To fly Ryanair or not to fly Ryanair

A while back I promised a Ryanair blog, and whilst this is not a rant, it is hardly in praise of the little yellow & blue airline either, after it cancelled the last remaining Monday morning flight from SW France back to the UK. The reason I am flying British Airways at the moment is because of what appears to be Ryanair's not caring about the customer policy.

Ryanair had a sale recently, well I know they are having one every week at the moment, in which they were selling tickets to the only destination to SW France that they have not cut this winter, and so I was relieved to be able to book flights from Stansted on a Friday morning to Limoges, and back to Stansted on a Monday morning, for a reasonable price. I then discovered a pile of emails in my inbox informing me my Monday flight had basically been cancelled, or as the put it, my flight departure time had been changed, and they had re booked me on the Sunday morning (10:55) flight, with the option to accept or refund, so I took the option to refund, going back to the UK on a Sunday morning was not an option.

This left me with the option of either Easyjet or British Airways, with Luton being a nightmare to get to and timings which were not ot my liking, I was left with only one viable option, British Airways, and I have to say the price of the flights is not that much higher than the little yellow & blue airline.

I do not want to knock Ryanair unduly because they have done alot for the tourist industry in France, however they have taken a lot as well in the form of incentives etc.. In the world of low cost airlines their customer service has to be amongst the worst, they are still on my list of airlines to fly, but they are at the bottom of the list, in the same way that I, as a customer, appear to be at the bottom of their list.

Travelling via BA is such a different experience to Ryanair, and I think you have to do a couple of years of travelling on the little yellow & blue airline to appreciate the difference, just the fact that you have a booked seat on the plane makes a big difference, for me it saves 45 minutes in time, as I do not have to rush to the airport to ensure I am somewhere close to the front of the plane for a quick exit to the train or hire car desk.

A tip if you are travelling with Ryanair and have hired a car from Hertz, remember so have half your fellow passengers, Hertz is Ryanair's car rental partner, so make sure you get to the rental desk tout suite or you will be there for over an hour in the queue especially in summer. If you have hold luggage, send the driver(s) to get the car while the rest of you wait for the luggage.

I could go on for hours, but let me refer you to a book that sums it up Ruinair by Paul Kilduff, he also has another book out called Ruinairski which I have not read yet, Ruinair is a good read for Ryanair regulars.

They are the airline you love to hate but sometimes they make it so easy to hate them.

Well time to board my British Airways flight back to Gatwick...