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 have a lot of sympathy for you, yes you should have paid for a confirmed seat but you didn’t, lesson learnt. I am annoyed that they didn’t put the kids with their parents. Imagine if the random
adult passenger next to the kid was a predator?? That would have been worse imo

I even pay extra to have my adult DC near me when we fly as a family with Ryan air. I prefer it.
on a full flight where on earth did you think the crew were going to get 5 seats for you all to sit together?

We flew with EasyJet in the summer, myself, DH, DD5 and DD2.

We had originally booked flights for the week previous (and paid for allocated seating) but unfortunately youngest DD ended up very seriously ill in hospital (ICU admission) over this time due to her severe asthma.

We booked flights for a week later after she was discharged from hospital but at this stage were unable to book seats together. Turned up on the flight with 4 completely different seats, Easyjet staff were very sympathetic and helpful and managed to get us 2 seats together on separate rows once everyone else was seated by asking other passengers if they would move so each of us sat with one of the children. So for all of those posters jumping on the defence and saying “why didn’t you pay for allocated seats”, what would you have done in my situation? Does my family not deserve a long-awaited break because of my youngest’s serious health condition? As I said, we tried to book allocated seating but as it was so last-minute we were unable to.

OP I feel for you and would complain about this, absolutely appalling x

Agree, makes me angry too. I'd rather the cost be absorbed in the price of the ticket rather than this booking seats nonsense. It creates problems for people who are booking last minute and don't have the option to pay for seats together, and quite rightly someone who has paid for a seat is going to be annoyed at being asked to move.

Never in a million years would I refuse to swap seats for a family unless I was with a child myself. I just don't understand this mindset.

Hopefully quickly! Why do people persist with the 'I'll be an obnoxious, demanding twat and of course I'll get what I want, go powerful me....'

I would hope anyone who pulled a stunt like that would be thrown off the flight.

OP seems to have vanished, il get one of the flight crew to put an announcement out for her to return to her seat and explain why she felt she didn’t have to pay for pre booked seats but instead made it other people’s problem!

While I don’t like the policy the easy way to avoid this it to book seats together in the first place.
Almost Everyone else will have done so, so unfair to make them move just because you didn’t?

But the airline says it is mandatory they sit together! It wasn’t a nice to have. Why isn’t it the airline’s responsibility to have them sit together?

Why didn’t you pay for seats together when you booked like everyone else?

More fool you.

Have you read any of the thread, especially where Ryanair’s policy is explained?

The adult has to pay to reserve a seat and then the child is allocated a seat beside them for free.

This adult didn't follow the policy, if she had her four year old would have been sat beside her.

I've recently booked Ryanair flights for our holiday next year. Our kids 20, 17 and 9 are flying with us and I had to do seat allocation on booking as youngest is under 12. It cost something like £10 each for the rest of us for seat allocation.
Didn't you get this option on booking?

Someone else who has swallowed the obnoxious O'Leary's propaganda hook line and sinker. It's 100% Ryanair's fault as they have created an unsafe booking system that forces families apart....hardly progress.

I think they should 100% have moved people at thr gate, terrible to leave a 4yo alone. Also incredibly miserable of people not to swap; lots of people won't have paid for their seats. If their policy is that one adult must pay for a seat so young kids don't end up alone the system should flag that up to you when you book your tickets.

They have two separate policies from the looks of it:

1. if you're travelling with an under 12 you must reserve your own seat (and subsequently will get an option to reserve the kids seat for free) -mandatory, responsibility of the booking adult

2. kids under 12 should sit beside an adult (note, not parent and should rather than must) - preference of the CAA, so consider as a guideline

Ryanair further cover themselves with For family bookings, children (aged 2 to 11 years) receive free reserved seating so they can sit beside a parent. Again, the language here is "so they can" rather than "as they must".

I suppose you could argue the OP should have been refused boarding because she failed to reserve her seat, but overall the onus is on the passenger rather than the airline.

Sorry OP, it sucks they couldn't follow their policy, but they can't force people to swap seats, especially if other passengers have paid. They can't make others give up their paid for seat for one that's worse than the one they booked, especially. If it's a busy flight, with lots of pre booked seats, then they can't always honour what they say about children being sat next to an adult from your party. I've seen it happen, and I've seen people refuse, quite reasonably, to swap, leaving families in a difficult spot. I've got two SEN kids and there's no way I'd have left it to chance when they were younger, and I certainly wouldn't have given up a seat to someone else who didn't plan ahead and wanted to inconvenience others because they didn't want to pay a few extra quid.

I agree the whole system sucks, and it's a massive rip off, but if you choose to fly Ryanair this is what you're accepting. Pre book your seats.

I would.
I like to sit in the aisle and I wouldn’t move for anyone.
The cf families are banking on folks like you saving them money.

I am puzzled how she managed to avoid the policy. When we flew with Ryanair, the system forced the adults to pay for seats and automatically assigned the child next to them. We couldn't proceed with the booking without paying

PS Ryanair are awful. I flew with them alone as a 13yo years ago and the staff were so horrible.

Came onto say this!

This is why I will ALWAYS pay for my seat.

And why I get pissed off at the people who don't pay and then expect people who have paid to move.

This is what I do too

@Boobygravy "more fool you" why? Being forced to pay extra to have a (in my case at the time) 2 year old child sit next to me is not something which was made clear at the point of booking (in 2009) nor is it on any view humane conduct. I'm more than happy to pay a decent airline which makes its terms clear at the point of booking, and have done so ever since.