Patrick Collinson also recently went through a painful 26-hour odyssey while trying to transit from Porto to Dublin on a Ryanair flight. His one-way fare for February, with priority boarding, cost him €228. Unfortunately, what he actually experienced was a total nightmare of travel confusion, miscommunication and lack of care.
Collinson’s ordeal began when he saw that his boarding pass had a “00” seat on it. This rare designation was a clear indicator that all was not right. Minutes before the scheduled departure at 19:10, he learned that there were no available seats on the flight. A Ryanair spokesperson subsequently informed him that the flight was “minus four.” That still meant he had a shot at climbing aboard. That glimmer of hope was short-lived for Collinson and the other passengers, however. Armed police surrounded them and forced them out of the boarding area.
The path first led Collinson to a surprising place. Despite these guarantees of accommodation, he was sent on a circuitous route through two other countries. More than 25,000 complaints later, the lack of clarity made life worse. Travelers were given different and often wrong information about their rights and flight status. Collinson was not given any food or beverage vouchers. This was against EU rules, which specify unequivocally that passengers must be provided meals and refreshments appropriate to the waiting time.
Throughout the ordeal, Collinson attempted to assert his rights, referencing the Irish government website that outlines compensation rules for delayed flights. He was owed €250 in compensation under the EU261 regulation, which protects passengers’ rights in situations of overbooking and delayed flights.
In response, Ryanair subsequently released a revised statement. Their counterexplanation was that the delay stemmed from some minor technical difficulty with the original aircraft, requiring a swap from an 8200 model with 197 seats to an 800 model that’s got 189 seats in it. As a result of this last minute change, several passengers—including Collinson—were rebooked to the next flight leaving for Dublin. Alice’s introduction to the movement came when that flight departed the next day from Stansted.
“Due to minor technical issues with the original aircraft, we were forced to make an aircraft change from an 8200 (197 seats) to an 800 (189 seats). As a result, a very small number of passengers on this flight from Porto to Dublin (12 August) were moved to the next available flight to Dublin (via Stansted) departing the following day.” – Ryanair
The whole process left Collinson feeling overlooked and angry. The resulting hotel stay—alone, and in a new, smoky and noisy environment—was hardly restful. This topsy-turvy environment made it impossible for him to get any rest in advance of his new, rebooked flight. In addition to the discomfort, he navigated a barrage of contradictory messages from Ryanair representatives about his rights and options moving forward.
As Ryanair CEO Michael O’Leary famously stated, “Ryanair’s booking system is 100% of people who said they’d never fly Ryanair again. This announcement is a further blow to the troubled airline. This feeling was consistent throughout Collinson’s experience as he raised a concern about leaders of the delay.