For those of you who choose to use Ryanair (be it through choice or otherwise), some interesting news regarding seating has been released.

Currently, you can reserve seats in row 1, 2, 5, 15, 16 and 17.

Well, Ryanair are extending reserved seating with 2 extra rows at the back of the plane – Rows 32 and 33.

This makes a total of 45 seats reservable on a Ryanair flight.

For those of you who are scratching your heads wondering why two rows at the back of the bus are now “premium” rows, Ryanair in most scenarios prefer to avoid using air-bridges connecting the plane to the terminal, and prefers to use stairway boarding, thus turning these seats in the back of the plane into a money spinner.

Speaking of costs, to reserve a seat, it’ll cost you€10/£10 each way (€15/€15 on longer routes e.g. to/from Canary Islands, bootable at time of booking and at check in. The fee includes priority boarding.

For those of you who use Ryanair, it could be useful for those of you who need to make a quick dash for the terminal once you’ve landed.

Well it’s been coming, and it seems Ryanair and Boeing have come to terms over a new order, with Ryanair going for 175 Boeing 737-800 aircraft.

These will compliment Ryanair’s current 737-800 fleet, with 75 aircraft to be used to replace some existing aircraft, whilst 100 aircraft are to be used for expansion purposes.

Delivery of the aircraft will be through to December 2018.

So the big question is why Ryanair didn’t go for the 737-8MAX instead?

Whilst Ryanair is evaluating the new plane, there will be costs to running a fleet that is different to its existing fleet. In addition, the benefits of the 737-MAX series have yet to proven as cost saving enough – at least to Ryanair. By using existing classes of aircraft, Ryanair keeps its cost down.

In what is surprising… well… no-one, The European Commission has blocked Ryanair from taking over Aer Lingus.

Commision Neelie Kroes states that the takover would

“Have led to dramatically reduced choice for consumers and, as a result, the likelihood of lower quality and higher fares. They were in particular not capable of ensuring that other airlines would enter the market on a sufficient scale to compete effectively with the merged airline.”

Ryanair is of course – fuming, and going to appeal. It calls the actions of the European Commission:

“A political decision to pander to the vested interests of the Irish government—which is a minority 25% shareholder in Aer Lingus—and is not one that is based on a fair and reasonable application of EU competition rules or precedent airline merger approvals in Europe.”

Meanwhile, Aer Lingus seems to be happy, stating  that

“Aer Lingus’ position from the outset has been that Ryanair’s offer should never have been made. The series of inadequate remedy offers presented by Ryanair only underlines the view that Ryanair made its offer without any reasonable belief that it could obtain clearance”

This is the 3rd attempt that Ryanair has gone after Aer Lingus, with this the 3rd rejection by European Commission officials. This time, it tried to make a redress by convincing IAG and FlyBe to fly routes that were only flown by Aer Lingus and Ryanair. It seems that this didn’t please the commission enough to grant the takeover.

So what next for this debacle? Well expect the lawyers to be making lots of money as Ryanair will probably deploy its legal team to try and overturn the decision. I’d also expect Ryanair to go on an offensive and launch a fare ware on routes where there is competition.

And that’s amusing in some ways – because if Ryanair hurts Aer Lingus, it will hurt the value of the share holdings Ryanair holds in Aer Lingus.

For me, I like the choice of two different airlines with two different methods in how it handles customers across the Irish Sea.  I have tried Ryanair in the dim and distant past – I didn’t like it then (and that’s when they had things like.. boarding passes and non chargeable check-in), and I’m happy to hand over money to Aer Lingus more than once (there are good segments on EI in this trip report and this trip report)

And choice is what drives the industry – lets hope Aer Lingus can build on this.

Ryanair appears to be going on the offensive after meetings with the EU Commission is intending to block the Ryanair buying Aer Lingus.

As you can guess, those over at Ryanair HQ aren’t impressed and are preparing to instruct their lawyers to go on the offensive if the takeover is denied by the EU Commission

Ryanair states

“It appears clear from this morning’s meeting, that no matter what remedies Ryanair offered, we were not going to get a fair hearing and were going to be prohibited regardless of competition rules.

