[FDOS_UK]

[quote quote=811090]“On what authority do you intervene? You are a passenger, not a crew member – this type of action can create conflict and is just as bad as the people who talk, IMO.”
I think that’s rather highhanded of you, I don’t think anyone needs third party ‘authority’ to ask people not to behave in a manner which might put others in danger. I don’t get up and yell at them, but if they are near enough to prevent me from hearing the announcement, I ask them to be quiet so that I can hear the safety briefing, even if I know them off by heart, others don’t. I’m sorry if you have an opposing view on that.

“If the crew are on the ball, all talking should be stopped and Ryanair are on the ball.”
Yes, but most other airlines aren’t, although it does seem to vary with the crew. I was on an EZY flight the other day and the cabin manager gave two women a full on bollocking over the PA – without being rude or aggressive, but put them in their place, and then went and had a word with them afterwards.

[/quote]
Not meaning to be high handed, it’s just that firstly asking people to stop talking does add to the interruption and I’ve also seen it result in ongoing conflict afterwards.

If you wish to make your point that the crew weren’t active enough, you could call the crew over and say that you couldn’t hear the briefing because of people overtalking – they then have to give you a personal briefing (which is very fast and won’t delay the flight, but makes the point).

I’ve only done it twice, both times when deadheading uniformed airline personnel were talking loudly over the briefing and I thought that some pushback was justified.

[Charles-P]

Found today on the internet

Posted by DJ Lockley to Facebook, what follows is a work of pure genius….Enjoy!

By: David Precious

Dear Sir/Madam,

I am writing for the attention of your customer experience team. I am definitely a customer, and believe me, you didn’t fail providing us with an experience.

My wife and I had booked to fly from Stansted on the Thursday 17th April, evening flight to Bratislava. After 2 hours of fun, fun, fun, stuck on the M25 doing 20 mph, we arrived at Stansted check in with just one hour until the flight. Knowing the strict Ryan Air policy on ‘check in closes 40 mins before the flight’ as you are the Low Fare Taxi of The Skies, we went straight to the Ryan Air assistant and explained our plight. She said we were still within the time and all would be fine but we had to make the attendant at check in aware and he would assist from there.

We approached the attendant as instructed and explained. Unfortunately, in the main part, due to him being a child, and forgetting to bring his mother to work, he heard only half of the words before his brain fell apart like a wet cake. He led us to the line for closing gates, advised we should wait and all would be ok. We stood patiently in the line for 20 minutes. We got to the front of the line and the lady, who we shall from this point refer to a Vacant, explained that she had literally just that second closed the flight and we had missed it. We complained that we had done as instructed and she said it was the child’s fault because he should have advised her that we were trying to board a closing flight and that because he hadn’t told her it was therefore our fault we had missed the plane.

Confused by this process of blame apportioning, another check in clerk, who we shall refer to as Not That Bright, tried to blame us for not responding to the last call for the flight as we should have made ourselves known. I argued that the last call had not been made. Not That Bright then questioned Vacant on whether she had done a final call. Vacant did what she does best and looked, well,…… After establishing that the child had not informed Vacant we were here, and Vacant had forgotten to do a last call and that all of this was irreversible, and my fault, Not That Bright and Vacant conferred to agree this was not a problem they wished to deal with and told us to get in a very, very long line of very, very unhappy people at the quite wrongly titled ‘Customer Services Counter’ as it was in fact a Customer Shouting Desk. We complained and requested the attention of a manager.

Out came Colin, a man so angry all his hair had literally fallen out. He was so aggressive I can only assume he had accidentally inserted something sharp into somewhere private and been unable to remove it before he came to work. He was definitely a middle Gimp. I know this as Vacant and Not That Bright were clearly quite scared of him, and he can’t have been a Big Cheese as he was talking directly to customers and we all know from the papers that no-one in Big Cheese management at Ryan Air has ever seen, let alone spoken to an actual customer.

Middle Gimp had clearly listen hard at Ryan Air Middle Gimp school as he managed to take two perfectly calm and sane adults and in a matter of seconds reduce them to angry people considering violence.

‘Check in opens 3 hours before the flight’ he barked repeatedly as if it was the answer to every question in life. We tried to ask Middle Gimp direct questions about why it was necessary for us to miss the flight because the Child had forgotten to do his job, and Vacant had forgotten to do hers.

