Paid for seats on ryan air and kids still sat separately

All airlines have been known to make last-minute seat changes at the gate. Anyone who has never experienced this just hasn’t flown enough.

Ryanair makes a virtue out of treating passengers like a herd of cattle, so to be so rude about a last minute change which completely ignored the fact the OP paid extra to avoid the extra stress they inflicted on her is par for the course - all they care about is cramming everyone in as quickly as possible in order to achieve ridiculously tight turnarounds. The OP would have done better to do as told and get on the flight as quickly as possible, so as to maximise the time available to insist on people moving seats once she was on board, rather than trying to argue with ground staff who had no power to change the situation and then getting on the flight after everyone else was comfortable where they were already sitting.

I would only ever fly Ryanair if desperate, or without small children or anyone else vulnerable. I would certainly ask for compensation, however, as they breached a term of the contract, and I would leave as many negative reviews as possible in as many places as possible.

Yes exactly she paid for a service she did not receive and should get her money paid.

she paid to book seats and then was split up so asking for a refund of what I assume was a triple figure amount is fine

I had similar experience with BA. Paid for seats and then when we checked our luggage the boarding passes had random seats on them. Turns out we were put on stand by due to overbooking and then last minute we were allocated random seats. I raised it and they said try to change the seats at the gate. I raised hell at the gate until they sat us in pairs of 2s (one adult one child). My kids were 2.5 and 4 at the time. Can you imagine a 2yo sitting by themselves? I didn’t chase the refund of the seat although I should have. I was glad we got to fly and got things sorted in the end.

You choose your own seats online, so how did this happen?

I don't think this is just Ryan air.

I had similar with British airways - paid for specific seats in advance. At check in 'oh sorry its a different aeroplane with different layout so all the seat reservations no long apply'.

I was v. annoyed and they also refused to refund the fee 'terms and conditions' apparently make it clear this is a risk. I did complain but didn't get anywhere. I was pretty disgusted and try to avoid flying BA if I can but unfortunately on a lot of routes out of the UK if you want a non-budget airline they are they only option.

Years ago BA used to be a great airline with great customer service. Now IMO its almost as bad as the budget airlines.

What a total scam - getting people to pay for specific seats and not honouring it.

how is that even possible? if you paid for seats you select them at booking and then you see it again at check in so would have known in advance if there was an issue to get it fixed.

I have only flown Ryanair once with DH and many years ago. Now I am an older lady and travel with friends of similar age, I tend/try to book with legacy airlines. Hold luggage allowance, seat selection, check in, and normally scheduled with no extra charges. Advantages: No lifting bags into overhead lockers, legs not injured with other peoples' carry ons, a hot drink and snack, lovely helpful cabin crew, rarely is the flight altered or delayed. Also with everything considered not much more expensive for us oldies. It probably would be a different matter with families, but worth looking at online.

Another day, another Mumsnet thread full of irrelevance. She paid to have her family sitting together and they were separated with absolutely no explanation. It doesn't matter if you personally don't give a fuck where your 10 year old sits.

You can get a refund when you paid extra for particular seats, but didn't get them. It is NOT because she didn't like the seats. Obviously.

You get refunds / compensation when you're not allowed onto the flight because it is over booked, NOT when you didn't like the seat you were in.

This is weird. Were you very late getting to the gate? It doesn't sound like you were treated right and should definitely get a refund. But given your kids are 10 and older, not a disaster.

not the same situation but I actually got a refund from Ryanair almost immediately after asking when my extra leg room seat was already taken due to a different plane seating layout, so it's really worth asking

So is only one child is under 12? When you said one is ten. If so then it’s only the one child that should have been beside someone and it sounds like they were if they were beside their siblings or have I got this completely wrong? Happens all the time on short haul carriers, just one of those things and there can be lots of reasons why things change last minute, special assistance needs, aircraft change etc.

I would have thought as a bare minimum you should be refunded the extra amount you paid for your seats, because you paid for a service you did not receive.

Have you complained to Ryanair and asked for compensation?

If you paid on a credit card, they would be able to help you because you’ve paid for something that you haven’t received.

I believe you OP because this happened on a recent flight we were on. The elderly wheelchair bound lady and her young carer/companion in front of me were told at the gate that a different plane had been sent from the one they were booked on and their seats didn’t exist.

The staff did their best but couldn’t find two seats together, and this poor lady was quite concerned about how she’d manage. Fortunately two passengers travelling together were a no show and they moved her and her companion to those.

Another couple who had paid to sit together weren’t so lucky, they were told their seats also weren’t available and they would be in randomly allocated seats seated apart. The gate staff said there was nothing they could do and to take it up with Ryanair.

Of course you should complain, although I haven’t found Ryanair’s customer service very helpful in the past. You might get a useless voucher out of it.

My son (18 at the time ) & 3 friends were 20 hours late home from a trip to Latvia using Ryanair. Never received the legal compensation, Ryanair gave them the run around for months till they gave up in the end. Bet they do that a lot! Hope OP gets her refund!

Why are some people so intensely committed to giving OPs a kicking no matter what?

This is pretty standard on MNs, I guess it's how some feel better about their sad existence

Why are some people so intensely committed to giving OPs a kicking no matter what? ‘It didn’t happen, and if it did happen it was probably your fault. Oh, it wasn’t your fault? Well, no need to be so dramatic’

Flying is shit & airlines treat you like shit, particularly Ryanair.

I hope there's never an emergency then

He seems conspicuous by his absence of input into any of what happened.

Everyone seems to think differently though 🤷‍♀️ Just seems bizarre that the parent who was closer was so passive.

Depending on the age of the children I don’t think this is legal. Minors must be sat beside an adult even if whole group isn’t together

What a bunch of assholes.

I wouldn't have been happy with this. And probably would have refused to board. But obviously they lied to you to get you to board.

You definitely need compensation at least for the costs of reserving the seats.

If you were last I wonder if they had moved to the standby list but wierd if there were other seats available!