To wonder why anyone would fly with Ryan Air?!

[candyandyoga]

Nasty, wanky airline! So many reasons why! Aibu?!

Ryan Air is not a pleasant experience. They never have enough space for your hand luggage and it is a real scrum trying to get a seat with your companions. However, I always make sure that I do not pay a penny more than I have to. I take hand luggage only and I bring all my food and drink onto the plane. I hate the b***ds but for me it is like a battle of wills and I have always won, so far.

Ryanair are one of the only airlines that fly from my local airport.

I've flown with them twice - once to Edinburgh and once to Lanzarote. The second flight was nearly 4 hours but i had no complaints, it was no different to any other flight i've been on.

Agree with the previous poster who said you have to think of it as a bus service.

I fly with them regularly (a few times a month), and it's fine, but it's not the same as (say) Lufthansa or BA.

The last flight I was on was from Dublin on a Friday and full of stags and hens. Cue a long explanation from the stewardesses about how we couldn't consume our own food and DRINK, or it would be confiscated.

To be fair, though, VB, the bus analogy only goes so far. I've never boarded a bus that changed its route so significantly after I'd boarded that I ended up in a different country.

Ryanair are wankers, but we have had to use them at times as they are the only ones that fly to our airport. They've always been shocking, but I could put up with it pre-dcs, now, shudder....if we can avoid using them we will drive further to Gatwick, even though we are closer to Stansted, and use Easyjet, which also adds an extra hour's drive on our arrival, but anything to avoid Ryanair if poss.

They are't always cheap unless you can book way in advance. The person sitting next to you might have paid hundreds more than you.

Yes, we've noticed that over the last two years begonia. At Christmas it was cheaper to fly with BA to Rome than Ryanair.

YABU. They are cheap. They fly to Denmark for less than £300. Even adding in all the extras it's cheaper than BA or SAS. The staff are always polite. It's not their fault that people dont read the t&cs. If you dont like it then dont fly or pay more.

No choice. Ryanair are the only airline to fly from our nearest airport in UK to our nearest airport in France.

I don't. Had a bad experience with them, can't bear the sound of Michael O'Leary and so I choose not to fly with them.
HMPH!

My DSis lives in Italy and I can fly to hers for the weekend for about £75 with Ryanair, when I book a week or so in advance. A non-cheapo airline costs about £300 - the flight experience is ten times better but I just can't justify it to myself.

Love them.

I don't find they are cheap - not cheaper than Easyjet, or monarch. Once you've added in the taxes, various debit/credit card fees, etc, they are the same price or pricier than EZ or MON.

And they fly to the city they say they're going to , not somehwere in the vicinity.

They can be very expensive. We are flying to a Greek island later this summer and have paid well over a grand for 3 tickets. I hate myself for doing this (and I suspect I will hate myself even more after the journey) but they were still the cheapest option (with at least 4 airlines flying from the UK collusion comes to mind).

We flew to Majorca last year and it was a great experience, I would not hesitate to use them again. On all the literature it was made clear that boarding passes needed to be printed out and I think I received an e-mail remainder. We all sat together on the plane and the check in at both ends was excellent.

we did. 4 adults spending a week together. Not arsed about getting seats together as only a 2.5 hr flight. Was fine, bit fed up of the animalistic nature of people running to get seats etc. We also had 1 luggage case in the hold between us and most of our stuff in hand luggage. Would never fly with them with DS though.

Best bit is all the shit they try and sell you it's hilarious. Even the boarding card is full of adverts. Scratch cards, food (which me may have bought) electronic cigs, everything! Tried to flog us 'reserved oxygen' for £100 a heard too...

Nooooooooooo. I put a thread about this in chat yesterday and you all assured me I would be fine.

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/_chat/1783555-Have-I-made-a-mistake-Re-flying-Ryanair

We flew with them recently - 2 DC on one of their longer routes. It was fine -- we all learned how to travel with hand luggage only (can hand wash clothes if necessary but we didn't need to), we printed boarding passes, I don't mind where I sit and anyway they will help you get a seat next to a young child (at least they helped people with this on our flights). Flights were on time and fine and made a vacation for 4 much more affordable, and gave us access to MUCH NEEDED vitamin D ie sunlight...