Given Ryanair’s remedies package clearly addresses every issue raised in the EU’s Statement of Objections, any decision to prohibit would be manifestly unfair and in contravention of EU competition rules. Ryanair has no alternative but to appeal any prohibition decision and we expect to get a fair hearing at the European Courts, as we haven’t received one from Commissioner Almunia and his case team. This decision is clearly a political one to meet the narrow, vested interests of the Irish Government and is not based on competition law.”

There have been 2 attempts so far by Ryanair to take over Aer Lingus – all of which have come to nothing.

Aer Lingus is owned by a number of companies and organisations:

• Ryanair – 29.4%
• Irish Government 25.4%
• Etihad 2.987%
• Others 42.213$%

Ryanair is trying to get the EU Commission on-side, by offering to give up Aer Lingus’s and Ryanair’s Gatwick base to IAG (Ownr of British Airways), and create FlyBe Ireland with FlyBe to take over 43 routes from Ireland. If this is enough to placitate the EU Commision – I’m unsure as the responses have been pretty negative so far in what the EU Commission sees as creating a single aviation monopoly in Ireland from Dublin Airport.

So it’s down to the EU Commission, and if they will approve the takeover or not. One way or another – a lot of lawyers are going to make a lot of money out of this as they pick over the bones of what is going to be a fight for Aer Lingus’s green shamrock.

“Ryanair has no alternative but to appeal any prohibition decision, and we expect to get a fair hearing at the European Courts.”

The European Commission has not formally announced the results of its investigation.

Everyone’s favourite airline – Ryanair – has a case at European Court of Justice, where they should had compensated a passenger who’s flight was cancelled due to the Eyjafjallajokull volcano erupting and spewing ash into the sky.

During that time, planes that had to traverse through the ash cloud had their services scrubbed, with major cancellations.

Ryanair argued at court that the eruption of  Eyjafjallajokull volcano was so extraordinary that normal rules should not apply (EU261/06).

Judges have ruled otherwise – and now making a binding rule in the European Union saying such events

 ”constitute ‘extraordinary circumstances’ which do not release air carriers from their obligation to provide care”.

This leaves the passenger in the duty of care of the airline, with no time limit or money to look after its passengers.

The case came to light when  Denise McDonagh had a seven-day wait for a Faro-Dublin flight on Ryanair, and had spent 1,130 euros (£968) on a hotel, food and transport – who has been awaiting payment since 2010.

The payment still has not been paid.

Ryanair has already paid out 27m euros to compensate people left stranded by the ash cloud, and whilst the airline is not expecting a flood of new claims, it had hoped to win the case to limit them in future.

The European Court of Justice says the passenger

“Reimbursement of the amounts which proved necessary, appropriate and reasonable to make up for the shortcomings of the air carrier”

Ryanair has put out a PR in response:

“Ryanair regrets the decision of the European Court which now allows passengers to claim for flight delays which are clearly and unambiguously outside of an airline’s control.

“When governments closed large swathes of European airspace unnecessarily in response to non-existent ‘ash clouds’ over Ireland the UK and continental Europe in 2010, the travel insurance companies escaped liability by claiming it was an ‘act of God’.

“Today’s ruling by the European Court now makes the airlines the insurer of last resort even when in the majority of cases (such as ATC delays or national strikes in Europe) these delays are entirely beyond an airline’s control.

“Today’s decision will materially increase the cost of flying across Europe and consumer airfares will increase as airlines will be obliged to recover the cost of these claims from their customers, because the defective European regulation does not allow us to recover such costs from the governments or unions who are responsible for over 95% of flight delays in Europe.”

Already, Ryanair has a €2 Compensation surcharge in its fares, with fare expected to rise because of this ruling.

The ECJ has published its judgement at http://curia.europa.eu/jcms/upload/docs/application/pdf/2013-01/cp130008en.pdf  whilst the UK Human Rights blog examines the arguments in an easy to understand form.

And as usual… most of you know my opinion of Ryanair, it’s practices and its surcharges. Thankfully, in lots of other cases – there are plenty of other airlines.

Once again, the Ryanair comedians of the air are it again.

All bookings made a credit card and flying with Ryanair after the 30th November will be subject to a 2% total surcharge on top of the £6 Administration fee that you are required to pay to book a ticket .