‘Why is this our fault, and why should we miss the flight because Ryan Air staff have admitted they made errors?.

‘Check in opens three hours before the flight’

‘Do you acknowledge we have just cause for complaint as we tried to do the right thing and the only reason we are not on the plane is because of communication failures with Ryan Air Staff?’

‘Check in opens three hours before the flight’

‘What colour are my trousers?’

‘Check in opens three hours before the flight’

‘Do you think economic sanctions on Russia will diffuse the escalating situation in Ukraine?’

‘Check in opens three hours before the flight’

‘Were Man Utd right to fire David Moyes?’

‘Check in opens three hours before the flight’

‘My tinkle is hurting, could you take a look if I promise not to tell anyone?’

‘Check in opens three hours before the flight’

Middle Gimp then conferred with Vacant and Not That Bright, and agreed that this was all our fault as we should have noticed that Child had made an error and we should have called the flight ourselves to assist Vacant in doing her job because she was clearly busy being, well,…… Middle Gimp then insisted we go to customer the Customer Shouting Desk, as he was definitely not going to do anything else. This was handy as the queue was very long so that by the time we would reach the front the plane would be half way to Bratislava and the problem would be solved.

We waited patiently in line as customer after customer stood at the desk to hear the same song;

‘No, no, I can’t do that, no, there are no Middle Gimps available, no, no, sorry, no, give me all your money’

We got to the Customer Shouting Desk and explained our plight to the lady there (who was actually very nice and clearly should not be working for Ryan Air as a result). She apologised but explained that Middle Gimp had finished being angry for the day and had returned to his padded cage and there were no other Middle Gimps around. We would have to book in to the flight for the next day and we would have to pay £110 each to change the ticket. When she tried to re-book the flight she said that the flight we had tried to get was actually delayed by 1 hour and still at the air port and that what we should do is run to the gate with all our luggage, she would call through and they would check our bags into the hold at the gate. We ran as fast as we could, which is not very fast because I am fat, to security to do as instructed. Security advised us that because our flight should have left, even though it hadn’t, the ticket machine would not open the barrier for us and we would need to return to the Customer Shouting Desk.

We waited patiently in the very long queue yet again for about 40 minutes to discover the nice lady had also gone home now so we had to explain the whole thing again to a new lady that looked like all the joy had been removed from her life at birth. She recited the Ryan Air customer services song with a sterling level of apathy and dreariness, I am surprised she could muster the will just to breather and stay alive.

‘No, no, I can’t do that, no, there are no Middle Gimps available, no, no, sorry, no, give me all your money’

She recited it with perfection, Middle Gimps across the world would have been in awe and the effectiveness of the techniques taught in Middle Gimp School. Seeing no other option but to hand over all our cash and come back the next morning we happily paid and got new flights.

As the new flight was at 6.25am in the morning we decided to get a hotel, we paid £79 for a room and got a taxi.

So, our customer experience was insightful and liberating. From the incompetent Child with a brain so full of girls and Vauxhall Corsa modifications he couldn’t actually listen or speak, through Vacant and Not That Bright who decided on reflection that anything they did wrong was our fault for not pointing it out to them, right through Middle Gimp who made a Tasmanian Devil look calm and Zen like, and the sad one, oh so sad, having every last drop of life sucked out of her by her chosen career at the Ryan Air Customer Shouting Desk. I very nearly jumped over the desk just to give her a cuddle and tell her everything would be alright if she could just muster the will to leave the Ryan Air Customer Shouting Desk and find a more fulfilling job, like starting the very first Israeli pork pie factory, or being a parking attendant in Tower Hamlets, or in fact just resigning herself to a slow and uncomfortable death would have been indistinguishable from the current position and would require much less effort.

The net result of this ‘experience’ was;

New Flights – £220
Hotel £79
Taxi x 2 £50
Worlds most expensive sandwich in the only hotel we could get £35

1 x significant breach of Tort Law (2008 as quoted by Lord Atkin) by Ryan Air, Google it, it’s a cracking read. I will leave you to decide the monetary value of this.

