Ryanair

We had the worst experience with Ryanair last month. To begin with, they do not have airport check-in and boarding pass printing. Their system is based on the customer bringing his/her boarding pass ahead of time. We did not realise this, and they send us to pay 50 Euros for each ticket (for a family of 5 it was 250 Euros). Payments are done in a different "office", so I had to go there and stand for 20 min in a very unorganized line. When I came back to check-in the agent was very upset that we didn't pay for our suitcases, almost yelling at us. Guess what? we didn't know about this as well. So now she sent me again for the same "office" to pay another 200 Euros. Now, however there is only one line instead of two, so it takes another 30 minutes to pay the fee. Overall, their service is the worst that I've experienced. They make you feel as if they are doing you a favor for allowing you to fly their planes. I encourage anyone who wants to fly at a low cost not to fly with Ryanair. Overall it comes out to a very expensive experience.

Ryanair uses the motto Low Fares Airline as a trap, to be honest. We bought our tickets for a short domestic flight for a good price. However the ridiculous add-on charges (55x4 euros per check-in at the airport fee + 67euros for a 22 kg luggage) made it cost much much more. I understand the luggage fee. However 220 euros airport check-in fee is twice the price of our total ticket cost! Finding this cost info on their website is almost impossible (it is literally hidden on the website - you have to search for that particular thing really). Their "don't forget to check-in online" e-mails can easily be ignored because they don't mention any airport check-in fee. It looks like a choice, not a must-do. At least three more couple of people paid that meaningless fee. Because they were not aware of it. If this airlines were for budget travelers and really cared about customer service, they would warn travelers about those ridiculous add-on fees. A fee should offer a service, so its value should be reasonable compared with the service it gives. So we paid 220 euros for a single check-in (not four - because normal airlines do a single check-in per reservation) done by a sour-faced check-in officer who scolded us like we were little kindergarden children. This is not an acceptable service. Like another couple said on that day, "Never again"!

We were charged 180 Euros (for a family of 4) because we were unable to complete the online checkin (website kept timing out when we tried from an internet cafe despite no other problems doing any other internet related jobs there). When I got to the airport and explained this, the lady at the desk that handles Ryanair at Lisbon said that it happened a lot and that Ryanair would refund us if we made a complaint on our return. We waited over an hour to check in, as only one guy was managing two flights, the flight sat for more than half an hour on the runway at Stansted and was possibly the most uncomfortable flight I have ever taken. Not only have Ryanair not refunded us, they haven't even replied fully to my concerns. Each time I write in, I get the same standardised response about terms and conditions. I wonder whether this is strategic so they can dupe people into running up fees with their tricky online checkin service. Never again.

We arrived at EMA exactly 2 hours before check in which was great. There was already a large queue at check in but we accepted the inevitable and joined it with about 100 other passengers in front. I was shocked to see only one counter open and 2 staff. I thought ok, must be fairly fast, but no - after having moved about 4 feet in half an hour I began to worry. I noticed the Ryanair desk across the hall so went over to ask when they were opening the other 2 check in desks, they said they didn't intend to. I explained we were worried about missing the flight and were told, once you are checked in the flight will wait for you? Anyway about 1hour 30 mins later we finally got our bags checked in then we ran to the next stage, bear in mind we had 3 OAP's and an 8 year old to deal with so running isn't exactly an option. We were told to empty all contents into the little boxes and go through security. After 40 minutes we got through security only to realise they were calling last boarding call for our flight. Our flight was at the end of the terminal, (when aren't they) so we had to leg it as fast as we could, now again, 3 OAP's me on crutches and an 8 year old trying to run through EMA to catch a flight that we had queued up for ages to get. Given that we did finally manage to get on board, I would not recommend either EMA airport or Ryanair for future travel. I would rather pay an additional charge to fly from another airport with another company. If there was an option for 0/10 I would give it zero.

Ryanair is the worst airline I have ever flown. We payed 344 Euros for short 40 min. return trip fight. When we got to the to the airport we had to pay 45 more Euros each just to have a boarding pass printed. We were traveling around Germany and Spain and didn't have access to computer printer, unaware of their policy. I've traveled the world and never heard of anything like that. They herd them in like cattle. There is basically no service and you pay extra for everything. Flight was late which almost caused us to miss connecting flight. Absolutely no one is available to help or answer questions.

Ryanair flight from Zadar Croatia to Dublin was probaly one of the most uncomfortable flights I have been on. There is no pocket to store your items such as your phone etc, this is the stupidest thing I have ever seen on a commercial aircraft, the seats are filthy - there was chewing gum stuck to the seats in front of us and certain parts of the chairs in front of us had a lot of dirt on them. Window seats are really uncomfortable I could not sleep because I had nowhere to rest my head as the seats are flat and comparable to rocks. This is the only airline that flys from Zadar to Dublin so we had no other choice and I understand it is a low cost airline - however, other low cost airlines at least clean their seats and provide a pocket for your stuff. We plan to never fly with them again as we are taking a flight from Belfast with easyJet to Split which is closer to our location in which we stay in.

I should have been on this flight but 15 days before flying it was cancelled together with the return flight from Italy. Apparently they can do this and there is nothing you can do about it. They claim it was done for operational reasons. I was unable to contact them and had no choice but spend double my original fare in order to book flights with another airline. However, the flight still left on the day it was supposed to. Of course my seats had been resold at twice the price I paid (they were advertising them the day after they cancelled my flight). Despite 3 emails complaining to Ryanair they have given me no explanation for telling me my flight was cancelled when it wasn't.

The Ryanair staff are friendly, but this is the only positive thing I can tell about. Less space between the seats, the food is bad and too expensive. Even drinks (with or without) alcohol are not to enjoy. They try to sell the food and drinks all the flight. Before flying back to Germany, we waited for about an hour for just checking in the luggage. Staff problems was the reason, just 1 person had to serve 3 counters.

The Ryanair fleet seems to be ageing badly. Over my 12 flights in total, the delays were under 50 minutes, so really not bad, never had a technical fault or other incident. However, the quality this time around on our Arrecife flight was lower than it was 2 years ago, the age of the plane was 3 years, however the interior cabin looked shabby. The flight was again without incident, but the standards of aircraft interior are now much lower than say the easyJet flight I took 2 weeks prior. All in all you get what you pay for, although saying that, I didnt get a cheap flight here - paying for Priority (my choice I know, but with 4 Children!) put the price up, perhaps families could get first dibs at seats?

For some ridiculous reason, using Ryanair online check-in which is mandatory, you need to re-enter all passport info again into the same system that already stored it when tickets were purchased. I again entered all info for our family of 8 and the website timed me out. I tried again, saving the info as I went along but their system does not allow saves. Again, timed out with an ‘error’ page. At check in we explained to a Ryanair agent what happened. She rudely told us this was not their problem and we had to pay extra. We were sent to pay for one bag and a check-in fee, amounting to $630Cdn, more than the price of 8 flights! We were told if we prove an ‘error’ page on the computer they would refund. We showed them the error page. They wouldn’t accept it there and forced us to pay up front then call customer service for a refund. We did, and received a stock email and refused us a refund. Everyone we dealt with had a superior couldn’t care less attitude. They lied about a refund being possible. As a business owner, this kind of service appalls me. This whole episode left a bad taste in our mouth and coloured our first trip to Ireland. We will never fly Ryanair again.