Has anybody successfully got a refund from Ryanair?

[TheGreatSoprendo]

Well, somewhat surprisingly, I've just got a reply from them via e-mail:

Ryanair said:

Without Prejudice.


<My address>


Our Ref: XXXXXX


Dear

Following your recent request for a refund of the government taxes paid on your unused Ryanair booking confirmation number XXXXX

In accordance with Ryanair's General Conditions of Carriage, we wish to confirm that government tax refunds are subject to a deduction by us of a reasonable administration charge of £17/20EUR.

We also refer you to our General Conditions of Carriage in this regard in particular Article 4.2.1 which states:-

4.2.1 Government taxes imposed in respect of a flight to be operated by us and undertaken
by you shall be payable by you at levels prevailing at the time you make your reservation. If
you do not travel, you may apply in writing within one month for a full refund subject to a
reasonable administration fee.

In this case, the administration fee exceeds the total amount of government taxes paid per passenger, so unfortunately no refund is due in this instance. Please note that all other fees and charges, such as passenger service charge, aviation insurance and handling fees are non refundable, as per our Terms and Conditions of Travel, agreed to at the time of purchase.

Yours sincerely,


Ryanair Customer Services

The taxes and charges on this booking were well over £40, so their reply doesn't make much sense, even taking account of their "reasonable" admin charge of £17.

I'm also wondering why they always head their correspondence with the words "Without prejudice".
Does this serve any purpose other than to make them look dodgy as hell?

Edited by TheGreatSoprendo on Friday 11th September 14:08

[Neil_H]

TheGreatSoprendo said:

The taxes and charges on this booking were well over £40, so their reply doesn't make much sense, even taking account of their "reasonable" admin charge of £17.

I'm also wondering why they always head their correspondence with the words "Without prejudice".
Does this serve any purpose other than to make them look dodgy as hell?

It does, I believe it means that the email can't be used in court proceedings.

I won't use Ryanair purely on the basis that Michael O'Leary is an absolute cock.

ETA: Someone on Wikipedia feels the same I think

Wikipedia said:

Michael O'Leary is Chief Executive Officer of the Irish airline Ryanair, the airline which has built its success on low fares which often balloon with £10 card handling fees in addition to other unexplained £10 handling fees, hence he is one of the Republic of Ireland's wealthiest businessmen.

Edited by Neil_H on Friday 11th September 14:29

[princeperch]

Parrot of Doom said:

Ryanair must have a UK office. Send a letter there, recorded delivery. Give me a fortnight.

When they don't pay, take them to court. Tell the magistrate that you tried repeatedly to contact them but were unsuccessful.

No magistrate in their right mind will refuse your claim. Then, later, when Ryanair still refuse to pay, get the Bailiffs in, and take pictures. Then post them here.

It'll make a great post. You'll probably be out of pocket though.

if a magistrate is hearing a case like this then you've taken a wrong turning somewhere...

[jamiebae]

TheGreatSoprendo said:

Well, somewhat surprisingly, I've just got a reply from them via e-mail:

Ryanair said:

Without Prejudice.


<My address>


Our Ref: XXXXXX


Dear

Following your recent request for a refund of the government taxes paid on your unused Ryanair booking confirmation number XXXXX

In accordance with Ryanair's General Conditions of Carriage, we wish to confirm that government tax refunds are subject to a deduction by us of a reasonable administration charge of £17/20EUR.

We also refer you to our General Conditions of Carriage in this regard in particular Article 4.2.1 which states:-

4.2.1 Government taxes imposed in respect of a flight to be operated by us and undertaken
by you shall be payable by you at levels prevailing at the time you make your reservation. If
you do not travel, you may apply in writing within one month for a full refund subject to a
reasonable administration fee.

In this case, the administration fee exceeds the total amount of government taxes paid per passenger, so unfortunately no refund is due in this instance. Please note that all other fees and charges, such as passenger service charge, aviation insurance and handling fees are non refundable, as per our Terms and Conditions of Travel, agreed to at the time of purchase.

Yours sincerely,


Ryanair Customer Services

The taxes and charges on this booking were well over £40, so their reply doesn't make much sense, even taking account of their "reasonable" admin charge of £17.

I'm also wondering why they always head their correspondence with the words "Without prejudice".
Does this serve any purpose other than to make them look dodgy as hell?