This fee is per person.

In addition, the £6 booking fee was avoidable by paying with a Ryanair Cash Passport. This benefit is now being withdrawn too, making the Cash Passport a very expensive purchase for very little gain.

So lets put this into a list to see if you’re going to be charged lots or lots and lots

Payment method            Admin Charge     Extra Card Fee? 

Ryanair Cash Passport      £6               None
Visa Debit Card            £6               None
Mastercard Debit Card      £6               None
Maestro Debit Card         £6               None
German ELV Payment         £6               None
Visa Credit Card           £6               2% of transaction total
MasterCard Credit Card     £6               2% of transaction total
American Express           £6               2% of transaction total

Ryanair Cash passport users in Ireland, Germany and Spain have different dates to avoid being charged more:

• Ireland -  1 February 2013
• Germany – 15 February 2013
• Spain – 21st March 2013

Ryanair blames these change on the UK Office of Fair Trading ruling on Credit Card fees to promote transparency. Ryanair has taken it as a challenge to charge more money.

It goes without saying, my standard advice comes into play if you’re even remotely thinking about flying with Ryanair (or any low cost carrier):

• Remember if you fly Ryanair, you have to play their game. How much you loose by is by how much you don’t read their rules, regulations and fees.
• Always ignore the headline fare too. Work it out the final before you hit the book button.
• And as usual, if you’re considering Ryanair, please remember – they are not the only game in town 9/10 times. Do a bit of research, and you may find that a traditional airline or one of the other Low Cost Carriers may suit your needs better.

In news that will make you go “oh really?”, the European Commission has formally objected to Ryanair taking over Aer Lingus, and has lodged concerns over competition.

Currently, a total of 40 routes are shared like for like by Aer Lingus and Ryanair – and are the only operators on that route (a good example is my local route to Dublin from Birmingham where Ryanair and Aer Lingus are the only operators… and by the time I’ve done the math, Aer Lingus are a few pennies more on a bad day… )..

Ryanair states:

“Ryanair expects that the Commission will shortly market test this transformational remedies package, and remains confident that its offer for Aer Lingus will receive competition clearance following any fair assessment by the Commission. A detailed process of engagement with the EU Commission is now underway,”

Ryanair has offered to engage with other airlines to encourage competition on routes that are operated by the two airlines and states they have actually got agreement.

Ryanair is thinking its luck could be in as there has been some major consolidations taking place (or in progress).

If that’s enough to satisfy the EC, then its a possibility the takeover might be cleared.

However, that’s a question that is yet to be answered…

Ryanair is expanding its reserved seating product, and is increasing the amount of reserved seats bookable on a Ryanair flight.

On their Boeing 737-800 fleet, seats in the following rows are avaible for booking from 1st November:

• Row 1
• Row 2
• Row 5
• Row 15
• Row 16
• Row 17

Rows 5 and 15 are the new additions.

The cost for reserving seats in these rows is £10/€10 on short legs, or on longer legs (and all flights to the Canary Islands), £15/€15.  For that princely sum, priority boarding is included too.

It seems that offering this service is generating some revenue to Ryanair, and for those passenger who want to get out of the plane first or enjoy extra legroom – and want to pay for it, this isn’t such a bad deal compared to some prebookable seats out there (both on legacy and low cost carriers)

I was doing my regular sweep of the Apple Store for fun things when I noticed that Ryanair now has a iPhone booking app.

With a traditional Ryanair sting in the tail:

So let’s see – nearly every other airline who publishes an app for phone use gives it away. Of course Ryanair will happily fleece you £2.49 for the privilege of an app that has minimal use.

This from an airline boss that calls his own passengers stupid for not printing off their own boarding passes.

Well – one less reason to book with them doesn’t it.

As usual remember there are plenty of other airlines apart from Ryanair who will fly to convenient airports that are well connected… who don’t charge for downloading their app.

In what really should surprise no-one, the latest bid for Aer Lingus by Ryanair is be investigated by the European Commission.

The current bid from Ryanair values Aer Lingus at €694m.

The EC said that initial findings of the take over would “indicates potential competition concerns”, additionally stating:

“On a large number of European routes, mainly out of Ireland, the two airlines are each other’s closest competitors and barriers to entry appear to be high,”

“Many of these routes are currently only served by the two airlines.

