UPDATE: We were the first to obtain an official response from Ryanair.
Here is an amazing tale from late last week, when an Irish freelance web designer/developer, Jason Roe [and Twitter], found himself involved in a extremely strange tête-à-tête with everyone's, er, favourite low cost carrier, Ryanair.
It all started when Roe wrote a blog post about how he'd discovered a usability error in ryanair.com booking process.
In short, he says he found a bug in the system which allowed users to obtain a 0.00 charge for their flights.
There was some disagreement in the comments section as to whether it worked at the time. Roe claims it does.
Nevertheless, some people at Ryanair HQ decided to chip in. The comments are not what one would expect of a large company that has decided to engage with social media, to say the least.
This is just one of many from a succession of commenters under the 'Ryanair staff...' tag on the same post.
Crikey.[NB: We have seen the IP addresses of the commenters and they all trace back to Ryanair HQ]
So, most people would say that the best method for dealing with a provocative post like Roe's is to be measured and calm.
But then again, Ryanair - lest we forget - doesn't exactly play by the same rules as others when it comes to dealing with customers, complaints, partners, etc.
[Read the full post - and it really is worth reading all the comments from Ryanair...]
Kevin,
OUUCHHH !!!! as you say sometime ;-)
Have you seen that the post generated more than 50 comments? How did he get there in the first place?
Twitter ;)
I cannot imagine that any Company, even Ryanair, would allow their employees to engage with any member of the public in this way. Even if they were in IT Support, they should have simply noted the issue and passed them to customer relations (such as it is at Ryanair).
Poor IT Management and training!
"passed them to customer relations (such as it is at Ryanair)"
From my experience of Ryanair they probably did :-)
In any case whether it was official by Ryanair or just a rogue employee, they have again managed to gain free publicity from this. It is no different really to some of the other stunts that they have done for years especially the battles with the ASA.
These Ryanair people are absolute JERKS and I am surprised they are still in business.
I live in Vancouver, BC Canada and a few years back my daughter was going to school in the UK. She rang me and asked if I could book a flight for her and 2 of her friends to Saltzberg, Austria. My first time online booking - somehow I booked them to somewhere in Italy (yes - dumb Canadian - I know that I should have paid better attention).
I rang customer service within minutes of the online mess up - who's recording said they were closed. So I woke up around 1AM my time to catch the morning in Ireland and rang to see if I could switch the 3 of them - expecting to pay some fee. The rude woman in customer service told me I should have called right away (hmm, they were closed when i rang many hours prior - and were just opening now) and that their online booking was final.
There was no explaining that to this dim wit. She went on the tell me that I had purchased 3 tickets to some city in Italy (that I later found out was not 'very student friendly') and had to purchase 3 more rickets if I wanted them to go 'somewhere else' - even though there was no different time or date of departure.
What an utter HAGG she was (I don't use the 'C' word much - but I still think it's appropriate here). I guess people over there don't make mistakes like us obviously uneducated North Americans. She was just about yelling at me on the phone when I asked if she could just change the destination and charge me an admin fee. I was shocked to say the least. It's been years since that incident and yet I am still p___ed.
Based on my experience with this company - I am not surprised to hear about someone else getting chewed out. Even after this many years - I still tell people about my negative experience experience with this company. I am sure this company is no stranger to negative comments and I hope the years of retelling this story has turned many people away from doing business with them.
Let's hope this New Economy and social media sites like this allows people the ability to make choices based on the types of companies they expect to deal with and all lift a pint to the demise in my opinion as a consumer and former customer of this very poor operator. My advice to anyone looking to deal with this company - pay a few dollars more somewhere else to help put them out of business!
What a shocking way to address anyone! Didn't this discussion come up at the last travel bloggers meeting in London - but a different company? These big companies need to train their staff to understand that whatever they do they are representing the company and therefore have a duty to act in a certain way.
If a member of my staff talked to a customer in this way I would be livid.
"out of business".. thats a bit too harsh!
I can now fly to london for 30euros.. that never used to happen once upon a time..
Sure there are downfalls in the service, but you cant have it all.
If you want better service pay more and fly Air Emirates or Air france.
