Ryanair, the World’s most hated airline, have lost almost 60% of their online visibility since September 2009 according to reports and independent research done by Greenlight, which is the UK’s leading search marketing agency.
The Flights Sector Report analyzed key search terms that are used when UK consumers go online to find a flight. It goes on to determine the best positioned and, hence, the most visible website in this sector based on the volume for each keyword.
Ryanair was able to take the fourth position in the viability stakes in the third quarter of 2009. However, in the fourth quarter it saw a dramatic shift. Apparently Easyjet found itself in the fourth spot and Ryanair fell down to spot 32.
Ryanair, the World’s most hated airline, have now scrapped the Visa Electron as a free payment method and are now only accepting pre-paid Mastercards.
About 20m people took out a Visa Electron card to take advantage of the perk that allowed them to avoid the £5 fee levied per passenger per journey for bookings made with a credit or debit card. Now the scumbags have taken this perk away.
The change means two adults taking return flights will have to pay £20 in charges, even if the flights are booked on the same card in the same transaction. Only customers paying with a pre-paid MasterCard will escape the fee.
We took a look at a few providers of pre-paid cards and highly recommend the FairFx pre-paid Mastercard for it’s low fees and easy application process:
Ryanair, the World’s most hated airline, have been named in the 12 least ethical companies in the World.
This week, the Swiss research firm Covalence released its annual ranking of the overall ethical performance of multinational corporations. The idea behind the Covalence research is that there’s value - both for companies and consumers - in measuring corporations against an ethical standard.
To complete its ethics index, Covalence compiled both quantitative and qualitative data, spanning seven years, for 581 companies. The data encompass 45 criteria that include labor standards, waste management and human rights records. And because it is a reputation index, the Covalence survey also incorporates media, industry and NGO documents into its evaluation.
It came as absolutely no surprise to us, therefore, to discover Ryanair listed in the top 12 worst companies in the World.
In it’s findings, Covalence noted that Michael O’Leary, the CEO of Irish budget airline Ryanair, is “known for his outrageous behavior and aggressive cost-cutting measures” and that “employees of his company are reportedly forbidden from using the company’s pens or charging their cellphones with its electricity”.
O’Leary has also been known to get nasty with customers, yelling and cursing at one person who requested a refund after a relative fell ill.
Congratulations to O’Leary and Ryanair on their effort at gaining this fabulous accolade.
Ryanair, the World’s most hated airline, have been accused by Aer Lingus of deterring the likes of British Airways from taking a stake in the business because of Ryanair’s “poison-pill” shareholding in Ireland’s national airline.
The airline’s new chief executive, Christoph Mueller, said bosses of European carriers had cited Ryanair’s 29% ownership of the business as an obstacle to any deal. Potential investment partners in the loss-making airline include British Airways and US operator United Airlines, with whom it has strategic alliances.
“A minority shareholding from an alliance partner is restricted by Ryanair. The shareholding works as a poison pill,” he said. Mueller added that he had met Ryanair’s outspoken chief executive, Michael O’Leary, at an industry gathering but had yet to have a one-to-one encounter with his largest shareholder. Citing the example of Germany’s Lufthansa, which has invested in Brussels Airlines and Austrian Airlines, Mueller said a corporate tie-up with another airline was impossible while Ryanair stays on the share register.
“The fact that Ryanair is a shareholder is a limiting factor in attracting other airline shareholders in the framework of a global alliance,” he added.
Ryanair, the World’s most hated airline, were yesterday branded “uncivilised” by Aer Lingus as it unveiled a plan to position itself midway between Ryanair, its no-frills rival, and high-end carriers such as British Airways.
Shares in the flag carrier initially rose as Christoph Mueller, its new chief executive, told investors in London of plans for a new business model that some analysts compared with that of Easyjet, Europe’s second-biggest low-cost airline.
While Aer Lingus hopes to lure business travellers with faster check-in times, pre-paid meals and central airports, rather than the secondary ones for which Ryanair is known, it will not focus on the quality lounges, free food and drinks associated with full-service airlines.
“You could say there’s a shift towards an EasyJet model,” said Joe Gill of Bloxham stockbrokers in Dublin, adding that investors seemed optimistic that the new strategy would start to deliver profits from 2011.
The airline’s “civilised” tag will be seen as a dig at Ryanair, which has twice tried to buy Aer Lingus and remains its biggest shareholder with a stake of 29 per cent. Mr Mueller said the size of this holding remained a deterrent to other airlines who might wish to take a stake in Aer Lingus.
