Monday, January 23, 2006

Ryanair's courtesy knows no bounds

I JUST got back this morning from a great weekend away with my pal Jordie and her wonderful family and I am absolutely knackered.

It was a mad busy week last week where I wasn’t in one place long enough to do anything other than work really so it has been a bit quiet here, apologies for that.

Once I had the doggie-sitter sorted for the weekend (thanks Kaz, who wrote about her weekend with the doggie here) we set off early on Friday morning, returning on a 7am flight this morning.

That was something else. It is so obvious that Ryanair send their staff for rude lessons and what an effective course it is too.

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My last experience of Ryanair involved a staff member sticking the palm of her hand right into my face saying ‘when I have dealt with this I will deal with you’ before walking off never to be seen again.

I thoughtabout telling her the gesture is probably one of the most confrontational I have ever seen. If she doesn't know already, she will when some fraught traveller punches her on the nose.

But maybe that is a ploy, cos then you react, security is called, you are evicted from the airport and they get to resell your seat to the poor person who missed check-in by 30 seconds.

And it was a bit like that this morning.

We sprinted into the airport at 6.18am for a 7am flight while someone was still being checked in. when they moved off the helpful fecker behind the counter informed me she was closed.

‘The desk closes at 6.20am’ she said looking over my shoulder at a clock behind me. Both the Young Wan and I were already traumatised by our 5am wakeup call and her in her school uniform and all and the woman went ‘WELL OKAY, but really next time get here early, this is just too much - *Massive sigh* - WHERES YOUR BOARDING PASS, QUICKLY QUICKLY, this is just too much’.

She moaned and chastised me like a bold child, rude auld bat and then proceeded to complain that my suitcase was too heavy after shouting at me for trying to put another bag beside it.

At 18kg, it was 3kg over the weight for one person, but yes there were two people traveling with a combined weight of 20kg. And she made me move stuff into a different bag with the lovely and snazzy Dyson hoover donated to the Redmum household by Jordie (Cheers!).

Now is the combined weight rule one of the many hidden rules that Ryanair has that we do not know about? Where you cannot pack two people’s belongings into one suitcase? She kept shouting at me saying ‘Hurry UP – I have no time for this’. Then going ‘STOP I need to tie this’.

I could have happily smacked her, but being a peace-loving woman and a I want to get on that flight woman I decided to let her rant, she was only really upsetting herself getting all worked up.

As hard as it was to listen to her moan at that time of morning; I did cos I wanted onto the flight that I had paid for, the flight that would get the Young Wan to school and me to work on time.

Ryanair staff have to be the most unobliging staff in the world. Makes you proud doesn’t it?

Oh and while their courtesy knows no bounds, I was happy with the pictures I took on the way over.

Howth
Bye bye Dublin

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Cooling chimneys

Runcorn Bridge

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6 comments:

Anonymous said...

She sounds like a right bitch, I would have told her so ... after I got my hands on the boarding pass.

Anonymous said...

She's gonna be fired for letting you through after the 40min check-in. You probably met one of the nicest staff at Ryanair!

Red Mum said...

I think its more to do with the fact that she thought she was finished but wasn't. We caught it by the skin of our teeth... Oh I would not have been a happy camper at all if we hadn't caught the flight.

Emma in Canada said...

I always heard that Ryanair had a great reputation. Apparently I have been talking to the wrong people! They are terrible at Air Canada as well, but if you're going international you have no other choices here unless you fly with an American airline.

Boliath said...

Ryanair suck big dick!

Sorry you had trouble with them, been there in the past myself, glad you had a lovely weekend.

Anonymous said...

I used to fly with Ryanair all the time when I lived in Sheffield since they were the only ones who flew to Manchester from Dublin (other than aer lingus but who wants to pay their fares!). When I moved to London I switched to BMI and never looked back. So friendly and helpful, free refreshments on the flight and much nicer planes and all for the same prices as Ryanair. Made me wonder how Ryanair gets away with it.

Glad to have you back though :)