Stranded in Italy by RyanAir should we sue?!

[Plentifulpenguins]

My husband and I are in our late 40s flew to Perugia for a much-desired holiday after my terminal cancer diagnosis as a final hurrah and we were due to stay at a hotel there. We flew with RyanAir to Perugia but 15 minutes from landing they said we were diverting to Bologna for weather reasons and then changed it to Pisa. We landed in Pisa which is 4 hours from Perugia, at 9pm, and assumed Ryanair would help us get back to Perugia. They told us they’d put us all on a bus but when we cleared security there was no bus!!!!!!!!!!! Im not well enough to drive and my partner is unable to drive so we couldn’t get a car hire.We waited until midnight trying to call taxis, hotels and Ryan air and nobody would help as there were no hotels available and over 100 passengers stranded including a couple with a newborn baby!!! In the end we and several others slept on the floor outside the airport because nobody from Ryanair was around and there was nowhere in the airport or neighbouring places to stay!!!!. At about 4am we managed to get a taxi and paid 675 euros to go to Perugia, and have almost arrived. I can’t even get hold of Ryanair and was just told via an automated email to put a claim through their online system. AIBU to bring legal case against Ryan air because they couldn’t even provide any alternatives and just left us stranded?? Does anyone even know how to do this or whether I’m wasting my time?

Good luck with it, OP - but you didn't mention whether you have insurance?

Yes, we do have travel insurance, thankfully. I would’ve taken the train had it not been 3am & not direct train

Trains start about 4am usually in these places. I remember from when I was in Pisa and honestly, one change for the sake of like £600 pounds is usually pretty goo compromise.

That's what Ryanair will argue on top of actually providing buses as pps said

The Ryanair bus arrived at 11pm OP. You needed to stay in the terminal as they usually walk you to where the buses are. The newborn baby would've been prioritised had they been in the right place. Unfortunately that place is rarely obvious

Keep all receipts and put a claim in

it’s not always the weather in your immediate region though

True, indeed but in our case flights with other airlines from same departures airport were arriving on time. Our screenshots helped our particular case.
Anyway, my point really is that it’s worth pursuing your claim even when Ryanair weren’t taking responsibility. In this case, they may say that buses were provided for passengers etc.There were emails flying back and forth with Ryanair in our particular case, getting us nowhere, so it can be worth it going through the Ombudsman’s office.
Op, hopefully the rest of the holiday will go to plan, 💐

same happened to us. Ra told us via video and message to put in a claim after we had been waiting for three hours for a non existent bus. Paid for the taxi. Got the receipt. Now being told that we should have waited for the bus! We’ve sent them the video and text message but they’re refusing to pay.

Not true. Extraordinary circumstances can be used to get out of paying extra compensation but they still have to provide food, lodging and/or onward transport. If it can't be resolved directly with the airline there are agencies who specialize in claims against airlines- two that I know of are called flight flightright and euclaim. They'll take a percentage off the compensation though.

Make a claim online make sure you have the taxi reciepts etc

This is what I'd expect too.

On a similar scale, a few years ago I was stranded at Gatwick airport during the Christmas Eve storms (booked flights via EasyJet). We had to wait all day and almost until after midnight for updates and then EasyJet finally cancelled all flights. If we'd been with BA we'd have had a chance as they were trying to get those in the air.

We had travel insurance which covered our hotel but not flights. Trying to get compensation from EasyJet for flights (and I worked for a lawyer at the time) was like trying to get blood out of a stone, basically I think it was 'act of God' (storm) so we got nothing back, I think the cost of flights but no other compensation plus costs of all our food and drink bought whilst in airport.

Ryan Air will try to wriggle their way out of this but you have travel insurance.

I had a fight with Tui about last minute cancelled holiday . If we had cancelled we would have had to pay them a lot of money but they just basically said tough luck and did not offer us suitable alternative or compensation . I studied the relevant law about compensation and them basically taking advantage of their size as a company against me one person . Took them to small claims court and got compensation on top of my refund . It was the principle of how their terrible customer service treated me . Hope your holiday works out ok and hopefully they will come up trumps and take your particular circumstances into account . 🤞

Well in my case which I've listed Gatwick airport and EasyJet wriggled out of paying us compensation. We had to make our own way home via trains at gone midnight or after and they didn't pay for that.

Lost out on our Christmas short break to Barcelona too.

Ryan Air's lawyers and legal team will argue until they're blue in the face to avoid paying compensation.

"Ryan Air's lawyers and legal team will argue until they're blue in the face to avoid paying compensation."

Won't be hard for them since they provided a coach transfer 2 hours after the flight landed.

Was this in October 2019? This happened to us going to Krakow too! They left us in the airport for hours. I think the flight arrived at 11pm and we only got the coach at 6am to the correct airport. Children were sleeping on the floor etc.

So they did put on buses, in fairly reasonable time. How come some people missed them? Was there only one bus?

I'm interested in some of the above comments..

Can I ask do many people here really seriously expect that in the event of a diversion there will automatically and immediately be buses waiting outside the arrival hall to take them on to their planned destination with pretty much zero delay?

The reality is if you divert somewhere and it turns out the crew/ground staff aren't simply going to be able to refuel and have another go at getting into the planned destination (as seems to have happened last night) it takes quite a while to get the logistics in place to transport passengers onwards/to hotels.

That’s not what I’m talking about- no 2 aircraft will have had the exact same schedule as each other and theres several different flights before yours. They might be arriving from the same destination but prior to that they will have had completely different schedules and been to different places and incurred different delays which could be weather.

glad you got it back though, that’s great!

I would go to Ryanair first before travel insurance.

Well done @Unsure33 . It's a shame that people have to actually take companies to court to enforce basic consumer rights. The OFT used to do so much before it was broken up.

Was this in October 2019? This happened to us going to Krakow too! They left us in the airport for hours. I think the flight arrived at 11pm and we only got the coach at 6am to the correct airport. Children were sleeping on the floor etc.

sausageandbeanx , Yes! I’ll never forget it. It didn’t matter about the money in the end , it was to get Ryanair to pay up for the appalling treatment of passengers!!!

I know that Limoges airport will be closed from the end of October for 2 months.
Ryan air are currently selling flights from Limoges during the closure.

I would. Ryanair will keep pushing you off and lying, but persistence is the key.

I agree with this. Although it must be frustrating to wait about for the coach, it’s sometimes just the way it is. They can’t simply click their fingers and provide transport for 150 passengers in the middle of the night. I completely understand how frustrating it is though, and I would be gutted if that was the beginning for my holiday, but it’s a logistical nightmare and there’s not much they can do to speed it up.

Ryanair have had to be taken to court over various things to take action to make them do what they were supposed to be alreday doing legally. Charging disabled passengers for assistance was one thing I will never forget.

Well advertising the flights to book.