Consumers often dont understand that if you pay less you must accept and expect less.. this will avoid such disappointment, at least, in most cases.
Clearly this got the attention of someone in Ryanair. I doubt it was the Customer Relations team, as I understand they are only there from 1700-1800 on the last day of the month when that happens to coincide with a Friday.
I cant believe the attitude on some people. I really hope that the employees dont get away with their attitude. Ryan air dont exactly have the best name for themselves as it is without their staff making it worse for them. The attitude stinks, they should be grateful that the problem has been pointed out and they should just thank him and get it sorted, not start an argument!!
Amazing!,
Check this story,
http://handtravel.wordpress.com/2009/01/15/d-19-ryanair-and-charleroi-brussels-airport/
I think the way the Ryanair people handled this was horrible.
But I'd caution those who would rush to express outrage at them to understand that they were responding to someone who, after all, claimed to have found a way to cheat the company and get free flights (even though apparently it didn't really work) and then posted it on a public site so that OTHER people could defraud Ryanair.
Still, awfully bad form for someone to rant and rave like this in an unprofessional way. They should have simply stated the facts without the snarkines and lashing out. Now THEY look like the idiots, not the folks posting tips on how to steal flights.
I have posted a complaint on GetSatisfaction.com.
See http://getsatisfaction.com/ryanair/topics/ryanair_staff_is_rude_and_need_to_apologize
Join in and vote against RyanAir!
I think they owe Jason a public apology…
Thanks,
Patrick
Why is it that Ryanair consistently chooses the path of greatest volatility and defiance of "standard" customer service? They could do wonders for their brand appeal if they made it a business priority, but clearly it's not.
To their credit they did apologize on another site. As the famous saying goes "Speak bad about me just speak about me"
@ giuliano.
Being Polite, having good manners, respecting your customers (and potential customers) and otherwise acting civilised doesnt cost a company a penny.
Acting Arrogant and absusive in the end costs the company a heck of a lot more.
HAVING ONCE BEEN SCAMMED BY RYANAIR THERE IS NO WAY I WOULD EVER FLY WITH THEM AGAIN.
THIS SENTIMENT IS ALSO HELD BY THE OTHER PEOPLE IN MY PARTY.
ONE DAY THEY MAY FIND OUT TO LATE THAT YOU CAN ONLY CATCH PEOPLE FOR SO LONG, THEN THEY WILL HAVE AIRCRAFT WITH NO PASSENGERS. ROLL ON THE DAY
After my experience with ryanair I arrived 36 hours later to final destination having spent 250 euros more and flying with another company.
All these because I was trying to understand why arriving 43 minutes prior to departure time, and not needing to register my luggage I was forbidden to be checked in. And forbidden to get into the next ryanair plane going to a 4 hours car distance to my final destination.
The only thing I tried to do is understand why I was not being allowed to get into the plane..
Isn't it possible to do something legal against them?
Having read all these comments it makes me think twice about flying with them again and lodging a complaint for racial discrimination. I live in the EU but am not an EU citizen. So I can book and pay on line, but am discriminated against when it comes to checking in on line. All other airlines allow it, but not RA. Therefore when I check in at the airport they squeeze a penalty of 10€ more. I thought that it would be illegal to charge different prices for services to customers depending on their nationality. Who can i complain to?
DONT' FLY BY RYANAIR. BOYCOTT O'LEARY AND RYANAIR
AIR et al.
no more unconstructive comments please. you have been warned.
La volgarita' e l'arroganza sono tipici di chi e' in affanno.
Leggete i loro dati finanziari e capirete le ragioni del loro malessere.
In Italia gente del genere e' definita Idiota...
Read about arrogance of Ryanair in Rome (only Italian language)
http://comitatoaeroportociampino.wordpress.com/
If you fly with them you'll realize every RyanAir employee is rude. I don't know why. They're probably low paid and have to work under pressure but they're really bad. RyanAir is one of the worst companies in the world. I've flown with them a lot in this last year. Their flight are always delayed. Last time they canceled my flight because of the snow in London and they didn't even worry about the fact I had to fly back to my country. I tried to change the flight but I found out I had to wait 3 days more. I chose EasyJet which is much better.
Alberto
what do you want from a company that asks money to let you piss in flight.