Ryanair cancelled flights to and from airports across Europe overnight and alerted passengers of the changes via email before sending them follow-up emails announcing their flights were not actually cancelled at all.
The airline’s error has left some passengers who made alternative arrangements with other airlines frustrated and fearing they would be left out of pocket.
Flights to Tenerife, Morocco and Birmingham in February were among those mistakenly cancelled and subsequently reinstated by the airline.
One passenger who contacted The Irish Times woke up on Friday morning to an email from the airline sent shortly after midnight telling her that her flight from Dublin to Birmingham on February 7th had been cancelled for “commercial reasons”.
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“You can avail of rerouting to your destination and reasonable care, or a full refund of the cost of your ticket. You can change to alternative flights online, free of charge,” it said.
The Ryanair customer logged into her booking and saw she was no longer set to depart.
She was then due to fly with a different airline to Edinburgh for Ireland’s Six Nations rugby match.
“I went on and booked an Aer Lingus flight, it was an earlier departure but that couldn’t be helped,” she told The Irish Times.
She put off applying for the refund she was legally entitled to until she could get to her laptop. However, at 10:42am she received a text from Ryanair which said: “Your flight is not cancelled and will operate as scheduled. Please check your email for further information”. When she logged back into her booking she found that “sure enough the flight [was] back”
In an email to her, Ryanair said she had “received an email last night incorrectly advising that your flight is cancelled. This email was sent in error. Your flight is not cancelled. We are currently in the process of reinstating flight(s) and you will receive confirmation that your booking has been reinstated via email today.”
The message said that if passengers had “already changed flight or requested a refund for this flight, and you wish to travel as scheduled please contact our customer service team.” It said it “sincerely apologise for any inconvenience caused”.
The customer spent much of Friday trying to get through to the airline.
“I just want Ryanair to refund me for the outbound flight on February 7th as their email of 00:20 stated they would. It’s not a huge amount of money, €35.99 for the flight, but this error is Ryanair’s, not mine. I do have travel insurance but I don’t think ‘airline screw up’ is an eligible expense.”
When contacted a Ryanair spokeswoman said “a tech glitch” on Thursday caused a small number of flights to be cancelled, but they were reinstated on Friday morning and passengers notified.
She said it would effect “a tiny few” passengers as the error was corrected within approximately 14 hours. Anyone who can show they booked alternative flights with other airlines would not be “out of pocket” as they can claim a full refund, she said.
However, a second passenger in a similar position did manage to get through to someone in the airline but her request for a refund was denied and she was told simply that “Ryanair flights are non-refundable. Changes to flight dates, routes, times, and customer names can be made online prior to the initial date of travel, our standard fees and fare difference may apply.
“We sympathise with your circumstances but we are not in a position to process your refund request and recommend that you contact your travel insurer with regard to this matter.”
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