1 x very angry and upset wife, in particular with Middle Gimp for being so unbelievably rude.

1 x Missed wedding reception for our Slovakian family (sorry, forgot to mention this nugget earlier) who all turned up from all over the country to see us for an event we were forced to miss, because Child and Vacant are clueless at best and Middle Gimp has anger management issues.

So, thank you Ryan Air for a comfortable and enjoyable experience. I have watched a program called the news so I fully expect this to land on the desk of the customer services team underneath the empty bottles and sandwich wrappers that you also file there. You treated us badly, you cost us money and made us miss our wedding reception through a display of incompetence I have not seen since Greece was allowed to have money and a cheque book.

I sincerely doubt you will do anything about this, compensate us, apologise, or even respond according to the news, so I have sent this recorded and sign for delivery to absolutely confirm my opinion of Ryan Air and that it is not just ‘lost in the post’

Regards

You bunch of…………….

P.S. Maybe Middle Gimp in particular, but Child, Not That Bright, and Vacant should purchase one of your reasonable priced tickets and go to Slovakia (assuming they were actually allowed on the plane. The Ryan Air employees there are smart, clever, bilingual, helpful, and polite and they should in my opinion experience an example of how they should do their job. The Slovak staff could explain it to them, but they wouldn’t be able to understand it for them, so it may be a waste of time after all.

[sailandfly]

I recently flew my second Ryanair flight in 11 years, an early morning flight from Porto to Faro. From booking to picking up luggage at Faro airport everything went smooth. I set my expectation higher than for the first flight (which was quite good as well) as pax reviews on different sites said service improved a lot. Plane was clean, Portuguese FAs did their job in a professional manner and experience was very much on the level of Norwegian flights which I have chance to fly more often. Maybe due short flight time there wasn’t many announcements but as usually I listen music during flights I am not sure would I noticed them at all. I got excellent value for money and would fly with them again when there would be a chance. Recently flew with Cebu Pacific and that experience was equally good. Safety was not an issue on both occasion. I do like comfortable transportation but only occasionally in limo, it is metro much more often for me 🙂

[FDOS_UK]

So to summarise that story, the couple

1 – didn’t allow enough time for their journey to the airport?

2 – didn’t act assertively and make themselves known to the check in agent before the desk closed?

And blame Ryanair for that?

[openfly]

Passengers talking noisily during the “emergency briefing”? Easy answer. At the end, call a crew member and ask them to repeat the briefing, due to being the unable to hear. I’ve done it once and the BA crew were brilliant. Apologised that they had to repeat the briefing due to several passengers not paying attention. The noisy chatterers paid attention during the stunned silence! ??

[Charles-P]

@openfly – it does surprise me how often crews are completely ignored during the briefing, I assume because we now regard flying as so safe and commonplace that our inner view is “it will never happen”.

[FaroFlyer]

I agree with FDOS_UK. I don’t think that FR are anybody’s first choice, but I don’t hesitate to use them if the schedule and price, including seats and priority, are acceptable.

I have flown them several times domestically, to UK, DE, ES and BE and the aircraft are clean and staff friendly. Yes, they push sales, but a smiling “No thanks” gets a smile back. My limit would also be 4 hours, because of seat recline comfort, but an inflatable pillow eases the lumbar discomfort which I get on most airlines.

[FDOS_UK]

[quote quote=811135]Passengers talking noisily during the “emergency briefing”? Easy answer. At the end, call a crew member and ask them to repeat the briefing, due to being the unable to hear. I’ve done it once and the BA crew were brilliant. Apologised that they had to repeat the briefing due to several passengers not paying attention. The noisy chatterers paid attention during the stunned silence! ??

[/quote]

+1

[Charles-P]

It’s interesting that while many of us here have had appalling experiences with Ryanair others such as @FaroFlyer and @sailandfly seem to have found them tolerable. I wonder if this is a reflection of the base where the aircraft operate from ? Does anybody here know if the crew and aircraft and linked permanently to one airport.

[Charles-P]

Of course although Ryanair are bad, it could be worse 🙂

[FDOS_UK]

[quote quote=811157]It’s interesting that while many of us here have had appalling experiences with Ryanair others such as @FaroFlyer and @sailandfly seem to have found them tolerable. I wonder if this is a reflection of the base where the aircraft operate from ? Does anybody here know if the crew and aircraft and linked permanently to one airport.

