Baggage - Ryanair consistently breaches own Customer Charter

[cutyou...@googlemail.com]

Two months ago, on 24 May, I took a party of 15 Scouts (12 young
people and 3 Adults) to Slovenia for a week-long expedition. We flew
Ryanair to Klagenfurt, Austria, as this was the nearest airport to our
destination. We checked in 15 rucksacks: 14 of these got to Austria
with us but one was missing. We got a Property Irregularity Report
from the airport, confirmed the forwarding address in Slovenia, and
set off on our expedition.

The airport rang TWO DAYS LATER to say that Ryanair had found the bag
and would deliver it to Klagenfurt the following day, 27 May. However,
they told me that Ryanair had refused to authorise the onward delivery
of the bag to us because we were "more than 25 km away from the
airport"!

I managed to send a clearly worded fax to Ryanair Baggage Handling
Department in Dublin (quite an achievement on a white-water rafting
day!), explaining that one child had no clothes or equipment for a
mountain expedition and requesting that they honour their
responsibility to deliver the bag to us without further delay. The fax
went straight through - perhaps because it was a bank holiday in UK.
Klagenfurt airport also sent them at least three emails, my insurers
tried to contact them and the child's parents actually managed to
speak to someone. Ryanair gave NO RESPONSE to anyone! Consequently,
the missing rucksack waited at Klagenfurt airport until we were able
to collect it during our return journey on 31 May.

We bought a few essentials to get the tearful Scout through the rest
of the week. Back home, I wrote to Ryanair again - this time sending
my letters to their Stansted and Dublin offices, by recorded delivery.
I asked for a response within 7 days, in accordance with their
customer charter, and demanded repayment of our expenses caused by
their mishandling of the delayed bag. I also requested compensation
for the suffering and upset caused to the family of the child who
spent a whole expedition without their stuff.

After 6 days I got an email from Ryanair - titled "do not reply to
this email" - saying they were sorry to have lost the bag and didn't
know where it was. Every single fact in the letter was wrong,
including the name of the bag's owner. This appears to be Ryanair's
attempt to meet their customer charter obligation without actually
investigating anything - or even reading my letters!

After receiving no cogent response from Ryanair, I wrote a third time
and spelled out what their customer service policy looks like from
this side: more calculated and cunning than incompetent. I asserted
that their refusal to respond to customers in need, or their
complaints afterwards, was a deliberate business policy. Needless to
say, they did not reply.

Fortunately, I have had my expenses paid by my travel insurer. Another
insurance company commented that it was so difficult to get Ryanair to
respond to claims that a consortium of insurers is planning to bring a
"class action" against them, to compel them to start handling
legitimate complaints and claims responsibly. There is no sign of the
compensation requested for the Scout who endured their expedition
without their essential equipment - and I am not about to hold my
breath.

So BE WARNED! If you entrust your expedition gear to Ryanair, you may
not see it again until the end of your expedition and they will not
even acknowledge your complaints, let alone deliver your kit to you,
despite the promises in their Customer Charter to do both these
things. Traveller beware!