Budget Travel - Ryanair to abolish checkin desks

Ryanair has confirmed it plans to close all of its airport check-in desks by the end of the year in a bid to reduce the cost of its flights.

From the start of 2010, all Ryanair passengers will need to check in online in order to confirm their flights.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/7903656.stm


No word yet on if they're subcontracting BAA to provide a latent human presence for continuity in their customer harassment, revenue extraction and policing departments, however.

the next stage is to get rid of all their aircraft

Fine if you are at home/office with internet/printing equipment before starting on your journey. What about if you are staying at a cheap B&B in Europe without internet facilities?

Some US hotels do offer airline internet check-in free or for a fee however, it was not widespread in the Europe where Ryanair is based.

They should offer SSCI - for a fee of course.
Still surprised they have not added in seat selection for an additional fee.

Do you just forfeit the flight if you turn up at the airport without internet check-in?

What about pax who aren't EU citizens, and hence can't do OLCI?

Doesn't Ryanair have a policy that you can check-in 14 days in advance? I still wonder, why won't they simply abolish check-in at all....

Do you just forfeit the flight if you turn up at the airport without internet check-in?

FR adopting that attitude would be about as customer unfriendly as they can be and would simply lead to anger and a complete lack of satisfaction on the part of pax.

So you've worked out what FR's approach will be then. :rolleyes:

I'm pretty sure SSCI is coming too, just the BBC missed that part of it.

Maybe that's the ultimate goal . Allow people to buy tickets but not be able to get on a flight ....they could do online scratchcards so they don't lose that revenue.

wonder how people with bags to check will do that. :confused:

wonder how people with bags to check will do that. :confused:

Hi,

I think the BBC report said that Bag drop desks are being kept.

Regards

TBS

I read it as just hype. T5 does not have checkin for economy passengers either, it's OLCi or CIK and then fast bag drop. Of course unlike Ryanair BA has hosts at the kiosks and assistance desks for those who really cannot manage to use the customer enabled options. Either way, it's just O'leary trying to get his dreary airline in the press again.

Either way (if they go OLCI/SSCI or OLCI only) - it's not like they are different than it is now. No connecting flights, no upgrades - no nothing. So the check-in desks effectively are bag-drops anyway.

So where else can Ryanair cut costs? Get rid of pilots and stay on autopilot all the time? Clearly the stewardess is still needed to sell the lottery tickets. And for the planned transatlantic flights to perform bjs in 1st class.

I tried to book a flight through Ryanair (and had the website fail, and have it go through to my credit card 14 hours later after I had given up on the website and bought Eurostar tickets :mad: ), and as a US citizens my wife and would have to pay £5 or so extra each to check in at the airport, as only EU citizens could do so. I'm surprised that revenue stream was negative, at £5 a head.

Not hugely different from what they presently do, to be honest, but a bit of headline grabbing nonetheless.

If 75% already check in online, a decent proportion of that remaining probably 25% probably will now do so if they need to, and Ryanair probably guess that whatever % remains (ie: customers that they might lose) aren't worth keeping the desks open. And they're probably right.

Presumably self-printed BPs can be used at all of their outstations.

LiarAir will now find a grassy field far far far away from the true destination and tell the passengers to shove themselves inside, standing room only. Cattle in the field will look on bemused but still chewing grass.

Vending machines are available in the gallery and would someone please press the autopilot button to start the trip. If there are any problems on flight, please do call us on your mobile phone to a Mongolian call centre using the premium skymobile thingygummy built into the aircraft.

;)

They can just put up some of those stand-up machines where you punch in your ticket number and it prints out your copy. Would solve the problem for anyone who has no internet access or printer the days approaching their flight.

Geneva airport "BA" staff already pretty much tell you to use the machines if you haven't yet done your checkin...

I read it as just hype. T5 does not have checkin for economy passengers either, it's OLCi or CIK and then fast bag drop. Of course unlike Ryanair BA has hosts at the kiosks and assistance desks for those who really cannot manage to use the customer enabled options. Either way, it's just O'leary trying to get his dreary airline in the press again.

