Ryanair made 4yr old sit alone

[LHGL]

We had a really stressful experience recently and I don’t know if it’s just me who finds this completely unacceptable but I just feel the need to get this out there.
Family of 5; DH, myself, DD 4 and 9, DS 7. Both DD’s get very travel sick.
Just under 3 hour flight to Italy and we check in online in advance, and I notice nobody is sitting together. I mean nobody is even on the same row - 5C, 32F,19B etc. We click ‘change seats’ but there are no options. I read up on kids sitting alone and am relieved to hear that Ryanair policy is that anyone under 12 needs to sit next to an adult.
We get to the airport and tell the Ryanair woman at baggage, she’s says not to worry and they’ll make sure we’re sitting together at the gate. Get to the gate, same story but the cabin crew will sort us out.

we board the plane and the two flight attendants tell us the flight is busy and they can’t help. DH reminds them of the policy of kids and adults sitting together, and they shrug and tell us we’re blocking the aisle. After a little more polite protestation we’re told they’ll sort us out once seated.
They don’t. We tried to swap with people ourselves but only managed to get the two youngest together, people weren’t terribly helpful and luck was against us with language and some odd folk.
The long and short of it was that the flight was a very distressing experience for all, not least the kids, and I was really taken aback by how uncaring the Ryanair attendants were. They put more effort into trying to sell us scratch cards than attempting to stop my kids being terrified of ever getting on a plane again.

I’ve had a similar experience with them. Awful company. I paid for my seats and when I got on the plane the seats didn’t even exist. I was separated from my 10 year old. I complained and complained and it took 6 months to get a poxy £40 refund for the seat or something. No apology or anything. I would never fly with them again. I’m so sorry for your experience. Please leave negative feedback with every forum going.

Or possibly you would have been removed from the plane. During your protest in the aisle what would you have said to the other passengers you were pissing off a out why you hadn't booked a seat?

They don't care.

The Ryan Air website says you must pay to reserve a seat and the child will get a free reserved seat next
to you, if you choose not to pay to reserve
your seat then that’s on you.

Then you'd be removed from the plane by security eventually.....

For medical reasons I always pre-book and PAY FOR an aisle seat with my husband next to me.

I wouldn't move from my paid for seat to accommodate a family that had not booked and paid for allocated seats.

Many people do the same, plenty of people aren't refusing to move to be mean, in many cases it's because they've paid for specific seats for a reason.

I can't believe this is real, I fly regularly with Ryanair and I'm fairly confident that they give you a free seat for kids and force an adult to pay to sit beside them- or visa versa. To ensure that people with kids seats pay for reservations.

It’s tricky isn’t it because other people will have paid to sit together so probably won’t want to move 🤷‍♀️

Ryanair are a nightmare even if you play by their rules. We flew with them last year and pre booked and paid for seats next to our four kids. When we got there they’d split us all up and put our two youngest (both under 5) in the emergency exits so obviously they had to move them before the flight took off. On that flight it seemed as though all parents had been separated from their children, it was a nightmare for the air hostesses trying to juggle everyone around when they were already on the plane. Total shambles. Just don’t fly with them.

If you hoped for random seat allocation in order to sit together, yyou've massively miscalculated.

A full flight is a full flight. If 80% of the passengers booked & paid for their seats, there isn't much the staff can do about it.
Yes, you can appeal to the kindness of strangers, but you cannot demand that they swap their seats with you.
Lesson learned, if it's to good to be true, it's probably not true at all. (Especially if it involves Ryanair!)

I booked our last holiday through a travel agent so the flight was paid for, I attempted to book seats together on check-in but couldn't, luckily I got 3 close by each other and some people offered to swap so my 3 yo wasn't on her own.

Why should you have to pay for reserved seats when legally you and your child can't sit apart? It's ridiculous that airlines get away with this.

Shame on Ryanair.

This - I am guessing other people pay for seat allocation so did not want to be split.

It's not true though is it. They say that to pressure people.

If noone moved, they won't refuse to take off, they will remove the 2 problem passengers.

Not least the admon of getting a new flight scheduled for the now delayed planeful of passengers. Plus it doesn't resolve the problem if everyone doubles down again.

When booking your flights did you have the option of selecting your seats at that point?

If you did, then in reality Ryanair didn’t make your 4 year old sit alone.

Budget airlines are budget airlines because they literally get you on board a flight.
In the 1980’s, everything that you may and may not have wanted was included in your ticket price.
Budget airlines stripped that all back.
Now if you want it you pay on top of the get your foot on the plane.

Sorry but you shouldn’t have been so tight and pre-booked your seats like the rest of us travelling with young children do.

You took the risk and didn’t get lucky this time. It’s 💯 your fault that your kids were in this situation and you need to take responsibility for your poor decision making as a parent.

But the policy says it is a free reservation as it is mandatory for children to sit with adults. So very confused- what would you pay for something that is mandatory. Ie the plane technically shouldn’t take off unless you are sitting together?

Why did you put the 2 youngest together and not an adult with the youngest?

Yabu in expecting the staff to just sort this all out for you. Why didnt you book sears together?

We pay to choose seats next to each other and I'd be angry if I was just expected to move to accommodate someone who hadn't.

You need to take some responsibility for the situation.

They couldn't move you because other people had paid to sit together. Pay to book seats. It's annoying but part of the cost and why budget airlines aren't often as budget as they first seem.

Seen that happen too. Police called and family taken off.

Happened on a different flight and like you, nobody agreed to move. The couple went up and down the plane, with the steward asking. All very embarrassing, when we knew we had paid for our seats and clearly they hadn't. People are not going to pay for their own seat and then give it up for someone who hasn't.

I have also seen two adults refuse to move out of someone else’s reserved seats. A stand off. Plane delayed and everyone around them furious. They sat it out and eventually the people whose sears they were in gave way and sat elsewhere. The stewards were pretty rubbish in sorting it out.

Exactly. I am genuinely confused by all the people saying they should have paid. The policy says they have to sit together ie not a nice to have (in which case you would need to pay) but mandatory

This is awful. Definitely look at your contracts. Christ 4 year old by herself!

I would if I was travelling without my own child. With a tiny bit of more empathy the world would be such a better place.

If you ended up getting 2 of the younger kids together, why didn't you or dh swap with one of them and sit with the youngest? The other 2 would have been fine for 3 hours as long as they knew where you where.

Also you a very unreasonable for not booking seats you wanted when everyone else does. I would have swapped with you out of pity for the young kids, not because I thought you where right.

Be sensible next time

So did your 4 year old actually spend 3 full hours sitting with complete strangers?