…I want to go to Brussels next Thursday-Saturday to see a few mates, seems like Ryanair is the only real option from Manchester, will it be as bad as people make out? hand luggage only if that makes a difference.

will it be as bad as people make out?

No, as long as you follow their rules etc.

Have you checked where the destination airport actually is?

Read the rules 3 times, stick to the rules. Don’t expect anything 🙂

As above, just follow the rules and you’ll be fine. only a very short flight anyway so its not like you’ll need in flight entertainment, a meal, friendly service, comfortable seats, legroom….

Just hand luggage makes it much easier but expect surprise charges as your booking and just accept that they are cheap for a reason

They’re fine. Pretty generous hand luggage allowance, generally pretty efficient and on time. Just don’t expect any frills.

One piece of hand luggage that fits in their sizing thing only. It says it everywhere so dont turn up with a bag of duty free and then threaten to kill the member of staff who says no you cant take it on. Fastest way to get arrested and miss your flight I have ever seen 😯

As said above they are cheap for a reason, but they get you to where you want to go.

One piece of hand luggage that fits in their sizing thing only. It says it everywhere so dont turn up with a bag of duty free and then threaten to kill the member of staff who says no you cant take it on.

They now allow a second carry on from duty free etc.

Do they do the first 50 / 100 only hand luggage thing where if you are one of the last to get on the plane, they put your hand luggage in the hold?

I’m sure I read it somewhere, but I can’t find any reference to it now 😕

I’ll refrain from threatening to kill anyone 😆 😯

Hopefully they’ll at least land me in Belgium!

Do they do the first 50 / 100 only hand luggage thing where if you are one of the last to get on the plane, they put your hand luggage in the hold?

They do that. Not sure there’s an exact number. It was the last 20 or so on the last flight I went on and only large wheely bags

following advice on here (I know right!) I read the rules. It says 90 items of hand luggage, the rest goes in the hold.

Last three flights I’ve taken have been Ryanair. No drama as I followed the rules and also stuck to our own rule of taking your own food and drink on as there’s is shit/vexpensive

Print your boarding card at home. Last time I flew it was 30 quid for a little slip of paper in the airport. I wasn’t bitter.

Just need to show them the boarding card on your phone. Better to print it out, though.

Jota they may do as I havent flown with them for a while now but they certainly didnt during this incident 😆 it got out of hand very quickly 😆

Last time I travelled with them the option to not use their insurance was between Bhutan and Burkina Faso in the ‘Your Nationality’ drop down menu

If you’ve got the cash pay for the priority boarding as well. Makes the whole thing way more civilised. Buses to the city are every half hour as well http://www.brussels-city-shuttle.com/en/#/

Tried the priority boarding thing. But now I just stay sat down at the gate until there’s only a handful of people left to board. Why stand up for 40 minutes when you don’t have to?

As last person on my hand luggage went under the seat in front of me. Pilot case within their specific dimensions

I don’t really get why anyone would pay for priority boarding any more. All Ryanair tickets now come with alloted seats, so priority boarding doesn’t give you the pick of the seats any more.

I use Ryanair fairly regularly. I live in the Netherlands but travel back to the UK pretty often. As long as you pay attention when you book the tickets and don’t pay for anything you don’t want, insurance, bag check in, a seat location of your choice, I don’t really get what all the ‘hidden costs’ are. Do be careful about hand luggage size though, as they are pretty hot on checking this, especially if it’s a busy flight. They do put some hand lugagge into the main hold now, but this is avoidable if you turn up reasonably early (or quite late, as I find out with my last flight, that I nearly missed!).
It can be a bit of a scrum getting to your seat, on the plane, which seems to have gotten worse since they changed so that people have designated seats. Pay attention to whether you need to get on via the front or rear doors as you can end up fighting your way down the aisle, having to get past a load of people, if you get on via the wrong door.
Ryanair’s not luxury, but it does a decent job at a decent price.

The last Ryanair flight I took they were just asking people who were already checking luggage to put hand luggage in as well rather than first come gets in cabin.

