Ryanair refund logic

Wouldn’t mind a sense check from the collected STW wisdom on this…

I was flying Ryanair one afternoon from Leeds Bradford to Dublin. Waiting at the airport, the inbound plane for my flight was diverted to Liverpool, due to wind at Leeds Bradford. Appreciating that nothing was going to be going in or out of LBA for a long time, I booked myself on a flight from Manchester to Dublin and got an Uber down to Manchester, eventually getting home about 8 hours later than planned.

After arriving at Manchester I got an email from Ryanair saying that as my original (LBA) flight was now delayed >5hrs, if I decided not to fly on it I was entitled to a refund of the original flight or rerouting at the earliest opportunity to my original destination (Dublin). I submitted a claim for the Manchester flight and Uber.

They got back to me saying they’d pay me nothing – something about how I had no intent to fly on the original LBA flight (?!). I’ve obviously followed up pointing out the above.

How do you see this – does Ryanair owe me the cost of my rerouting via Manchester? Am I out on a limb? Something else?

Get the credit card company involved, in my experience they’ll sort it.

Did you check in for the flight?

If you didn’t check in and your receipts (Uber/Manchester flight) were timed before they offered you the reroute they may assume that you never intended to travel.

They are also duty bound to screw over customers at every opportunity.

Sounds like you jumped the gun a bit and should have waited to receive that email before rerouting yourself and booking your Manchester flight and catching your Uber.  Had you gone through security at Leeds / checked in?

I think you might struggle to get much out of them but maybe try for a refund of the Leeds flight or the Manchester flight.

I was intrigued by this so I did a bit of googling. According to the CAB website you might be claiming for the wrong thing. You should probably be asking for a refund of the original ticket, plus delay compensation. If this covers the whole cost of the Uber and BA flight, or not it doesn’t look like that matters. It sounds like they have at least accepted responsibility, so that’s a start.

https://www.citizensadvice.org.uk/consumer/holiday-cancellations-and-compensation/if-your-flights-delayed-or-cancelled/#:~:text=If%20your%20flight%20is%20cancelled,get%20you%20to%20your%20destination

edit – what the previous posters said about if you checked in or not sounds sensible, but I’d be trying my damndest to get something from them either way!

Ahh, interesting you’re asking about checking in. I had indeed checked in and gone through security at LBA; the flight was 2 hours delayed by the time the plane was diverted, so I’d been hanging around at the gate for a while. But I wondered about the jumping the gun part too; I’d’ve been even later if I’d waited for them to get their backsides in gear, but appreciate they might say there’s a clear order to things…

flyertalk is the place – loads of uber flight geeks on there who will give you the correct advice on what you are entitled to claim

the event is weather related so I don’t think you’re likely to get much out of them – they’re on the hook for getting you to the other airport as soon as reasonable but don’t owe any compensation nor (afaik) necessarily have to pay you back if you choose another option.

if you were checked in they should def refund you the first flight. I don’t know if you’ll get much more than that

As above. Go to FlyerTalk.

There is loads of legislation and case law on this.

But think you went too early. 5 hours is when it all kicks in so anything before that will likely be on your own head.

In this instance RyanAir are probably ‘right’.

Try and find out when the original flight actually landed. This is how the delay compensation is worked out, if it’s applicable.

But think you went too early. 5 hours is when it all kicks in

That CAB link up there gives drastically reduced delays times for shorter routes. 2 hours late at destination for upto 1500km.

sniffFree Member
Try and find out when the original flight actually landed. This is how the delay compensation is worked out, if it’s applicable.

Original flight was due to land 1325 in Dublin. It eventually landed at 0030 (the following morning), as they had to get a plane over there, so well past 5 hours.

It’s correct you won’t get compensation because the delay was weather driven. But you need to decide if you want to fight for reimbursement of ‘a reasonable’ alternative or are happy to accept the refund of your untaken flight and move on.

Ideally you should have contacted Ryanair to request the re-route and had it ok’d by them. One difficulty is your flight wasn’t cancelled, only delayed. What you are arguing is, at the time you re-booked yourself, the airline knew the delay would be long and did not offer “a reasonable reroute under comparable travel conditions … at the earliest opportunity”. I think you might have to take this to small claims for reimbursement, and you might well lose, so flyertalk is a good place to start.

Depends on the severity of the weather and if it was freaky or not…..

https://airadvisor.com/en/flight-delays-due-to-weather

IME it’s very difficult getting money out of Ryan Air, earlier this year we also had a flight from LBA that couldn’t get in due to high winds, plane diverted to east mids so we were transported there by bus, eventually got on the plane after we were all reissued new boarding passes however the plan went tech just prior to take off, by the time it was fixed the crew ran out of hours. I agree the initial problem was weather related but the mechanical and crew issue were not, even involving a specialist claims company we were not able to claim for anything.

Ryanair have worked out that it’s cheaper to pay the regulator’s fine for not giving refunds when they should than to give refunds when they should. Their business model has always been “we don’t give a fek, take it or leave it.” Good luck getting anything out of them.

If you booked your own alternative travel then you won’t get anything. And weather can’t be controlled by Ryanair so you won’t get compensation.

In contrast two years ago we got delayed for over 5 hours coming back from Croatia. It was Ryanair’s fault as the plane broke. We got pretty good food while waiting. When I got back i clicked the link on Ryanair website filled in the flight details and two weeks later had £1200 in my account. The original flights cost £675! I fly Ryanair regularly. They have improved a lot IME

So In short, follow the compensation links on Ryanair website. If they owe you money they’ll pay pretty quick. If they don’t you won’t get anything.

Their business model has always been “we don’t give a fek, take it or leave it.”

This.

In contrast two years ago we got delayed for over 5 hours coming back from Croatia. It was Ryanair’s fault as the plane broke. We got pretty good food while waiting. When I got back i clicked the link on Ryanair website filled in the flight details and two weeks later had £1200 in my account. The original flights cost £675! I fly Ryanair regularly. They have improved a lot IME

We had similar – I doctored the the voucher they gave us to upgrade our food. Figured it’s what Michael O’Leary would do.

So In short, follow the compensation links on Ryanair website. If they owe you money they’ll pay pretty quick. If they don’t you won’t get anything.

Yeah, that’s been my experience too. We shall see I guess.