Ryanair, the World’s most hated airline, plans to increase its fares at its Dublin hub and probably across its European network, Chief Executive Michael O’Leary was quoted as saying on Thursday.
O’Leary told the Irish Times newspaper average fares could rise from the beginning of its next financial year in April.
O’Leary is to hold a news conference later on Thursday to discuss changes to Ryanair’s summer schedule from Dublin Airport.
“There will be an extensive range of frequency and capacity cuts (in Dublin) starting on the 28th of March,” O’Leary told the newspaper.
Ticket prices are closely watched by analysts and O’Leary said he would be surprised if they didn’t go up by at least 5 to 10 percent out of Ireland.
He added that average fares across the entire airline could rise from April 1.
Ryanair, the World’s most hated airline, are very good at ripping their customers off given the opportunity. It come’s as no surprise that we get sent all sorts of stories detailing these acts of robbery.
The following is from a passenger called “Marie” who travelled from London to Nimes…
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I am an experienced traveller, fly several times a year, although haven’t taken a Ryanair flight for a couple of years as I’m currently working in New Zealand.
So I’m by no means a naive traveller, know all about most of the stupid rules, rip-off strategies, although I have to say they have got worse recently.
I was back home in the UK over Xmas and New Year. I have family near Nimes in France so I wanted to pay a short visit there too. I turned up at Luton airport on Dec 28th, in plenty of time for my flight. One very slow person checking in bags for the whole flight (despite £5 charge for supposed online check-in and threat of £40 charge if boarding pass not printed off before arrival at the airport). Horrendous queues through security due to events on the transatlantic Delta flight on Xmas day, not all security lanes open.
Me and 10 others finally arrived at the gate at 11am (flight was due to leave at 11). Plane was still sitting on the tarmac 50 metres from the terminal door, doors open, steps still down, going nowhere. But Ryanair staff said nope, we couldn’t get on the plane, Ryanair rules, once they close the gate no more passengers allowed on (like robots…computer says no?!).
No consideration for the security situation in the airport at the time, despite 10 people practically begging to be allowed to just take the 30 second walk out onto the plane. They actually left our checked in bags on the plane and sent them to Nimes. After the events of Lockerbie I’m sure unaccompanied luggage in the hold is illegal. And after all that supposed enhanced slow security.
All they could do to ‘help’ was charge another £100 for a flight out of Stansted at 8pm to Marseile (or wait 2 days for the next flight to Nimes). I duly paid this, plus paid for transportation to Stansted.
I checked when I booked the ticket that I wouldn’t have to pay the 40 pounds fee for a new boarding pass, but was assured that at Stansted there are kiosks where check-in and printing of boarding passes can be done for free.
At Stansted, the automated check-in kiosk I used didn’t work and didn’t print out my boarding pass; when I asked for help I was told sorry can’t help, but that I could get a new boarding pass re-issued at the ticket desk at a cost of £40; which I didn’t do BTW.
After shouting at the man, even though I ‘m very calm and tolerant (that’s what Ryanair does to a person), I paid £4 at an internet point to print, couldn’t be bothered queuing again and having to argue with another of these robots!!
I’m speechless at what these ‘people’ try to get away with!! I finally got to where I needed to be 9 hours late and feeling very robbed and mistreated. Ryanair staff and defenders on here can go on about how low prices mean we shouldn’t expect the service, but I paid over 300 pounds for my return ticket as it was Christmas, more than the BA flight from Gatwick to Marseille. But I wanted the ‘convenience’ of flying from and to airports nearer to where i needed to go, routes which Ryanair monopolize. I actually ended up paying around 450 pounds to get to France, I could have gone to New York on a decent airline for that!
I will NEVER fly with Ryanair again, and I really mean it. Cheating, thieving, uncaring company, deserve to be prosecuted and hung out to dry.
A Ryanair plane that departed from Tampere was forced to make an emergency landing in Sweden. The pilot made the decision to land after noting a problem with the plane’s engines.
The aircraft, which was heading for Frankfurt, Germany, landed at the Skavstan Airport near Nyköping, in southeast Sweden.
The landing was smooth. However, technicians decided to keep the plane grounded, reported Sweden’s public television company SVT.
Swedish aviation officials confirmed the plane had an engine problem. Passengers of the interrupted flight were loaded onto another plane to continue their journey.
