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Comment by physicsguy | Hacker News Reader

Ryanair are what they are. The reason every flight is so cheap in Europe is because of them. They've never pretended to be anything else other than a budget airline where any extras or conveniences will cost you extra. I've literally just checked in with an EasyJet flight and it's exactly the same patterns everywhere. Every other airline copied RyanAir because most passengers are highly price sensitive. The problem is that they're still not as cheap.

The 'not printing a boarding ticket' before you travel and being charged for it at the airport has been around since 2009: https://theguardian.com/money/2009/may/14/ryanair-online-che... so it's hard for people to feign ignorance of it.

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> They've never pretended to be anything else other than a budget airline where any extras or conveniences will cost you extra

This part is not objectionable - it's the lack of transparency and attempts to trick you into paying additional fees that are worse than normal. Take booking.com as a comparison. They are very up front about costs and your expected costs for a stay booked via them will normally match up with what you see on the checkout costs and your actual final costs. That isn't the case for Ryanair

> The 'not printing a boarding ticket' before you travel and being charged for it at the airport has been around since 2009: https://theguardian.com/money/2009/may/14/ryanair-online-che... so it's hard for people to feign ignorance of it.

Everyone has a first time travelling with Ryanair and some number of them will fall into this trap because they didn't know. This would be fine if people were intentionally making the choice to trade off the inconvenience (?) of checking in online vs at the airport but what % of people paying that fee did that? It would be easy for Ryanair to provide a more transparent customer experience here.

> The 'not printing a boarding ticket' before you travel and being charged for it at the airport has been around since 2009

That does not mean it is acceptable.

Treating passengers in a respectable civilised manner should be a given. Quite why we have sunk to thinking such shenanigans are acceptable will continue to puzzle me. If any other business tried this, you would tell them to swivel.

What's so difficult about checking in with the app? I found the situation pretty painless and you can go straight to security that way, if you don't have to check in any luggage.

> What's so difficult about checking in with the app?

You <------> My point

Simply put; what is so difficult about not adding excessive charges to passengers? And why are you trying to justify this?

It is difficult because having attendants print boarding cards or working with an airport to maintain ticket printers costs money that eats into their margins and increases prices. It's not like they don't warn you that checking in at the airport is paid. I'd much rather save 1€ and check in the way I usually would, even if it means someone who can't read a few warnings has to pay a fee.

Other airlines add excessive charges too, they just put it in the face value of the fare.

Ryanair don’t have anywhere near as many staff at check in, ergo, it’s a cost they save. It’s not excessive, it’s an incentive to do it as they suggest online and keep their costs and thus the total cost of flying down.

The old-school airlines never swindle you and they're still around. I'd much rather avoid a few dark patterns and save a significant cost of my ticket, and it seems like most of Europe agrees.

> Treating passengers in a respectable civilised manner should be a given

Then pay more for an airline that provides that.

The RyanAir deal is pretty straight-forward: you will be treated like subhuman cattle, and in exchange you will have very low prices. They optimize many things to save costs, including having less staff for things like printing boarding tickets. They're fairly up-front about it and in general it's a fair deal. Whether you personally like that deal is a different matter.

I'd kinda agree if it didn't include actively trying to scam me for extra money. It's not about them saving cost anymore, it's about them trying to trick customers for extra money against their will.

I like it. Or at least I like flying to Lisbon for £40 return.

I've never been treated like a subhuman on Ryanair. I have been treated like cattle.

Except they actively try to scam you for money.

I don't know if that design is around, but they would have the option to add extra carry on (not luggage). The image would be of something that clearly looks like luggage, and next to it a tiny tiny backpack.

If you read the wording carefully, you'd notice that this is just for carry on. You have to scroll down to the bottom of the page, select a submenu and there you can finally see the option to add luggage. That's straight up scammy.

People are very (and possibly irrationally) price sensitive to airline costs, so they are willing to put up with a lot compared with many other goods/services.

Ryanair is not straight forward, it's tricksy and only cheap if you hit the magic set of conditions that let you get the cheap deals at the cheap times.

What people object to is not the no frills concept but the

"ahaha you didn't opt for <insert obscured choice> so now you have to pay an extra €20 would you like to pay in GBP? That will £40 please or you're not getting on the flight home.

p.s. Our cabin bags are ever so slightly smaller than the standard every other airline uses and if yours don't fit it will another €50 surcharge."

situation.

Strong disagree, there are other low cost airliners that have massively better user experience, not because they are stellar, its just that ryanair is rock bottom slump of shite and they often make you feel it when using them.

These days, even ie Swiss airlines often offer comparable prices for same routes. No free food or drinks, yet you are still treated like a human being with a speck of respect.

The difference though is that Swiss' coverage is only from Switzerland, a very wealthy and well-managed country, to other major business and tourist destinations and can arguably run at a loss since it's a national carrier. Not every country can afford that - the only flights I can get from my small hometown of ~350000 are with budget airlines because the national carrier simply isn't competitive enough to be able to run profitable flights from there. Before they showed up the airport was effectively dysfunctional. Budget airlines have tremendously improved connectivity for less popular and less wealthy of the continent.

Not disagreeing here, not at all. And don't overestimate how well organized Switzerland is.

Our closest airport (Geneva) is much better served by Easyjet than its own Swiss airlines, who have top priority Zurich and then nothing for a looooong time. They are absolutely uncompetitive here, almost no direct flights and you need to fly 200km and change in Zurich (so adding risks and flights take 2-3x longer, sucks with small kids), compared to Easyjet who offers direct flights to tens of destinations on 3 continents for comparable or lower prices.

Not sure when was the last time I flew Swiss, few years ago. Easyjet? 4x this year, once to Africa. But this is about Ryanair, for some reason they positioned themselves as the worst budget airlines and they don't even fight their image. Suffice to say, I've never flown them.

The reason is because the EU deregulated in 1992. Ryanair didn't invent low cost (that South West airline from 1949 can claim that I believe) and they also had serious competition from EasyJet, a low cost competitor, amongst others. If the EU didn't deregulate they would not have got very far.

Yes Ryanair are victors these days but let's not rewrite history

I am lucky not having to fly with them since 2006 or so. I would only ever visit their web site if I am completely desperate and there is absolutely no other alternative transportation and I must travel

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