Budget Travel - The high cost of budget flying

I wonder if other members of this forum have had the misfortune of being diverted while flying with a low-cost airline, and if yes, then what were your experiences.
I was recently lured by one of those Ryanair special offers for tickets at 0.99 euros through the Frankfurt Hahn airport.
The outbound flight form Hahn went OK but the return flight was diverted to Cologne-Bonn airport, landing at the almost deserted airport at midnight on a Sunday. Ryanair's 'contract of carriage' clearly states that there is a possibility that a flight may be diverted but they indicate that in such cases they will provide the passengers with transportation to the original destination.

In my case, however, the experienced turned into a logistical nightmare as I ended up having to jostle with hundreds of other similarly affected passengers (as two more diverted planes had arrived at the airport) to try to get on the bus that was supposed to take us to Hahn. During the whole ordeal, no one from Ryanair offered any help, the airport officials were washing their hands of the whole thing, and the poor bus driver was barely able to keep some semblance of order as everyone was pushing to get on the bus. I tried for an hour and then I gave up and together with other passengers decided to try our luck with the trains. There was no way we were going to wait until who knows when, especially after seeing that in a one hour period only 3 buses arrived. We finally made it to Frankfurt Main at 5:30 am the next day and from there we were able to continue our journeys.

Of course I did contact Ryanair afterwards and filed a complaint but they effectively just absolved themselves of any responsibility.

Has anyone else been on a flight that was diverted?
If yes, how were you treated afterwards?

Also, does anyone else know if diverted flights are counted in the 'on-time arrival' statistics? I suspect that they are not and for this reason Ryanair's stats look good every month. However, if diversions were to be included then their on-time arrivals would probably look more down to earth. I also wonder what percentage of their flights are diverted as compared to other airlines.
I suspect that due to the fact that they fly to secondary airports that are most likely not equipped with Cat. III landing systems, as opposed to most major airports that do have such systems, Ryanair flights suffer diversions more frequently. I am sure that if the same weather conditions that prevented our landing at Hahn were present at FRA-Main we would not have to divert at all.

So, the final question is: yes you may pay only a few euros for the ticket and most of the times you will get to your destination, but are you prepared to deal with the instances when you will get diverted, wasting a lot of time waiting to be bused, spending quite a bit of money on sustenance or alternate transportation and then suffering the consequences of a disrupted journey, never mind dealing with the frustrations of finding yourself at a strange airport, abandoned by the airline? Is it all worth it?

Several cliches come to mind: You get what you paid for; There's no such thing as a free lunch. Ideally, one might think by paying 99 cents for this flight and one can travel around the world. In reality, you either pay up front or in the end with time or other currency. Nevertheless, there are situations where everything turned out perfectly.

This is not about clichés because:
a. I did not get what I paid for (I was not transported to Hahn)
b. the mythical 'lunch' was not free as I did pay for it (in total actually about 46 euros when all the fees and taxes were counted)

This is more about breach of contract, Ryanair's indifference and a warning to all those who are contemplating putting their latvian-speaking grandma on a Ryanair plane to see the relatives in Frankfurt. It may turn out that grandma is stuck in Cologne, completely bewildered and abandoned in a strange place, unable to talk to anyone to find out what's happening.

The breach of contract is simple: Ryanair took my money (as little of it as it was) and in return agreed to transport me, in some comfort and safety, to Hahn. It did not do it and, what's more, it didn't care.
To many people, this would not matter a lot because the impact on their lives was manageable. However, to many other people, the impact can be serious. The diversion itself, of course, is not Ryanair's fault. However, it is an event, or a risk, that they must be able to deal with in everday operation. Based on my experience, they do not have a system in place that enables them to deal with such eventualities in a reasonable and competent way. What astounds me is that the aviation authorities accept this situation.

LCCs are also notorious for being more rigid about checked-luggage limits. And in such cases, some people pay more to fly a LCC than to fly a non-LCC carrier.

especially after seeing that in a one hour period only 3 buses arrived.

Imagine not being able to rustle up a fleet of coaches within an hour at an airport they don't normally serve and at the dead of night on a Sunday after unplanned diversions - What is this world coming to!

>Is it all worth it?

As with most things in life "it depends."

Let's say you pay for tickets yourself and you fly often. Let's also say for the sake of arguement that by flying LCCs you save yourself $2000 per year. Is the risk of a bad situation worth the $2000 savings per year? Some would say yes, some no.

Let's say you fly infrequently and the LCC ticket saves you $100 - Is the inconvenience worth the $100? Probably not.

Cheers,
Geoff Glave
Vancouver, Canada

This is a well known risk of flying Ryanair. They are within their rights and there is no moral- let alone legal- bond impelling them to bring you home.

Sorry for your inconvenience, but you get what you pay for....

When Independence Air was still up & running, a buddy of mine flew TYS-IAD-DTW to go to a concert in DTW because it was about $300 less than TYS-DTW non-stop on NW. DH ended up cancelling the DTW-IAD flight on the return & even though there were at least 3 DTW-IAD flights on NW that day, he was forced to wait around for something like 7 hours til the next DTW-IAD flight on DH as DH didn't have any sort of share agreements in place with either NW or UA. He finally got back to TYS, but a lot later than intended.

Ever since then, I stay away from the LCC's - I prefer to fly with a company that'll get me home & if they can't, they have agreements with someone who can.

I have travelled a bit around Europe using LCC's (both Ryanair and Easyjet) and have been fortunate to always end up in the right place in a reasonable amount of time. Hopefully my good luck will continue.

I can certainly sympathize with "Refuse's" frustration at Ryanair's handling of this situation. However as others have pointed out this sort of problem may be a downside of flying with LCC's.

It would be interesting to hear from others who have experienced similar unplanned diversions on mainline carriers, and how this was handled. There are a number of current threads in the NW, AA, and UA forums about weather related problems in NRT. It doesn't sound like that was much fun either.

My question is as follows. Some of the premium credit cards offer "Trip Interruption" coverage on flights purchased using the card. I wonder if anyone has ever recovered costs incurred during these type of incidents (unplanned diversions, weather delays, flight cancellations, etc.) from any of the credit card insurance programs.

How far is Hahn from Cologne. From what I remember of Hahn you'd be better off at Cologne anyway. ;) To the OP sorry about your bad experience, seems like this is a risk you take when flying with Ryanair.

I think the OP is quite right to be miffed. LCC or no, getting you from A to B is the most basic and rock bottom expectation that any airline should have to meet. If Ryanair thinks it can do that by only charging 1 euro or whatever per passenger, that's their business, but they still have a basic obligation to deliver the passenger to their final destination within a reasonable period after the scheduled arrival time. Just because they are LCC and he paid a dirt cheap fair does not relieve Ryanair of that obligation. And for them to treat him as if they don't is bunk.

they still have a basic obligation to deliver the passenger to their final destination within a reasonable period after the scheduled arrival time. Just because they are LCC and he paid a dirt cheap fair does not relieve Ryanair of that obligation. And for them to treat him as if they don't is bunk.

Unfortunately, no, Ryanair can do this. It's in their terms and conditions which every passenger accepts. I don't like it either but it's in black and white... :(

But there is lots in their terms and conditions which is now illegal. It's just that the laws which make their T&Cs illegal are still fairly new and no one has challenged them yet.

This is why I prefer scheduled service over charters to sun destinations, UA+AC would actually take care you unlike the outsoucred CSA's with the charter airlines.

But I mean, if you're a student and poor, and got diverted, you'd just sleep on the ramp somewhere. It's apart of LCC culture. Now if you're a cheap-assed yuppie, you'll have problems.