Here are the ,littler perks that you don't get, and I'm curious about whether, when you fly another airline, these perks really cost the difference in price. Does anyone know?

• seats don't recline (uncomfortable on a 4.5hr flight, OK probably otherwise)
• no fabric seat pockets, no laminated safety card
• no in-flight entertainment/media etc (though KLM and the likes don't do these on short flights either I guess)
• people always going through selling stuff so less peace and quiet
• no seat reservation (how can these actually cost airlines any money? anyone know? so why wouldn't ryanair offer them?)
• obviously the hand luggage only -- I imagine that this actually does save them money because baggage can be expensive, fuel-wise
• boarding pass printing issue - this is presumably a cash cow for them only
• and obviously no free beverage service - presumably this does actually cost airlines in cabin crew numbers to provide? which in turn adds to costs.
• not a nearby/nice gate with ramp rather than walking on to tarmac
• yellow colour is indeed stressful and unattractive

Of all of these, the seat reservations and boarding pass things bug me because I doubt that offering them would actually cost much money, or certainly wouldn't cost anything like the fees they charge... Presumably they save money not having upholstered reclining seats etc etc.

I think there is a class-based or wealth-based or whatever snobbery about this, though - lots of people say, oh, I'd never fly Ryanair, it's ... um ... tainted with cheapness? Like "I'd never set foot in [aldi, iceland,whatever shop you think is cheap]" or the uniquely British phrase: reassuringly expensive. After all, none of us have really (except the one poster's DH maybe) done a thorough comparison of labour conditions, safety records (i don't think they have ever had a crash) etc etc.

I'm another one who doesn't really have a choice as my inlaws are in Italy and they are the only airline who fly to that destination unless I spend an extra 1.5 hours in the car to get to Heathrow.

I can put up with the no frills, even the seating policy (even Easyjet have gone back to assigned seating so either it doesn't save them any money or that's how they are differentiating themselves). It's the utter disdain with which they regard their customers that gets to me. They are so unpleasant and unhelpful.

Plus, I find the whole scrum to get on the plane and queuing at the gate 3 hours beforehand very stressful now I have children. And DH refuses, on principle, to give them any more money on Speedy Boarding.

Flying with them in 4 weeks to Italy and I can honestly say that it spoils my enjoyment of looking forward to my holiday.

Yeah, I forgot about the queuing! Definitely a huge cost. But we didn't actually do it. We did get to the gate around the time (just before) it said 'gate closes at...' on the boarding passes. Only to stand around for 20 minutes or whatever with the gate most definitely not closed. But we let the DC wander a little and watch planes outside, we bought a coffee, we sat on the trunki things ...

I guess I think flying (economy, not that I typically fly anything else!) is going to be inconvenient, uncomfortable and will feature way too much waiting around, no matter who you fly with! Personally, saving 800-1200£ on the 4 tickets, total, by giving up on reclining seats and suffering a yellow colour (while being uncomfortable and entertaining 2 children, which I would do on BA or KLM or whoever) is totally worth it to me. If I had compelling data re labour conditions (not just that they are bad but that they are substantially worse than industry standards) or safety conditions .. that'd be different. But for me, the snob factor, seat colour and recline etc might get 10-15% more out of me, but not 300%.

No choice - I hate Ryanair and Michael O'Leary is an arse, but we keep on flying with them because they fly from our local airport .... Other airports are at least 2 hours away and DD gets carsick if she's in the car for more than 20 minutes. I'd rather endure a couple of hours on a Ryanair flight than put DD through multiple vomiting episodes on the way to and from our holiday!

I flew with them recently. Once you know what to expect they aren't so bad. You need to be stringent with your luggage and hand luggage weight. You need to put your handbag in your hand luggage which gets shoved overhead so best keep purse etc on your person.

I would suggest queuing for a seat as soon as the gate is called.

I would use them again as it cost £85 return to Spain .

Because... You might end up sitting next to Robbie Williams of ex Take That fame (this was 1997 mind...)