A couple of weeks ago, we highlighted a story from a reader called Alison who was due to fly out of Knock on a Ryanair flight bound for Tenerife.
The airport has in recent times relaxed its rules on liquids in hand luggage, scrapping the 100ml limit. Our reader was carrying cosmetics that were in excess of the previous 100ml, and was delighted with herself.
However, the weather gods intervened, and instead of flying out of Knock, she found herself being bussed by Ryanair to Shannon for another flight to the same destination.
It turned out that Shannon had not relaxed its rules on liquids and, as a result, our reader had to forfeit her cosmetics at the security check-in.
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She contacted us to see whether we could extract a different response from the airline to the one she was getting.
“I’ve been on to Ryanair and over and back, to which they just keep replying that it’s up to customer[s] to abide by airport rules – and I’m not getting anywhere. I just feel it’s very unfair, as I did abide and had cleared security in Knock, and was ready to go. I wouldn’t have brought the items otherwise. Any words of wisdom or advice or is it just time to let it go?”
We could see where she was coming from. She did abide by the airport rules as they applied in Knock, and it was not her fault that the actual departure airport was changed at the last minute.
We got on to the airline to see if it might, at the very least, accept that our reader had abided by the rules as they initially applied, and might it consider offering her something by way of redress for the lost cosmetics?
There was – and we did suspect this when we made contact – no chance of that happening. The best we could do was get an abusive statement from Ryanair which – to be honest - was more childish than informative.
Along with some other choice words, the airline slagged off our “ever-declining readership” and suggested we “make inventions about what ‘most people’ would agree, when you have no insight whatsoever into what ‘most people’ think”.
We should point out that the airline has no insight into the readership Pricewatch has, or whether that number is going up or down – but that is neither here nor there, and we shall rise above such juvenile name-calling.
The only reason we are bringing the matter up is because the story prompted another reader to get in touch with quite a different tale about the way another airline handled a similar situation.
Mary starts by saying that – unlike Ryanair – she sympathises with Alison over her dealings with different security rules in various airports.
“I flew to Malaga with Aer Lingus a fortnight ago. Security in Dublin Airport has become quite streamlined and you’re now allowed bring through two litres of liquid. Confident that the same rules would apply at Malaga Airport (assuming international or EU rules would apply across the board) on the return journey, I confidently put a small medicine bottle as well as my water in my carry-on bag,” she writes.
However, she then found out that only 100ml was allowed through in Malaga “as in times of yore – and that all containers of liquids were to be binned also. I drank the water, but the medicine was a homely remedy I’d found very useful for digestion, particularly when travelling, and I was loath to give it up. I had recently come upon it in Edinburgh and it would have meant going online to order a replacement.”
She says it was her good fortune to have arrived at the airport early, “so there was time to return to check-in, where the lovely Spanish Aer Lingus guy agreed to put my carry-on bag through (it was too late to get my main bag back) at no extra charge. I had a fold-up shopping bag, so I moved a few things for the flight into it and sent my backpack through.
“He told me that this happens a lot. I can tell you I was so pleased to be flying Aer Lingus with their charming and helpful staff and that my experience was so different from Alison’s, which I read about the following Monday.”
