The Curmudgeon

The curmudgeon is a miserable sod. He likes to have a moan. He tackles subjects which many foreigners living in Spain agree with but are too polite to say anything.

Ryanair - the world's most successful airline - and the most hated
Friday, April 18, 2025 @ 6:27 PM

I've always had a love/hate relationship with Ryanair, the Irish low-cost airline.

When Ryanair started out, back in 1980, I always preferred its main competitor easyJet, run by the charismatic and charming Greek Stelios Haji-Ioannou (Athens, 1967) as compared to the abrasive and aggressive Ryanair boss Michael O'Leary (Dublin, 1961).

My Ryanair History

For several years we flew easyJet out of Manchester, but then we switched to Liverpool John Lennon airport, a Ryanair hub, because the flights were cheaper and the routes and timings more convenient. We had bought an apartment in Ronda (Malaga) in 2001 and also a house there two years later. For years we flew to Granada, until Ryanair pulled out over a row about landing fees, so we resumed flying to Malaga airport, usually with Ryanair, for the reasons mentioned.

I hated the experience. These were the days of the undignified sprint to board the plane as no seats were allocated back then. Only to discover that the cabin crew, all sassy scouse lasses, were rude and unfriendly, made our flights far from pleasant experiences.

But, hey, the flights only lasted around 2 and a bit hours and were ridiculously cheap (sometimes as little as 5€) that I put up with it.

In addition O'Leary's quest to extract as much as possible from passengers with extra charges and expensive onboard drinks and snacks, and penny-pinching when it came to refunds or compensation, was incredibly frustrating.

Makeover/Charm Offensive

Then it all began to change when Ryanair pioneered seat allocation, at an extra cost, of course, if you wished to choose your seat - aisle, front, middle, back, extra legroom. Charges for your luggage were next. Nowadays a checked-in 15kg case can cost more than the flight!

As a result when I fly Ryanair to the UK to visit family, I squeeze a minimum of clothing into my free hand luggage, on the grounds I can always wash and dry socks and underwear as I invariably stay with one of my kids or my brother.

The airline must also have invested in staff training because cabin crew suddenly became friendly and pleasant, or maybe it's because they weren't from Liverpool!

Just to be clear and fair, I worked on Merseyside for 25 years and I just loved the people, for their cheeky humour.

From Liverpool (one of my favourite cities for its vibe, its pubs, its two cathedrals, the Everyman Theatre, the Cavern Club and its refurbished docks), to Bootle, Formby, Southport and Maghull.

I must not forget St Helens and Newton-le Willows, where I also worked for six and nine years respectively, before clocking up a decade in the borough of Sefton.

Endword

Despite all the above, I've grown to "love" the Irish airline, as it serves its purpose, ie cheap, "no frills" air travel to almost anywhere in Europe.

By the way, my German (second) wife won't hear a bad word said about Ryanair.

© The Curmudgeon

Links:

20+ Things To Do In Granada - Not Just The Alhambra (2025)!

Fear of flying? - Olive Press News Spain

My first post-Covid flight - Secret Serrania de Ronda

My Special Places in Spain

My Top 10 places in Ronda - Secret Serrania de Ronda

Ryanair one of four airlines fined for illegal charges for passengers

Photos:

MerseysidePrepared, MerseyTravel, Ryanair Help Centre, Trip Advisor, Wikipedia

Acknowledgements:

Olive Press News, Paul Whitelock, Ryanair, Sophie Pearce, ThirdEyeTraveller, Wikipedia

Tags:

Athens, Bootle, Cavern Club, Curmudgeon, Dublin, easyJet, Everyman Theatre, Formby, German, Granada, Irish airline, Liverpool, Liverpool John Lennon Airport, low-cost airline, Maghull, Malaga, Manchester, Merseyside, MerseysidePrepared, MerseyTravel, Michael O'Leary, Newton-le Willows, Olive Press News, Paul Whitelock, Ronda, Ryanair, Ryanair Help Centre, St Helens, Sefton, Sophie Pearce, Southport, Stansted airport, Stelios Haji-Ioannou, ThirdEyeTraveller, Trip Advisor, Wikipedia

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7 Comments

antonio1 said:
Saturday, April 19, 2025 @ 9:49 AM

For the last few years Ryanair seem to have the policy of seating travellers as far apart as humanly possible to try and extract payments for booked seats. A few times when I checked two of us in, one would be allocated a middle seat near the front of the aircraft and another a middle seat near the back. As a result of this we always travel with Easyjet now where we have always been seated together apart from once when it was a very late booking.