Do they do the first 50 / 100 only hand luggage thing where if you are one of the last to get on the plane, they put your hand luggage in the hold?

They do that. Not sure there’s an exact number. It was the last 20 or so on the last flight I went on and only large wheely bags

If they do this with your hand luggage and it gets knicked it is not insured as it is not checked in baggage.I do not know what would happen if you refused to put your bag in the hold.

Check the airport brussels south is not brussels but Charleroi. They do have some flights actually going to brussels zaventem now. Alternative is Manchester Antwerp and then train from antwerp to brussels should be as fast likely faster then brussels south and you wonth be flying ryanair if that’s not your cup of tea.

Flown with them 7 times in the past two years and never had any bother with them. Always seem to be on time (I might be lucky though) and they’ve never once challenged me about hand baggage despite me pushing the limit a bit on a couple of occasions. The prices have always been brilliant too. You can even take a smaller item of hand baggage on now alongside your main bag e.g. camera case.

Easyjet – they seem to be really arsey about baggage size, a few times they’ve been late.

Flybe – don’t get me started on these jokers. More expensive than BA from Manchester to Milan Malpensa, really erratic pricing, always seem to be late.

Conclusion – Stick to the rules, try not to take check in luggage as it bumps up the price, don’t buy food or drinks on board and you should be ok.

If they do this with your hand luggage and it gets knicked it is not insured as it is not checked in baggage.I do not know what would happen if you refused to put your bag in the hold.

The odd time they’ve done this to me they’ve put a sticker on the bag, scanned the barcode and given me a receipt for it. Would this not count as proof that they checked it in?

OP I hate Ryan Air with a passion but have used them from time to time as they are the only airline which flies to certain destinations.

Yup follow the rules. Check in online and print boarding cards (ideally twice in case you lose the first one). Arrive early (the check in does close 45 mins before and that can include if you in the queue). They will do whatever they can to surcharge you so double check all the rules. Nothing is free on the aircraft but its a short flight so ok I imagine.

Fingers crossed the flight isn’t cancelled as they’ll make you pay for the next one or reschedule you onto one in a few days or just refund your ticket.

As an aside check the airport is reasonably close/convenient for the city (Milan I know Ryan Air is bad as their airport s very far from the city).

Don’t expect anything

Other than to pay next to nothing for flying a few hundred miles. People often forget that bit 🙄

Other than to pay next to nothing for flying a few hundred miles. People often forget that bit

Or not.

Fingers crossed the flight isn’t cancelled as they’ll make you pay for the next one or reschedule you onto one in a few days or just refund your ticket.

Last time I flew with Ryanair I got stung for 75 Euros (my ticket only cost 30)as my carry on soft bag didn’t quite fit in their frame checker. There was someone getting everyone to slide their carry on into the bag checker and if your bag didn’t fit in perfectly inside the space i.e. none of the bag poking out of the top – it had to fit neatly inside the volume of their checker, then you got directed to the check in desk. My bag was a soft bag and fitted in the frame fine, but required a little push as its sides were bulging a bit, but that was not allowed. Wasn’t a problem on the way out, the bag wasn’t even checked, so they’re inconsistent too, which is worse – if you’re going to be a bastard then at least be consistent about it.

I just get the feeling they are looking for every tiny excuse to stiff you. Other budget airlines are reasonable with the rules they set out – i’ve never ever had an issue with an oversized carry on bag with any other airline budget or otherwise, but not Ryanair. I never fly them now. If I were in your position i’d go out of my way to avoid flying with them and fly Easyjet from Liverpool or even Stanstead, or some other airline out of any other airport. It would have to absolutely and utterly be the one and only option for me to fly Ryanair.

Often now, if I can make arrangements early enough, I find that a lot of the main airlines can be competitive – or at least competitive enough, with the budget airlines, and you fly into a half decent airport that is not 80km away from where you want to actually go.

Actually, last time I went to Brussels I took Eurostar. Door to door travel time was not that different to flying – about an hour and a half longer, which is the length of the train journey into London, and it was, on the whole a far better and more relaxed experience than flying. Not massively more expensive than flying, but you got a nice big seat, lots of legroom, a bar that you can stand at and enjoy a drink or two. Very civilised.