Edited by TheGreatSoprendo on Friday 11th September 14:08

I assume the charge is per-person-per-flight (like their credit card processing fee) and cunningly set at slightly above the maximum possible taxes you could have paid on a flight....

I'd love to never fly with them again, but unfortunatley I can't afford to pay over twice as much to fly to Sicily or France just on principal

[Silver993tt]

Snoggledog said:

TheGreatSoprendo said:

Snoggledog said:

Good luck with getting your money back. Would I be correct in assuming that the outlaws are in central Europe perchance?

Yep - Poland. Still, I'm sure I can work this up into a suitable excuse not to visit them half as often in the future.

Mines Slovak so Ryanair is the only choice apart from driving. I've refused to go on several occasions as I loath flying with Ryanair.

If Ryan Air are flying to Bratislava, you can easily use Vienna instead. It's only a 30 minute drive on the motorway from the east of Vienna so you can use BA or Austrian instead.

[Snoggledog]

Silver993tt said:

Snoggledog said:

TheGreatSoprendo said:

Snoggledog said:

Good luck with getting your money back. Would I be correct in assuming that the outlaws are in central Europe perchance?

Yep - Poland. Still, I'm sure I can work this up into a suitable excuse not to visit them half as often in the future.

Mines Slovak so Ryanair is the only choice apart from driving. I've refused to go on several occasions as I loath flying with Ryanair.

If Ryan Air are flying to Bratislava, you can easily use Vienna instead. It's only a 30 minute drive on the motorway from the east of Vienna so you can use BA or Austrian instead.

True, but Bratislava is much much much more convenient than Vienna. My wife can check in at Bratislava, go for a drive with her parents to the shopping centre down the road, have a coffee and a last natter before ambling back to the airport and running through security 5 minutes before the gate is due to close. With Vienna she has to go through the whole polava (?) of leaving Bratislava, driving for an hour, getting there 2 hours before hand, checking in, hanging around before joining the queue for security, waiting half an hour to be felt up by a bull dyke etc etc etc.. At the moment going from Bratislava equates to a 30 minute trip from home to sat on the plane.

[princeperch]

it's headed without prejudice because if you then go on to sue them for the money you can't refer the judge to the contents of that letter at the hearing

[Silver993tt]

princeperch said:

it's headed without prejudice because if you then go on to sue them for the money you can't refer the judge to the contents of that letter at the hearing

Sounds like it's a good idea to have this on every email that's sent then making all emails useless in any litigation

Edited by Silver993tt on Sunday 13th September 11:10

[sneijder]

If you never get a penny from them, take comfort in the fact you've just convinced me never to use them.

[sneijder]

Sorry, that should have read use them again. I have had the misfortune in the past, in addition to the overall shoddiness the arrival / departure times the 2.5 hour coach trip to my intended destination put me off.

[FPC]

TheGreatSoprendo said:

The taxes and charges on this booking were well over £40, so their reply doesn't make much sense, even taking account of their "reasonable" admin charge of £17.

I'm also wondering why they always head their correspondence with the words "Without prejudice".
Does this serve any purpose other than to make them look dodgy as hell?

I suspect that you can only have the 'government taxes' refunded, not the 'fees'. Government taxes are something like £10 IIRC.

Without prejudice in this case not necessary - the letter is 'open' and does not contain the offer of a settlement. They probably just stick 'without prejudice' on all their correspondence.

[Silver993tt]

FPC said:

TheGreatSoprendo said:

The taxes and charges on this booking were well over £40, so their reply doesn't make much sense, even taking account of their "reasonable" admin charge of £17.

I'm also wondering why they always head their correspondence with the words "Without prejudice".
Does this serve any purpose other than to make them look dodgy as hell?

I suspect that you can only have the 'government taxes' refunded, not the 'fees'. Government taxes are something like £10 IIRC.

Without prejudice in this case not necessary - the letter is 'open' and does not contain the offer of a settlement. They probably just stick 'without prejudice' on all their correspondence.

so does that mean if you quote 'Without Prejudice' on any letter or email you can basically say what you like and there can be no legal recourse based on the content?

[FPC]

Silver993tt said:

FPC said:

TheGreatSoprendo said:

The taxes and charges on this booking were well over £40, so their reply doesn't make much sense, even taking account of their "reasonable" admin charge of £17.

