Ryanair

[TerryC]

My mother was supposed to be coming to Spain for her 90th birthday. She lives in the Isle of Man and is frail so I was going to fly to Liverpool to escort here to Malaga. She had two falls and two hospital stays just before the long planned trip coming out of hospital two days before the trip here. Needless to say she couldn't come. So I went to her catching the same flight to Liverpool I would have caught had she been fit to travel. The flights were with Flybe, IOM - LPL for my mother. Malaga - LPL for me with Easyjet. Lpl - Malaga for both of us and then three weeks later Malaga - Lpl for both of us with Eastjet. Then she would return to IOM from LPL with Easyjet and I'd come home on Ryanair.
Undoing the itinery was a nightmare. No refund for cancellations except in the case of a death, so we are having to claim through the travel insurance who naturally want to know the ins and outs of a duck's bum.
The insurance company want it confirmed by the airlines that the flights were not taken.
Flybe - Send an email and we'll get back to you within 28 days.
Easyjet - Send an email and we'll get back to you, no time specified.
Ryanair - Download a form, complete it then POST it to us in Ireland. We will stamp it and post it back. Then rhis morning I received an email from Ryanair. We acknowledge receipt of your letter. You need to pay your local handling agent £8.50/€10.00 administration fee. Apart from the anger at having to pay for this, who the hell is the local handling agent.
I can remember when flying was a pleasant experience, not any longer, at least not with the so called "cheap" airlines.

[pete_l]

Presumably you can add the out-of-pocket costs of obtaining "proof" on to your claim.

In the meantime, maybe this will cheer you up Ryanair fined 8m euros by French court

[Mowser]

at least not with the so called "cheap" airlines.

I'm a bit confused with the last part. If a flight is cancelled, it's the insurers who should be contacted.
I can't see this as a Ryanair problem - it's an insurance problem. Who were your insurers?

[TerryC]

Mouser

My complaint is that Ryanair want to charge me for a letter, to send to my insurance company, for a flight that I didn't take with them. A flight that originally cost £117.00 to book.

[peteroldracer]

It would be interesting to know what Ryanair would do if you had taken out their insurance?
It does seem fair to me though, as there is a cost to Ryanair that is the fault of your insurance company, so they (the insurer) should pay for it. It is not Ryanair's fault that you had to cancel, either.

[Mowser]

Mouser

My complaint is that Ryanair want to charge me for a letter, to send to my insurance company, for a flight that I didn't take with them. A flight that originally cost £117.00 to book.

Gotcha. Add the cost of this to your insurance claim.

[olive]

I am not convinced that Ryanair insurance covers you IF you live abroad. I recall ploughing through it once before.

We have a 90 year old relative coming next month. Insurance is a nightmare or impossible.

[carrowcrin]

I would suggest you contact your credit card provider used at time of booking. I think it is likely that they will send you back to the airline you booked with but they will be aware of procedures and may be of other assistance. I had a problem with car hire not yet resolved and i found the information i got from the credit card company a great insight as to how these thing works..

[Mowser]

We have a 90 year old relative coming next month. Insurance is a nightmare or impossible.

I went to insure.com and got a very good price for my mother-in-law who is also 90.
We had to pay a bit more as she has high blood pressure, but the quote was excellent.
http://www.insureforall.com/travelling-over-80.cfm was OK last year but we managed a great insurance this year withhttp://www.explorerinsurance.co.uk
Your best bet is to go to http://tinyurl.com/pd9a24p

[markwilding]

Charging for this isn't limited to Ryanair.
I seem to remember being charged for a quote to replace a camera.

[TerryC]

Here is a copy of an eMail I sent to Ryanair yesterday:-

Why is Ryanair making this so difficult. A charge for this letter to confirm that I did not take a flight was not mentioned on your website. I would have enclosed a cheque with the letter if I had been informed, not that I believe there should be a charge anyway.

Further, you say I must go to my nearest reservations centre to pay this, which means an hours drive to Malaga Airport, that is assuming there is a reservations centre there, car parking charges and then an hours drive back home, totally unnecessary expense.

I appreciate Ryanair is totally money orientated, but to make a charge for not taking a flight which cost me 115.31 pounds I believe is outrageous.

Please confirm that there is a reservations agent for Ryanair that will be open on a Sunday at about 4.00pm. You say that the reservations agent will issue the letter, why in that case was I forced to post it to Ireland?

