Passenger gets his revenge with Ryanair Facebook rant

When Michael O’Leary heralded a new era for Ryanair last September, in which the airline would “not piss people off unnecessarily”, he might have had in mind the likes of James Lockley.

Chances are the airline’s boss has never heard of Mr Lockley, from Hertfordshire in England, but he’s about to.

Drawing on his own experience and reflecting that of many Ryanair customers, Mr Lockley launched a broadside at the airline after he and his new bride missed their flight from Stansted to Slovakia, where his wife’s family had gathered for a wedding reception.

Arriving in a rush an hour before the flight, the couple were assured there was plenty of time by an assistant who ushered them in the direction of a check-in attendant.

It was then that things started going pear-shaped.

“We approached the attendant as instructed and explained,” Lockley said. “Unfortunately, in the main part due to him being a child, and forgetting to bring his mother to work, he heard only half of the words before his brain fell apart like a wet cake.

Things got worse when the couple finally got to the head of the queue at the boarding gate.

“We got to the front of the line and the lady... explained that she had literally just that second closed the flight and we had missed it,” he said.

Joining the long line of unhappy customers at what Lockley calls the “customer shouting desk”, the couple sought out a manager who “was so aggressive I can only assume he had accidentally inserted something sharp into somewhere private and been unable to remove it before he came to work”.

Repeating the mantra that “check-in opens three hours before the flight”, in answer to every question, the manager managed to reduce two perfectly calm and sane adults to semi-coherent rage.

This is where Lockley shows his comic genius: “Why is this our fault, and why should we miss the flight because of errors Ryanair staff have just admitted?”

“Check-in opens three hours before the flight.”

“Do you acknowledge we have just cause for complaint as we tried to do the right thing and the only reason we are not on the plane is because of communication failures between Ryanair staff?”

“Check-in opens three hours before the flight.”

“What colour are my trousers?”

“Check-in opens three hours before the flight.”

“Do you think economic sanctions on Russia will diffuse the escalating situation in Ukraine?”

“Check-in opens three hours before the flight.”

“Were Man Utd right to fire David Moyes?”

“Check-in opens three hours before the flight.”

Despite an apology from a woman at the “customer shouting desk”, the couple had to book into a hotel and fly out the next day at a total extra cost of £384 (€468).

According to Mr Lockley, Ryanair “cost us money and made us miss our own wedding reception through a display of incompetence I have not seen since Greece was allowed to have money and a cheque book”.

“I cannot believe the response I got,” Mr Lockley told the Irish Examiner yesterday.

“It has already been shared online by 43,000 people. It has all been a bit of a shock to me.”

He has also sent his thoughts on the experience to Ryanair and hopes the airline will respond.

* For Mr Lockley full, feature-length rant, go to http://exa.mn/3p3