I'm also wondering why they always head their correspondence with the words "Without prejudice".
Does this serve any purpose other than to make them look dodgy as hell?

I suspect that you can only have the 'government taxes' refunded, not the 'fees'. Government taxes are something like £10 IIRC.

Without prejudice in this case not necessary - the letter is 'open' and does not contain the offer of a settlement. They probably just stick 'without prejudice' on all their correspondence.

so does that mean if you quote 'Without Prejudice' on any letter or email you can basically say what you like and there can be no legal recourse based on the content?

No. Basically, you can make an offer to settle a dispute on a 'without prejudice' basis such that you do not admit liability. However, just saying 'without prejudice' does not mean that you can say whatever you like without any possibility of legal recourse.

[Silver993tt]

FPC said:

Silver993tt said:

FPC said:

TheGreatSoprendo said:

The taxes and charges on this booking were well over £40, so their reply doesn't make much sense, even taking account of their "reasonable" admin charge of £17.

I'm also wondering why they always head their correspondence with the words "Without prejudice".
Does this serve any purpose other than to make them look dodgy as hell?

I suspect that you can only have the 'government taxes' refunded, not the 'fees'. Government taxes are something like £10 IIRC.

Without prejudice in this case not necessary - the letter is 'open' and does not contain the offer of a settlement. They probably just stick 'without prejudice' on all their correspondence.

so does that mean if you quote 'Without Prejudice' on any letter or email you can basically say what you like and there can be no legal recourse based on the content?

No. Basically, you can make an offer to settle a dispute on a 'without prejudice' basis such that you do not admit liability. However, just saying 'without prejudice' does not mean that you can say whatever you like without any possibility of legal recourse.

ok, thanks for the info

[Snoggledog]

Bumped to add that the missus got stung last week with a new trick.

Hand luggage is now being weighed at the departure gate. Any hand luggage over 10kg gets hit with the £15/kg charge. So people need to factor in the weight of any bottles etc that they pick up in duty free before packing hand luggage.

[dave328]

Snoggledog said:

Bumped to add that the missus got stung last week with a new trick.

Hand luggage is now being weighed at the departure gate. Any hand luggage over 10kg gets hit with the £15/kg charge. So people need to factor in the weight of any bottles etc that they pick up in duty free before packing hand luggage.

Which airport was this?

[Snoggledog]

dave328 said:

Snoggledog said:

Bumped to add that the missus got stung last week with a new trick.

Hand luggage is now being weighed at the departure gate. Any hand luggage over 10kg gets hit with the £15/kg charge. So people need to factor in the weight of any bottles etc that they pick up in duty free before packing hand luggage.

Which airport was this?

Stansted

[robm3]

There's something called a Tipping Point. This is the point at which a deal/product/brand whatever becomes unpopular or unviable.
I suspect Ryanair is rapidly closing on this point.

For me personally I use air travel weekly. I actually won't use Ryanair specifically as the cabin staff are the rudest you've ever met. So I use a combination of Easyjet, Air France and Lufthansa instead.

[FPC]

robm3 said:

There's something called a Tipping Point. This is the point at which a deal/product/brand whatever becomes unpopular or unviable.
I suspect Ryanair is rapidly closing on this point.

For me personally I use air travel weekly. I actually won't use Ryanair specifically as the cabin staff are the rudest you've ever met. So I use a combination of Easyjet, Air France and Lufthansa instead.

Except that Ryanair are probably one of the most successful airlines at the moment!

Agreed - I always avoid Ryanair when I can. Easyjet are streets ahead in terms of travelling experience.

[TheGreatSoprendo]

robm3 said:

There's something called a Tipping Point. This is the point at which a deal/product/brand whatever becomes unpopular or unviable.
I suspect Ryanair is rapidly closing on this point.

For me personally I use air travel weekly. I actually won't use Ryanair specifically as the cabin staff are the rudest you've ever met. So I use a combination of Easyjet, Air France and Lufthansa instead.

Exactly right. I've given up trying to get my money back from them now - I've got better things to do with my time - but I simply won't fly with them again. Even on the rare occasion they (genuinely) do flights for £1, it's simply not worth it to be treated by the Ryanair Stasi like something they've just stepped in.