Don't think so. Ryanair don't like the check-in computers, they cost money to buy and maintain.Plus they have to pay for the paper the pass is printed on instead of the passenger. But most of all they have to rent the floor space for the computers from the airport and that's more unnecessary cost!!

MatthewRob: but wouldn't the machines be cheaper then human beings in the long run? Renting a square meter of floor space for a machine is cheaper then +20 square meters to run a ticketing desk...

MatthewRob: but wouldn't the machines be cheaper then human beings in the long run? Renting a square meter of floor space for a machine is cheaper then +20 square meters to run a ticketing desk...

In the long run, maybe. But lets say each machine, rental and maintenance costs GBP5000 over 5 years and each airport on average has 10 (STN would have lots more, others less) at 100 airports thats 5 million, plus the software cost, prob another 4 mill (we all know how FR hates software which is why they have no seat allocation!) thats a large one-off outlay when they can just cut everybody AND have no machines!

Also lots of airports are outsourced so dont pay for a full person or checkin desk, just the time they use it. While a machine would be permanent. They are currently having an argument with DUB about check-in machines. They still need desks for bag drop, but can prob cut half.

True... but maybe the machines could be shared by other companies, thus splitting the cost in half or more. I think the machines in GVA let you register on half a dozen different company operated flights, of which BA is just one.

True... but maybe the machines could be shared by other companies, thus splitting the cost in half or more. I think the machines in GVA let you register on half a dozen different company operated flights, of which BA is just one.

Yeah, I think that might have to do with being on a common check-in system. I just have a feeling Ryanair would not want to contribute anything to this! Don't even their check-in agents still use paper and pen? They have always been adamant that software costs money and have only used it for POS.

I'm sure a system would actually make them more efficient. Then again a smile and pleasantness would make them mildly customer friendly and they have never adopted that policy.

Don't think so. Ryanair don't like the check-in computers, they cost money to buy and maintain.Plus they have to pay for the paper the pass is printed on instead of the passenger. But most of all they have to rent the floor space for the computers from the airport and that's more unnecessary cost!!

They may not like them but I have seen pictures of them in the hideous Ryanair colour scheme with their logo on the screen. They may not have them at every station though. As pointed out most airports now have CUSS (common user self service) which is a much cheaper option for the airlines and is maintained by the airport. You may even find these in T3 for BA at LHR (at least thats what it looked like in the artist impression of Zone G).

Still there is almost nothing that O'Leary could think up to inflict on his customers that would surprise me.

I personally don't like using these machines... Yes they're efficient, and yes they have worked fine everytime I've used them, and no, I have no actual problems using them per se, but...

It distances you from the experience, from the airline itself. Even OLCI does this and whilst useful to select your seats and the like, I still in the end like to go down to the desk, check my bags in chat with the person checking me in, and receive my tickets in hand from "a person".

Oh well... anything to cut costs I guess.

It distances you from the experience, from the airline itself. Even OLCI does this and whilst useful to select your seats and the like, I still in the end like to go down to the desk, check my bags in chat with the person checking me in, and receive my tickets in hand from "a person".

So it's YOU that's always holding the queue up at the 'fast' bag drop, then?! ;)

When I was in STN 2 months ago, they had about 20 of these machines, which worked fine, although they did charge us £4 pppw for the pleasure of using them :mad::mad:.

Fine if you are at home/office with internet/printing equipment before starting on your journey. What about if you are staying at a cheap B&B in Europe without internet facilities?


OLCI for this ghastly airline (which I will never fly on, ever) opens up 14 days before departure so I guess pax will be encouraged to OLCI for both legs before they start their journey.

Time to move this one off to Budget Travel.

But BA is going the same way ....

Colleague with Silver card and J section of longhaul F ticket, was refused the issue of a BP in Zurich at the BA check-in desk despite the fact that he had checked bags and that there was nobody else at the desk. The agent made him go to the machine (with his luggage) to get his BP and then cart the luggage back to drop it off. I watched this open-mouhted ! Complete insanity matched only by the intransigence of the agent.