“The takeover could therefore lead to the elimination of actual and potential competition on a large number of these routes”

The 2006 attempt by Ryanair to take over Aer Lingus  blocked by the European Commission on the grounds if the take over went ahead, the combined entity would have over 80% of slots at Dublin Airport, whilst the 2nd bid for in 2009 ended in rejection from shareholders

Currently, Aer Lingus has a mixed ownership, with 29.4% owned by Ryanair, 25.6% by the Irish Government, Etihad owning 3%, with the rest listed on stock markets.

Ryanair’s hope is this time they can convince other airlines to attack on routes that both airlines operate to create competition. Considering Dublin Airport is a fortress hub almost where the major competition is between Aer Lingus and Ryanair – this has very little chance of working.

Meanwhile, Aer Lingus has said:

“Aer Lingus is a much stronger airline today than it was at the time of the previous Ryanair offers and is Ryanair’s only significant competitor on the vast majority of Irish air routes,”

“The number of routes into and out of Ireland on which Aer Lingus and Ryanair compete has sharply increased since 2007.”

The European Commission said it would decide by 14 January 2013 whether it approved of the deal or not. Expect a lot of lobbying from both sides until that date hits…

On the ground when we get on a plane, the first thing we see when the doors go to close is the safety video or a safety demonstration – and hopefully a lot of us pay attention to it.

However, there are bigger issues on the ground as Flight reports – and it’s enough to make you want to head to the small room.

The incident occurred on 14th April 2011, when passengers aboard a Ryanair 737-800 witnessed a ground collision between the aircraft they were on and an American Airlines 767-300.

Even though both of the aircraft came together on the ground, passengers aboard the Ryanair 737 failed convince the severity of the incident to the cabin crew, who in turn failed to inform the cockpit crew correctly to prevent either aircraft departing and that  both aircraft had made contact with each other on the tarmac.

The Ryanair 737 appeared to strike the AA 767 on a stabiliser as the Ryanair 737 headed to a hold-point at Barcelona, awaiting a take-off from runway 25L .

Even though passenger spoke to a flight attendant,  investigators state that “deficiencies in the communications” between cabin crew and the pilots meant that the severity of the incident went unrecognised for what had occurred.

Both aircraft took off (and thankfully landed safely). The Ryanair 737 came away with a scratched winglet on the starboard side. However, the more worrying damage was to the AA 767 which  had a gash in its outboard left-hand horizontal stabiliser. The damage was enough for it to be withdrawn for service and repair.

The Spanish investigation authority blame a language issue with a passenger leaving their seat and communicating to the crew in Spanish, which meant the crew had difficulty understanding. The severity of it was missed even when a passenger told the cabin crew in English that they thought that the Ryanair 737 had hit the AA 767.

More worryingly, when the message was relayed to the cockpit, only a single chime bell was used (as opposed to three chimes) and the captain “did not sense much concern” in the flight attendant’s voice.

The Spanish investigation authority says:

“The captain was under the impression that only one passenger had witnessed the contact, and not several as she later discovered,”

“She said that her decision to continue with the flight would probably have been different if she had known that several passengers had reported contact.”

Meanwhile, aboard the American Airlines 767, neither of the pilots were aware of the collision – or the damage that had been caused to that aircraft.

The Spanish Authorities says the cockpit-voice recorders were overwritten and acceleration information from the flight-data recorder could not identify the precise moment of the collision, and investigators could not draw up a detailed analysis of the geometry, and thus no blame is apportioned even though there was a massive communication breakdown – apart from a recommendation to Ryanair it reassess its training for on-board communications.

There are some good pictures of the damage at AVHerald which I urge you to look at.

And then ask – how the hell did this happen without both captains realising something had happened? And why the hell did either of those aircraft end up in the air (and in one case, heading to New York on a damaged stabiliser?)

This really makes the mind boggle when airlines have safety drilled in further and further to everyone.

Maybe both airlines need to take a step back and analyse what safety is – and what the impact of incidents like this could had been… because I would NOT like to had been aboard EITHER aircraft after that event – let alone fly on them.