to think BARGAIN FLIGHTS are a complete rip off?

[forevercleaning]

Flights booked to France with Ryanair.

5 people £29.99 each way

therefore £59.98 return per person

or £299.90 total per family

turns into £671.80 !!!!

I realize there are going to be add ons but FFS is this taking the pee pee?

Then we move on to the car hire

1 week £163.51 becomes £237.12

Why can they not just say how much it will be and cut out all the bullshit inbetween?

YABU - flights are way too cheap - they need to be less affordable, as precious resources (oil!) are being squandered when we should be conserving. If you think this is expensive - get used to it - you ain't seen nuthin yet!

It is unreasonable that they don't just tell you the whole cost from the start, nstead of enticing you with one price and then adding on lots of others costs. I agree with you there.

that's Ryanair, I'm afraid, and I used to be a fan!

Yep, I can get flights from my local airport back to Scotland. Great saves all that traveling (8hrs by car).

But no, oh no. I even found flights for free but the total for 4 return came to over £600 with the add ons

mrsguy, I understand what you are saying but was asking if i was being unreasonable for them to more than double the price, instead of stating exactly what you have to pay in the first place.

It's not about the cost, its the bullshit you get.

you have to really shop around and be careful

we have booked with monarch, yes the flights could have been cheaper, but i have chosen to pay extra for allocated child friendly seats and for extra luggage... also, they try to add on their own insurance, so watch out for that

despite that, still cheaper than easyjet and we are going in school hols

i wonder if the big charter companies like BA quote the proper prices, or if they are the same as these so called 'low cost' airlines.

YABU, you have a choice when booking not to take up all the add ons.They put them on to the booking and it is up to you to read the small print and remove them if you want to.
I use budget airlines a lot because i fly a lot for work. I always know what the cost is because i always check for add ons and remove accordingly.

Do you book with Flybe from Norwich to Edinburgh, newforold?

newforold - a bit difficult to fly 5 people on holiday without luggage! £32 each way for just 2 bags

You also cannot do an online check-in when you need to check the luggage in (well i couldnt anyway)£40

The immediate add ons for taxes, fees and charges were £227.90 are not an option to exclude, so why not just tell me that in the first place, it just seems to make more sense to me.

FGS, no-one is forcing you to book these flights. I like the budget airlines because it's the only way five of us can afford to fly.

Chippy have you tried driving for 8/9hrs to Scotland with a four year old?

My parents are elderly, I am an only child, the quickest and best way to get to them is by flying.

of course nobody is forcing us to book these flights. If you read the thread, i have said it would be better to be clear from the start how much the flight is. then you dont waste time going through pages of bookings.

ie not £29.99 flight but include the taxes,fees and charges so that folk can see clearly that it is ££52.78 and then you can add on luggage, priority boarding, insurance and any extras.

I am not whinging about the cost of the flight. I still see that for just under 700 quid a family of five can fly to france and back, and that is not my issue.

My issue is, as I have said, why not just give the full basic cost in the first place!!!

But surely most people realise by now that the headline figures are nonsense? And compare prices across the budget and traditional carriers before booking?

You only pay for the services you use. We somehow manage to fly with 3 DC, hand luggage only (with the DC loaded up like mules, and wearing most of our clothes, I will admit ), no priority boarding (which is a waste of money anyway), no online check in.

Admittedly chippy, i did not compare costs, i was in such a hurry to tie in the actual holiday with the flights available for the same dates that i rushed the booking but as each page of the booking progressed, it got dearer and dearer lol!

Last year i just whizzed into ryanair web and got us all down to the south of france in May for £235 total.

Suppose august is different though.

Lessons to be learned for next time!

I am totally with you on this one. Ignoring the fuel crisis/envirnomental issues/flight costs versus the earth etc, just on basic irritating internet shopping techniques, this bugs the hell out of me too

Makes me really mad because my PIL see the prices on the internet and say stuff like "why are you not coming over more often, it is only about £25 per person at the moment..." - yes until you look at flying direct routes, in the day, calculate all the rest and suddenly it is nearly 1k instead!

When I buy a tin of beans it is not advertised 12p on the shelf and then at the till add on VAT, bean tax, shopping insurance, car parking fee, trolley hire and bag, queuing premium taxes, blarh die blarh cost etc etc. so why oh why do internet flight shops feel the need to slowly add on each teeny little bit extra bit by bit ???

Ryanair are the kings of piss-taking. Their baggage allowance is only 15 kilos & excess weight is £12.50 per kilo. They are total bastards.

The others - even easyjet - are not nearly as bad (although they do also deceive a bit) - they were supposed to be stopped from doing this though?

oh thank you Bagel and WW. Glad you agree.

In fact, I was just thinking the same about going to the shops and finding I was being charged 'just for the packaging' but then had to buy all the ingredients!!

It shouldnt be allowed.

Fimbo what about the train, sleeper still runs i think...i do it by train alot but have car when there..
am scared of flying and but hate all this add on shit in any services tis bollocks

this is a useful link

Actually I just checked my emails and there was a message from a trad.carrier which DH is using this weekend, advising him to pre-book a checked bag (which he won't of course) so I guess everyone is getting in on the 'extras' act.

My DDs have flown to Pisa with Ryanair today - we booked it in January, the flights cost £7.96, but the total was £108.34.

(Obv £108 for 2 roundtrip flights is a perfectly reasonably all-in fare, but the "extras" are outrageous)

thanks for that chippy, have saved it to faves, and will study long and hard, so I wont get shafted next time!!

"Why can they not just say how much it will be and cut out all the bullshit inbetween? "

because apart from tax and the booking charge, most of these add ons are avoidable for travellers who wish to avoid them.
preferrential seeting/on-line booking/luggage cuts out a lot. i do not wish to avail of any of the services which cost additional money such as baggage so i am eternally grateful to ryanair for allowing me to avoid them and charging the passengers who do use them.

For a family of 4 going on holiday on a Ryanair flight, your "avoidable" add-ons - ie taking baggage, checking-in and paying with a credit card, but excluding priority boarding, add up to £50; and if each of them had the misfortune to go over the 15kg allowance by 1 kilo, that would be another £50. That is taking the piss.

(easyjet allow 20kg, and no weight limit on their cabin baggage allowance. I really really hope people start rearing up at Ryanair's greed and they go bust.)