Top Of The Mornin To Ya! (Ryanair)

Member Name: doncasteryb

Product:	Ryanair
Date:	20/10/09 (84 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Cheap fares when on special offer

Disadvantages: Depending where you travel from, certain destinations are limted

Having recently been on a Ryanair flight and then seeing Panorama slating the airline, I thought i'd express my opinion on the budget airline. We went to Duesseldorf (Weeze) in Germany which is located around 50 miles away from the centre of Duesseldorf. The actual airport was abit isolated and on the small size - one of Ryanair's price busting moves,, meaning that they have to pay less fees to land. Once there you have the option of travelling to your location via taxi (at a whopping 150 euros - approximately £130! Or you can wait a while and catch a coach for 28 euros return). Most of the destinations have some sort of coach service available, so always check before flying.

The all singing, dancing website is very much user friendly, although I must urge you to be cautious as there are extra charges which can be avoided. An example of these charges is the classic - paying with visa electron means that you really don't pay the taxes, which means you have just that little bit extra in your pocket. You can do pretty much everything from the website such as search for hotels, car hire and also check in (15 days to 4 hours prior to your flight) to name a few.

There are plenty of idiots guide's to Ryanair available on Google, you just have to search around. But this is how i did it, step by step:-

Get yourself a visa electron card - I got mine from Abbey, as not all banks do them. This took 7 days for it to arrive, so plan in advance to avoid the £5 extra per person.

Don't be confined in terms of a particular date - enter the airport you wish to depart from and the location you wish to get to, then check the departure and arrival prices - to make sure you get the cheapest deal. You must remember that not all days and destinations are covered by special offers so take care when booking.

Opt to take hand luggage (10kg) max. Taking extra luggage (i.e a suitcase) pushes the price up significantly. Sports Soccer sell a suitcase that is ideal for the purpose of Ryanair and conforms to their standards. 10kg probably doesn't sound like much but you can get all your essentials in and even manage to leave room for items you want to bring back. A trick we found that worked was to wear heavier items of clothing, therefore allowing you to take more.

Shop around for travel insurance and not just from Ryainair and definitely don't buy food or drinks on the plane as you will be paying a lot more than you would on the High Street. The drop down menu asking for insurance is a little obscure, in that the choice for "no insurance" is half way down the list. Like I said, just be wary when you're making a booking, and you really will have a dirt cheap flight.

We travelled relatively cheaply, at £10 flight's there and back and i have to say that i encountered no problems whatsoever. The only advice I can give, if you want a window seat, is to queue early, prior to boarding the aircraft. On the way there I managed to bag myself the best seat but on route back to Manchester, as it was packed, we were separated and had to sit a few rows apart. The flights were on time outbound and inbound with a rather peculiar recorded announcement from Michael O'Leary that yet again "Ryanair has landed another flight on time", which made me chuckle.

Boarding passes are accessed via an email and we found that printing an extra copy each just gave us that extra reassurance. If you happen to misplace this, Ryanair charge £40 per person, as they claim it to be an "emergency boarding pass" - so it is essential that you keep this in a safe place.

All in all it was a brilliant trip to Germany, so good, that we have booked our second journey with Ryanair. As long as you bear in mind that it is a budget airline and you get what you pay for, you can't really go wrong. Rock on Ryanair!

Summary: You get what you pay for