Ryanair’s critics are out of their minds
Are Spain’s regulators out of their minds? You may have seen the news that the country’s consumer rights ministry has just slapped hefty fines on five budget airlines, with the largest of the penalties (€108 million/£90 million) issued against Ryanair.
Goodness knows we all enjoy complaining about Ryanair. But would even the biggest critic of the Michael O’Leary empire honestly suggest for a second that the Irish low-cost carrier is guilty of “illicit” behaviour with its pricing – and thus should be made to cough up 6 per cent of its yearly profits?
Take a look at the Spanish judgment and you’ll soon see how ludicrous it is. According to these supposed consumer guardians, Ryanair’s pricing model (cheaper ticket prices made possible by ancillary fees) amounts to some sort of deceptive voodoo that robs the ability of customers to fairly judge its prices.
Honestly, have any of them actually booked a flight this decade? Have they not realised that virtually every airline in Europe now uses a similar pricing model to Ryanair (at least for their basic fares) when it comes to short-haul trips? It might not be popular, but it’s much easier to compare prices between Ryanair and British Airways (to name but two).
Even if that weren’t the case, do they really assume that there is anyone out there who doesn’t know how the Ryanair model works by now? The fact that fees for things like picking your seat still get referred to by some as “hidden fees” is so outdated as to be nonsensical. Not least when a quick Google search will find you a detailed comparison of how much each airline charges.
But even addressing such arguments loses sight of the main point here, which is that Ryanair’s pricing model is about as pro-consumer as it gets. What some anti-market regulators view as unfair actually results in much cheaper prices for the vast majority of customers – and we’ve had 20 years of evidence to back that up.
While I can’t claim to have flown in the pre-Ryanair era, it’s common knowledge that flights were more expensive. Just ask Sir Robin Jacob, the former High Court judge who presided over a famous case between British Airways and Ryanair that should have put the matter to bed way back in 2000.
The dispute sprang from a notorious Ryanair advertising campaign which displayed some of its ticket prices alongside BA’s. For a return trip from London to Frankfurt, for example, Ryanair was offering tickets for £69, compared with a whopping £374 with BA. (In true early O’Leary style, the advert called the latter “Expensive B------s”.)
When BA sued claiming misrepresentation, the High Court sided with Ryanair (although Mr Justice Jacob did acknowledge that BA’s prices weren’t so expensive at weekends). It’s an interesting case, and one that the Spanish consumer watchdog could have benefited from reading before taking aim at budget airlines.
But perhaps the ultimate proof of Ryanair’s consumer-friendly credentials is the fact that its prices have actually got cheaper since then. A return to Frankfurt for £69? I just tried to book the same trip for this January and I was quoted £29.98. How many other companies can say they are charging less than they were 25 years ago?
Ah, critics will say, but Ryanair didn’t charge for a carry-on bag in those days. Well yes, that’s true – but isn’t that the point? The more things they can make optional (for a price), then the lower they can make the actual tickets – and the more choice we consumers have.
Even leaving aside prices, the love-to-hate-them airline punches above its weight on other important metrics. For a start, it’s famously punctual, beating easyJet, British Airways, TUI and Wizz Air when it came to delays in 2023. Meanwhile, its cancellation rate was less than a fifth of BA’s, with just one in 300 flights departing from the UK getting the chop last year.
The low-cost pioneer also deserves some applause for the speed it has been opening up new routes from smaller British airports. In the past two years, they’ve announced new services from Glasgow, Aberdeen, Manchester, Birmingham, Norwich, Bournemouth, Bristol and even Teesside.
If you haven’t heard of the latter, it used to be known as Durham Tees Valley, until it ran into commercial difficulties in the 2010s. In 2018, it was effectively nationalised by the Tory mayor Ben Houchen. Now he’s hoping that Ryanair’s routes to Malaga and Mallorca will revive its fortunes. In other words, Ryanair is “levelling up” in action.
Sure, there are things that could be improved (we made some helpful suggestions here), but the fact remains that Europe’s largest low-cost carrier has done more to protect our wallets than any consumer watchdog I can think of. No wonder Ryanair say they will appeal the judgement.
I mean, just look at their prices for early next year. London to Venice for £40 return? If that’s “illicit profiteering”, then I’m Al Capone.