Student changes name to avoid Ryanair £220 fee

Student changes name to avoid Ryanair £220 fee

Adam Armstrong, 19 from Manchester was requested to pay a £220 administration fee after his girlfriend’s stepfather reserved a seat to Ibiza for him but accidentally used is Facebook name, which Adam had changed as a joke to Adam West (the name of the actor who played Batman on TV).

Adam had this to say:

“Ryanair pride themselves on being a customer-centric business, it just seems like a joke when they wouldn’t change the name. I just thought it was completely ridiculous. All they needed to do was hit the backspace key on a keyboard and they want to charge me £220?”

Adam avoided the cost by changing his surname by deed poll to West for free and by getting a new passport under the name for £103, The Sun reported. Because the booking was split over two bookings it meant the £110 charge was doubled to £220.

A statement from Ryanair said:

“Customers are asked to ensure that the details they enter at the time of booking are correct before completing their booking and we offer a 24-hour grace period to correct minor booking errors.

“A name change fee is charged in order to discourage and prevent unauthorised online travel agents from ‘screenscraping’ Ryanair’s cheapest fares and reselling them on to unwitting consumers at hugely inflated costs.”

How much do other companies charge?

Norwegian Air £25 plus the difference in the original fare and its current price.
Thomson Airways £25 plus the difference in the original fare and its current price.
Monarch charges £100 for a name change (or £120 on the day).
Ryanair charges £110, or £160 on the day at the airport.
British Airways Free plus the differences in the original fare and its current price.
EasyJet Free (You can make small corrections of up to 3 characters free of charge online OR if you need to correct more than 3 characters per name, then this can only be done by calling our customer service team who will make the necessary changes for you free of charge).
WhizzAir Free (as of 2013) – Just ring up

A further statement from Ryanair read:

Following the publication of this article, Ryanair has made the following statement: “Customers are asked to ensure that the details they enter at the time of booking are correct before completing their booking and we offer a 24 hour ‘grace period’ to correct minor booking errors. A name change fee is charged in order to discourage and prevent unauthorised online travel agents from ‘screenscraping’ Ryanair’s cheapest fares and reselling them on to unwitting consumers at hugely inflated costs. Under our “Always Getting Better” improvement programme, we have reduced our baggage, sports equipment, airport check-in and missed departure fees, as we continue to improve the Ryanair travel experience for the 100m customers we’ll carry this year.”

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