Ryanair holiday warning – family pay £113 extra for flights due to easy mistake

A FAMILY was forced to shell out an extra €136 (£113) on their Ryanair flights after making an easy mistake when returning from their holiday.

Sue Graham had booked return flights to Benidorm for herself, her husband Eric and stepdaughter Sophie.

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However, when they tried to fly home from Alicante to the UK, they were told they had to pay an extra €30 each for their flights for their seats.

She told the Liverpool Echo that Ryanair staff said their “seats had been cancelled” and they had to pay extra to keep them.

Sue explained: “When I told the attendant we had no money I was told, ‘It’s not my problem,’ either pay a further €30 each or sort yourself out.”

Not only that, but they also had to pay another €46 for her husband’s hand luggage, despite it being okay on the flight before.

Sue, who suffers from anxiety and depression, said she was left fearing they were going to be abandoned at the airport.

They only managed to get on the flight after her husband used money they were saving for their Sky bill to pay the extra costs.

Sue said she was “disgusted” with how Ryanair treated them when they were told to pay it, or not get on their flight.

However, a Ryanair spokesperson refuted this, saying the problem was because they booked the flights through On The Beach, and then didn’t check in.

They said: “This is a prime example of the issues faced when customers book flights through OTAs (online travel agents) and not directly with the airline.

“Ryanair did not cancel the seats in Ms. Graham’s booking. Ms. Graham was charged a standard airport check-in fee of €90 (€30 per passenger) as she failed to check-in online two hours prior to the scheduled departure time.”

The airline said passengers should only ever book directly on the website or the app to prevent this from happening.

It isn’t the first time this has happened – last year, Ryanair said anyone with flights issued by Kiwi.com would be stopped from boarding.

Ryanair’s Director of Marketing, Dara Brady, said that they became aware of the problem with Ryanair flights through Kiwi.com after a “small number of passengers” tried to board without official Ryanair Boarding Passes.

Since then, Ryanair has introduced their own “Verified Seal” to prevent their flights from being sold by third parties.

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