All of the above – inconsistent application of rules makes it a stressful experience. If you’re lucky it will be a cheap, no-frills flight to roughly where you wanted to go.

Personally, I have only ever caught them when there was absolutely no other option, and I hated every second of it. I hated sweeping crumbs off my seat before I could sit down, I hated the constant up-selling throughout the flight, and I really disliked how uncomfortable it was. The price is not always ground-breaking, but it is occasionally the only option so they can charge what they like.

You also have to wonder at what point cutting costs extends to not doing the proper maintenance of aircraft, training of staff etc.

If you’re a nervous flyer I would find another way. We convinced someone who hated flying to come with us, and now they never want to fly again…

I hate them.
They are not cheap, two adults, two children (3 and 4) with seats, hold luggage x2 Bristol to Alicante in June was over £900 return.
We were away for 6 nights, you cant print your boarding pass more than 2 days before your flight if you don’t pay for an advanced boarding pass.
It costs to book a specific seat, so if you have kids and don’t want to leave them sitting on the aircraft next to some other poor sod for 2.5 hrs you have to find a printer whilst your on your holiday which isn’t always that easy.

Schedules are ridiculous, they give a deliberately late expected arrival time so that they can play their annoying music when they land a minute early. If they are 30 min late they say nothing or blame someone else without apology.

iolo – Member
Print your boarding card at home. Last time I flew it was 30 quid for a little slip of paper in the airport. I wasn’t bitter.I didn’t bother to read the rules

FTFY

You might have fixed it for iolo, but if you read the post above you can see it isn’t always that easy to abide by their rules unless you pay extra. Price transparency is not one of their strong points.

It costs to book a specific seat, so if you have kids and don’t want to leave them sitting on the aircraft next to some other poor sod for 2.5 hrs you have to find a printer whilst your on your holiday which isn’t always that easy.

They won’t split kids from their parents generally.

CAA guidelines ask airlines to develop procedures for the seat allocation of family groups, particularly when a group includes children. It is probable that family group members would seek each other out should an emergency evacuation be required, an action that could adversely affect the passenger flow rates towards emergency exits and might seriously affect the outcome of an evacuation.

Additionally, children and infants should be seated where they can be adequately supervised by an accompanying adult in the event of turbulence or a decompression in the cabin.

Airlines procedures should take into account the following factors:

Children, accompanied by adults, should ideally be seated in the same seat row as the adult. In wide-bodied aircraft, children and accompanying adults should not be separated by more than one aisle. Where this is not possible, children should be separated by no more than one seat row from accompanying adults.

Seat allocation procedures for family groups and suitable seating arrangements for large parties of children should reflect the above criteria.

Whenever small numbers of infants and children are travelling together, the airline should make every effort to ensure that they are allocated seats where they can be readily supervised by the responsible accompanying adult in both normal and abnormal conditions.
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We were away for 6 nights, you cant print your boarding pass more than 2 days before your flight if you don’t pay for an advanced boarding pass.

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Maybe you were misinformed regarding the 2 day limit on printing the boarding passes?
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Just expect a thoroughly joyless and miserable experience, you won’t be disappointed

My wife flew back from Spain with them last night. Hand luggage only 40 euros all in. Just booked to fly back on th 12th (47.99). Just treat it like a bus, not that pleasant but does the job.

Just expect a thoroughly joyless and miserable experience, you won’t be disappointed +1

I hate Ryan Air and their attitude which seeps down from the top to nearly all the staff who you can tell are treated like shit and therefore care little about their job or customer service. If the prices really were that good I wouldn’t mind but they are no better that the other budget airlines.
If I have to use them I try to treat it like a bus journey

We paid for the priority boarding last time. Admittedly it isn’t a massive difference but just thought of it as making the miserable experience slightly more bearable.
Small extra cost to make our holiday nicer in my opinion.

Not sure I’d bother if flying more often.