Readers' Forum: Have Your Say

The full Irish rip-off now arriving at T2

A recent breakfast at the swish new T2 at Dublin Airport saw Pricewatch reader Hugh Murphy fly into a furious rage.

He called into the foodcourt at the new terminal and went into a restaurant called Harvest Market. “They advertised a breakfast for about €12,” he writes “but that included rashers which I didn’t fancy, so I asked could I get a smaller one.” He was told he could order singularly, which he did. It was a mistake.

Despite the fact that his order was smaller than the €12 breakfast it “came in at a whopping €15.70! And it wasn’t big”.

To prove the point, he even took a photograph of the breakfast which he sent us. “I kept the receipt,” he writes. A scrambled egg was €4.95; a boxty cake, €2; a piece of white pudding, €1.35; the same price as a sausage – and he ordered two of them. A slice of toast cost, now, are you ready for this? €2. Yes, €2. For a slice of toast. One slice of toast.

His americano came to €2.70.

“Looking at that, the coffee is pretty standard, but the rest is just shocking,” he writes. “I don’t recall seeing any prices for individual items (I suspect no one would ever buy!) and there was little or no communication from the girl behind the counter (why would there be, in fairness to her). So, do with it what you will – it seems to me fairly over the top, even bearing in mind business people and their per-diems and wealthy tourists. Ironically, at a point when we are actively looking for volunteers to welcome people to Dublin, we are ripping people off (more than usual!) on their way out.”

We contacted the Dublin Airport Authority to find out more and were told that our customer was incorrectly charged for his breakfast. The restaurant “sincerely apologises for this error” and asked us to pass on our reader’s details so that it could contact him directly. We were told the correct price for a full Irish breakfast in the Harvest Market, including toast and tea or coffee is €11.95 – which still seems expensive to us. The authority says it works very closely with all the food outlets “to ensure that the standard is high and there is good value for customers. All food and beverage outlets are benchmarked against a similar quality establishments downtown and we check prices regularly to ensure there is good value and choice for passengers.”

Not amused by Aer Lingus diversion

Sticking with an airport theme, Joe Phelan contacted us with a tale “of lousy service” from Aer Lingus. “We were due to fly from Alicante to Dublin direct, arriving at 12.25am on the last Sunday in March.

“However a separate plane which was due to deliver and collect people from Malaga developed “technical difficulties”. It was decided to amalgamate the two flights by altering the route to Dublin – Alicante – Malaga – Dublin.” This re-routing resulted in a three-hour delay in returning to Dublin. By way of compensation, the Alicante passengers (who should have flown directly home) were provided with a bottle of water, a chocolate bar and a packet of crisps. “Which really made up for the inconvenience of being diverted to Malaga and consequently arriving in Dublin at 3.30am”.

Excess baggage charge strikes bum note

And while we’re talking about airlines and airports, Caroline Senior got in touch to complain about Aer Arann. She works in the Waterford Arts Centre which last month hosted a concert by musician Michael Nyman and his band. With such a big group travelling and with many of the group carrying instruments, she booked and paid for extra baggage for the travelling party who were flying from Luton to Waterford.

They had to pay no additional charges coming in from the UK but when they were leaving from Waterford, an Aer Arann staff member said they would have to pay for excess baggage charges. “It seems that when you book extra bags you are not given extra weight,” she writes. You are allowed to carry 20kg in one bag but if you book two bags you are still only allowed carry 20kg,” she says. She says the information is on the website but still believes it is a “sneaky trick”.

The airline website does state that a fee of €7 per kilo is charged to all baggage exceeding the applicable checked baggage allowances of each booking which, it claims, is lower than the industry standard.