PablodeRonda said:
Saturday, April 19, 2025 @ 10:30 AM

Hi, Antonio1
I would still prefer to fly easyJet but unfortunately they either don't fly the routes I use nowadays and/or they don't fly at convenient times and/or they're too expensive. Fortunately my wife knows her way round the ever more complicated Ryanair website and she invariably books the right package at the right price.

antonio1 said:
Saturday, April 19, 2025 @ 10:40 AM

Hi PablodeRonda,

We fly mostly from Liverpool so the prices and times are similar. Easyjet seats are a bit more comfortable and it is handy to have a seat pocket to put your stuff in. I did used to occasionally use Ryanair if the time suited better but most of the flights from here are now on Boeing Max's which I dont fancy just yet. The onboard customer service is usually fine on both so that is not a factor.

PablodeRonda said:
Saturday, April 19, 2025 @ 11:27 AM

antonio1, how is Liverpool these days? I used to live in Warrington and worked in the Liverpool/Merseyside area for a quarter of a century. Liverpool JL airport was my airport of choice.
Since I emigrated to Spain 16 years ago I no longer go to the North West as my two kids moved to London and Hastings respectively and my only living close relative, my brother, lives near Bristol.
So, the only UK airports I use these days are Bristol, London City, Gatwick and Stansted. That gives me a choice of a few more airlines apart from Ryanair: easyJet, Jet2, Norwegian, Vueling, and Wizzair, all five of which are better than Ryanair for most things, eg comfort, ease of booking, embarkation, food offer, legroom.
BTW, I am also The Curmudgeon, in case you hadn't already worked that out .

antonio1 said:
Saturday, April 19, 2025 @ 11:56 AM

Liverpool Airport is still the same, basic but quick in and out which is a big attraction to me. Also parking very close so no waiting for coaches. We did fly to Malaga with Norwegian from LPL a few years back but it was discontinued. Jet2.com now have a LPL base to but no route to Malaga as yet

Charlietwice said:
Saturday, April 19, 2025 @ 2:39 PM

An interesting piece. I’m from Liverpool but lived in Spain nearly 10 years and only travel back to visit family. 15 years ago we were travelling back (a party of 14 of us) from Mallorca to Liverpool on Ryanair and because of an admin error by the transfer company, our coach arrived at Palma airport an hour late. We were 10 minutes late for checking in our cases and the bag drop was closed. Three of our party had transferred on a different coach and were already through security. We went to the Ryanair desk for help as the flight had been delayed by an hour and there was still 90 minutes before it took off. They refused to let us drop our cases despite the flight delay, they said there was nothing they could do. We ended up having to pay over £1,200 for 11 seats on a flight to Leeds Bradford later that day. Their customer service were no help and they refused to do anything other than book extra flights for us. Incidentally on the flight out, the bag drop queues were so big, they had to rush us through and we had to run for the plane, despite us continually warning them we could miss the fight. (We arrived to check in two and a half hours early). We didn’t use Ryanair again for years. We have reluctantly started using them again more recently as they often are the only choice for some routes.

JohnSal said:
Saturday, April 19, 2025 @ 7:09 PM

With Ryanair you know what to expect. My only gripe is that some of the groundstaff, especially the newly recruited foreign staff in Malta airport, go out of their way to trap some poor soul whose hand baggage appears to exceed the specified dimensions by and inch or so! Otherwise, I am quite happy to use Ryanair and travel to places which otherwise would require a connection and a hefty increase in price. They are nearly always on time (or thereabouts) and are a blessing for us to travel directly from Malta to Seville several times during any given year.