This blog celebrates disruptors and on a couple of occasions in the past I have mentioned Ryanair as one. Now I regret having done so. They developed an operationally efficient airline like Southwest and passed along savings to consumers. But in recent years they have been trying to sabotage that hard-earned brand with all kinds of exotic fees.
The Dublin Airport Authority points out since 2006
• Ryanair’s baggage check-in charge has increased by 600%
• The charge for using a credit card to book a Ryanair flight has increased by 285%
• The cost of changing a Ryanair flight booking has increased by 66%
There should be no increase. There should be no fee at all for them
And there is an entitlement attitude towards customers, brought out in this recent interview with the CEO Michael O’Leary:
- “Our ideal passenger is someone with a pulse and a credit card, who will follow the simple instructions to lower our costs to the maximum.”
- “The customer’s usually wrong!”
- “(Some customers are) too mentally bloody lazy to travel with carry-on bags”
If customers want a mystery they can go read a book or watch a movie. But that’s what his fares have become. It is some statement that his fees now embarrass even banks and telcos with their own creative fees.
He has other choice comments about competitors, his staff, regulators, even Boeing who provides him the lifeblood planes for the business.
If I were a lady, I would boycott his airline based on some of the comments in the interview. I would hate to hear his views on his ethnic and elderly customers.
No wonder when asked about close friends he says “My wife, occasionally. My children on a good day.”
And by the way, Michael, only your customers have the right to assess whether you are offering a “terrific customer service”
I sure hope SaaS or third party maintenance or cloud vendors or VoIP or other technology disruptors never get as “creative” in their pricing or as negative about their customers