I think this whole situation is rediculous, it makes you wonder if the airlines are in collusion with insurance companies to make life as difficult as possible so that clients in the end, give up. I appreciate insurance companies need documentary evidence when problems occour, but they must know how difficult it is to get anything out of these budget airlines.

[peteroldracer]

Stupidly, I have just realised that of course Ryanair kept the £115 without having any costs for providing travel, so have no moral right to charge for a letter - they have already been paid!
But then again, Irish Mick does not "do" morals.....

[Mowser]

I still can't see why it's a Ryanair problem. If you don't take a flight, you lose the money - unless there is a medical problem. In which case, it's up to the insurance company to sort it out. The same would happen if you flew with BA, Virgin, Air France etc.

[gus-lopez]

at least not with the so called "cheap" airlines.

I'm a bit confused with the last part. If a flight is cancelled, it's the insurers who should be contacted.
I can't see this as a Ryanair problem - it's an insurance problem. Who were your insurers?

This is why I don't have anything to do with the Irish monkey.
What person in his right mind would think that French people ,living & working in France, could possibly be able to get away with the employer paying Irish tax & social security ?
What they should have done is banned Ryanair from flying into any French airport ,or using French airspace until the fine is paid.
"The low-cost airline said it would appeal against the ruling." On what grounds ? You could understand it if the employee's were employed IN Ireland & working away from home.

[ajtg1952]

But then again, Irish Mick does not "do" morals.....

I think that you will find that Mr O'Leary does have morals, when a valid case arises! However he also likes to make money for himself and his shareholders. Nothing wrong in this!

To issue this letter there will be a cost to his business so why should he not charge for it. Everyone else does.

[Mowser]

This is why I don't have anything to do with the Irish monkey.

Oh dear.

[peteroldracer]

To issue this letter there will be a cost to his business so why should he not charge for it. Everyone else does.

He has also charged for providing a flight, with all the admin, staffing and fuel costs that this involves. Admittedly through no fault of his airline, they have not had any cost apart from a small amount of administration for this flight, but rather than ease the problems of their customer by providing a simple letter at no cost, they keep the flight charges, and also want to get a bit more.....
If they were to change their policy so that cancelled flights incurred an admin charge of whatever, reflecting that no-one has had to deal with this passenger at any airport, or on board, no fuel has been used by her and so on, with the balance returned to the booker.............?
When will they realise that this is yet another previous customer who will be unlikely to use them again, it is yet more negative publicity that may push other potential customers to Jet2, Monarch, BA et al.
Perhaps the OP might feel like constantly writing and complaining to whoever, until the sorry episode has cost Ryanair much more than they have gained?

[ajtg1952]

[quote="peteroldracer

yet more negative publicity that may push other potential customers to Jet2, Monarch, BA et al.
[/quote]


80.4M CARRIED IN YEAR TO SEPT (UP 2%)

Ryanair, Europe’s only ultra-low cost carrier (ULCC), today (2 Oct) released its passenger and load factor statistics for September 2013:
•Traffic increased by 3% to over 8m passengers.
•Load factor increased 1% to 85%.
•Annual traffic to end September grew 2% to over 80m passengers.

I don't think he will be losing too much sleep over this one!

[Campo Steve]

The original post states that the admin payment is to be made to the local handling agent, not to Ryanair!

My guess is that although Ryanair have a full passenger list planned for a flight, they may not have an up to date list of people that didn't turn up for a flight. That would be held by the handling agent at the airport i.e. The people that tear off and keep half of your boarding pass. That pile of boarding passes is the final list of who boarded. So maybe Ryanair have to check with the handling agent at the airport and it is them that are making the charge.

It isn't always Ryanair staff at the gate. Could be Servisair, Swissport or whoever they contract at the particular airport.

I'm only guessing though.

Having said that, as I have said before, when I was unable to fly because of my diagnosis and operation, I just wrote direct to Ryanair. We had no travel insurance. They were very sympathetic and gave me a full refund with no argument, despite the situation being outwith their T&C's.

My suspicion it is the insurance company or the handling agent trying to make a few bucks. I think the blame is unfairly being placed at Ryanair's door.

[TerryC]

I still can't see why it's a Ryanair problem. If you don't take a flight, you lose the money - unless there is a medical problem. In which case, it's up to the insurance company to sort it out. The same would happen if you flew with BA, Virgin, Air France etc.

I am not saying it is Ryanair's problem. I am trying to get my money back from the travel insurance company. The flight was cancelled because my mother was hospitalised. My problem with Ryanair is the difficulty and cost of getting a simple confirmation from them that I didn't take the flight.