RYANAIR PASSENGERS using the airline’s new inflight mobile phone service will pay up to 10 times the international rate within Europe, it has emerged.
The airline yesterday unveiled what it says is Europe’s first inflight mobile phone service by revealing that 22 mostly Dublin-based planes have been equipped with the technology. The service will be extended to the remainder of the 170 planes in the fleet over the coming 18 months.
However, concerns about the high cost of the service have prompted Vodafone Ireland, which accounts for almost half the Irish mobile phone market, not to offer it to customers.
Although Ryanair had claimed at a press conference that Vodafone was offering the service, that company said it had decided not to provide inflight roaming “at this point”. A spokeswoman said it wanted to protect customers from the possibility of higher than expected charges and to assess customer demand before making a decision.
Ryanair chief executive Michael O’Leary called on two other phone companies, Meteor and 3, to “get off their backsides” and conclude agreements with the airline. For now, only O2 is offering the service. Mr O’Leary said the airline intends to offer inflight gambling on its flights within a few years, if the rollout of mobile phone services goes to plan.
Previous attempts by the airline to introduce gambling on its flights were stymied by the lack of an effective payment system. However, new technology opens up the possibility of customers making payments on their phone, allowing inflight gambling and other lucrative pay applications.
Mr O’Leary said: “This was the last place on earth where you couldn’t be reached, but that has changed now.”
Ryanair says using mobile phones onboard will cost €2-€3 per minute for a call, significantly more than the 46 cent per minute maximum charged for normal roaming between European countries (22 cent to receive a call).
Sending text messages will cost less than 50 cent, but receiving texts will be free. Sending an e-mail on a Blackberry or other smartphone will be €1-€2, while web browsing will cost about €10-€15 per megabyte of data transferred.
Mr O’Leary admitted the new service wasn’t cheap but predicted it would be used by millions of Ryanair customers. Charges would fall with time and increased usage. “I think there is an enormous appetite for this. It will allow passengers to keep in touch with the office, family or friends and we expect demand to grow rapidly.”
He said passengers were likely to use the service for urgent or important calls rather than “rubbish” texts.
Ryanair is providing the new service in co-operation with OnAir, a Swiss-based technology firm owned by two leading aviation companies, Airbus and SITA.
Mr O’Leary said Ryanair would take only a small proportion of revenues, which he declined to specify, from the service.
At present, only six passengers will be able to make calls at any one time, but this will increase to 12 by the end of the year.
Phones will still have to be switched off at takeoff and landing for safety reasons, but can be used at any other time.