Tuesday, 14 July 2009

The sky is the limit

"Fly to Europe for only £9.99!"

You've probably seen these adverts on the television or in the newspapers, and indeed probably used one or more of the airlines as well. I certainly have.

But having today booked some flights to Spain I was going off the wall: firstly about the difference between the advertised price and the actual price and secondly the way they remove standard essentials from the flight and then charge you for them as an extra.

Get to the airport and check in and on these budget airlines you cannot reserve a seat like you used to be able to. They'll happily charge you for the privilege though.

Luggage is another example: you have to pay extra to take a suitcase. They say it's a saving for those that don't need to carry any luggage, but it's not. It's an increase in price for those that do.

Then there's the in-flight meal. Generally you got a light meal of some kind on any flight longer than an hour or so but now you have to buy it for a ridiculous price. This is something I don't particularly mind because aircraft meals are terrible but the price never went down because of it.

Ryanair announced that using the toilet will soon be a chargeable extra and further ahead they are intending to convert portions of their aircraft to standing room only so they can then charge you extra - for a seat!

The result is when you see advertising for different airlines you can never compare them at face value because they all drop various standard features and charge you extra for them.

Jet2 have been advertising flights to Spain for £9.99 on the TV all the time recently. They quoted me £160 return. They might as well have said the flights are free - except for all the extra stuff we add on.

And don't even think about bringing any extra luggage home....

1 comment:

  1. I didn't think I'd be able to find any cheap flights from Blackpool... Jet2 aren't as good as Ryanair for that sort of thing.

    Now I know for a fact that with Ryanair you can almost always get a good deal, so long as you don't leave it too late - a mate of mine has flown in and out of the UK from Dublin recently for €2 each way, including taxes.

    And as for things like charging to go to the toilet - I'd treat it with a pinch of salt. It's funny how much attention Ryanair gets from this sort of news...!

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