[/quote]

Maybe it is a reflection that some of us have flown enough sectors to have a balanced view?

*****Edited by Business Traveller*****

[MartynSinclair]

Most firms/businesses, Ryan included, can offer a decent service for the money paid. The problem for me is how businesses and firms deal with problems that arise from time to time.

I would have no confidence of having a satisfactory customer experience with Ryan, if things went wrong. I had a problem with BA a couple of weeks ago, which was caused by not having a connecting ticket. All it took was a discussion, in a professional tone and the problem was resolved within a few minutes.

I think Ryan have created their own problems with their inflexible and inability to think on their feet, attitude.

Yes, arrive 3 hours before flight
Yes, other passengers aren’t flying so queues are small
Yes, you are not travelling with too much hand baggage
Yes, you are prepared to follow “orders”
Yes, you are happy to depart and arrive at some very obscure “city” airports
Yes, you are happy to be squashed in and not able to move to a free / empty row
Yes, you are happy to feel as if you are in a store with crew trying to sell you anything and everything
Yes, you are happy to have to endure loads of cabin announcements

… then Ryan Air is the perfect airline for you

[FDOS_UK]

[quote quote=811176]Most firms/businesses, Ryan included, can offer a decent service for the money paid. The problem for me is how businesses and firms deal with problems that arise from time to time.

I would have no confidence of having a satisfactory customer experience with Ryan, if things went wrong. I had a problem with BA a couple of weeks ago, which was caused by not having a connecting ticket. All it took was a discussion, in a professional tone and the problem was resolved within a few minutes.

I think Ryan have created their own problems with their inflexible and inability to think on their feet, attitude.

Yes, arrive 3 hours before flight
Yes, other passengers aren’t flying so queues are small
Yes, you are not travelling with too much hand baggage
Yes, you are prepared to follow “orders”
Yes, you are happy to depart and arrive at some very obscure “city” airports
Yes, you are happy to be squashed in and not able to move to a free / empty row
Yes, you are happy to feel as if you are in a store with crew trying to sell you anything and everything
Yes, you are happy to have to endure loads of cabin announcements

… then Ryan Air is the perfect airline for you

[/quote]

Martyn

I don’t recognise the above.

Yes, arrive 3 hours before flight – no, two will do
Yes, other passengers aren’t flying so queues are small – sorry, don’t understand
Yes, you are not travelling with too much hand baggage – Ryanair offers two bags, like BA – the weight limit for the larger item is 10kg, which seems enough
Yes, you are prepared to follow “orders” – same for all airlines (at least in Y)
Yes, you are happy to depart and arrive at some very obscure “city” airports – no longer necessarily the case, plus FR also fly to ‘obscure’ airports that are well located for some areas
Yes, you are happy to be squashed in and not able to move to a free / empty row – no one will stop you moving to a free row
Yes, you are happy to feel as if you are in a store with crew trying to sell you anything and everything – no worse than on many airlines and a ‘curfew’ makes for quieter night flights
Yes, you are happy to have to endure loads of cabin announcements – just like other airlines (BA is pretty bad at this, with all the ‘let me add my personal welcome guff)

As I wrote earlier and Faro Flyer, too, not my first choice (my order of priority from MAN would be EZY/Norwegian, Monarch, Ryanair, Jet 2, Flybe, Vueling) but not half as bad as many think and usually on time.

[Charles-P]

@MartynSinclair – yes spot on. It clearly appeals to a certain type of person because commercially they have been successful (with the exception of the big losses in 2009 and 2010 of €10.3 million and €10.9 million) but it’s not for me and I will not be using them again.

[FDOS_UK]

Shall we stick to the facts?

Ryanair’s adjusted profits after tax were

2009 – €105m*
2010 – €318m

*The 2009 loss after tax – unadjusted, including the accelerated fleet depreciation and an extraordinary write down of shareholdings in Aer Lingus) was (€169m).

Sources:

https://www.ryanair.com/doc/investor/2009/Annual_report_2009_web.pdf
https://www.ryanair.com/doc/investor/2010/Annual_report_2010_web.pdf

[Author]

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