGE CHARGE for anything (truth be known they make a nice little profit out of excess baggage).....which is fair enough...if someone is excess.....then they should be charged.....but on this occasion...your husband offered to carry some of the weight as hand luggage....and thats were its WRONG! (assuming you's are on the same booking) Anyway, couple this with the fact that the ground handling agents have no motivation/customer focus, and the strong possibility that the check in lady was on Commission for charging excess...you begin to see the real reason why she sent the bag on down!

As I've said...don't bother writing to Ryanair. Your best bet now is to get Madame France into hot water.

Oh look....your friend see's a debit from his account for E.35 :eek: BUT NO PIN OR NO SIGNATURE was asked for?????? Oh dear....this sounds like Card Fraud......Madame France has been a naughty girl.....taking your friends card (which was inside his passport :rolleyes: ) and swiping cash from the card without him knowing.

Your friend call up AMEX/MASTERCARD/VISA and reports fraud....they investigate and home in on the Montpellier airport.....(and guess what Madame France and her team are working on the same day that AMEX/MASTERCARD/VISA call! :T )

Ok I'm done.....

Though all the above was a waste of time if you guys were on different bookings...

Iona_Penny

Oh! Thanks so much for all your thoughts.

I wasn't going to complain to Ryanair about the excess baggage thing - I just thought DAMN about that although we were peeved we were not allowed to remove stuff and husband, daughter and daughters friend an me were all on same booking and only one bag was over kind of assumed they averaged the weight (we weren't over going!) but that's a lesson learned. Also the flight was cheapish for August so I have no complaints avout that.

We went on holiday with friends and it was the man of the other couple who 'paid' the charge. Had a horrid feeling at the time. Cross that I had cash they wouldn't accept nor my switch card. Perhaps I should have said I had no other way to pay (which I didn't) and see what happened.

Will speak to the knight in shining armour today and tell him of your advice.

Back later!

Altarf

iceliquid wrote:

Oh look....your friend see's a debit from his account for E.35 :eek: BUT NO PIN OR NO SIGNATURE was asked for?????? Oh dear....this sounds like Card Fraud......Madame France has been a naughty girl.....taking your friends card (which was inside his passport :rolleyes: ) and swiping cash from the card without him knowing.

Your friend call up AMEX/MASTERCARD/VISA and reports fraud....

And another person recommending your friend commit fraud. If he follows this advice he had best hope that there isn't CCTV at the airport, otherwise he would be best not going back to France for a while.

Iona_Penny

What?? Am I missing something?? Him accused of fraud , avoiding France??

How is he going to be accused of fraud? I just don't feel comfortable about the way the charge was paid on his card ie no proper recognised debiting of card.

Still trying to get hold of him to ring and check the use of his card. I wouldn't be happy if it were mine but feel worse if a friend has suffered financial loss trying to help out.

reelcrazy

Altarf wrote:

And another person recommending your friend commit fraud. If he follows this advice he had best hope that there isn't CCTV at the airport, otherwise he would be best not going back to France for a while.

Get off your high horse. We have already established that the check in staff WRONGLY charged Iona_Penny excess baggage and in my opinion committed fraud on her to gain commission (which I know they get as I know a check in girl back here).

I say anything Iona_Penny can do to get her own back is fair game.

patacake58

i also got stopped at check in by ryanair in may. my case was 2 kilos overweight but the staff let me take it out and put in my hand luggage. also was 2 kilos over in june but paid the excess charge in cash. i cant understand why they would not accept cash, have they changed their policy?

Altarf

reelcrazy wrote:

Get off your high horse. We have already established that the check in staff WRONGLY charged Iona_Penny excess baggage and in my opinion committed fraud on her to gain commission (which I know they get as I know a check in girl back here).

I say anything Iona_Penny can do to get her own back is fair game.

Two people directly recommended that Iona_Penny's friend lied to obtain a refund. I personally don't see that recommending fraud is good solution for a fairly minor sum, given the possible implications for the friend.

Clearly you disagree. I will resist hurling insults back.