Customers who choose to book a flight with Ryanair will be hit with a £6 credit card charge per person, each way. Bear in mind when planning your next holiday, these fees will add £48 to the average family of four’s bill.
How to avoid the charge
The only way to avoid the credit card charge is to apply for Ryanair’s Cash Passport prepaid Mastercard and use this when making a transaction. These new fees are not included in the advertised price, they are classed as optional. Previous to this, any prepaid Mastercard could be used to avoid the card charges.
Is the pre-paid card advisable?
Unless you frequently book flights with Ryanair, it is probably not advisable to apply for this card. Charges levied for use of the card abroad and ATM withdrawals are high. Despite this, if you solely use this card to purchase flights with Ryanair, this may be a viable way for you to avoid these charges. The card must be used at least once every 6 months, or you will be subject to a £2.50 monthly inactivity fee.
Any other alternatives to avoid the credit card charge?
Consider the alternative options. EasyJet, BMI Baby, Flybe, Jet2 and Thomson Airways all apply charges when using credit and debit cards. These can be levied per person, per transaction or applied as a percentage of the transaction cost. None of these airlines charge for payments made with Visa Electron.
Visit moneysavingexpert.com and view the comprehensive list of airline charges and how to avoid them.
Check the additional fees charged by all airlines, and make sure that you conduct a fair comparison, don’t just be lured by the headline price.
I am sick too death of people moaning about the extra charges Ryan air make, before I commit to buy a flight I know the total including charges and I have a choice. This year I will have flown 8 times from Malta with Ryan air. Excellent prices. On average 3 hour flight I don’t really need to eat, or drink, if I don’t want. I choose the generous 10kg hand luggage allowance plenty for a week. Ryan air freed the people living in Malta for holidays around Europe. God Bless O’Leary.
So stop moaning and pay the massive fares on schedule flights, Oh by the way once out of 8 flights we landed late 11 minutes.
What matters is this simple question. After you add on the credit card charges is Ryanair cheaper than amy other alternative? If it is then pay the fare. If it isn’t then don’t fly with Ryanair.
I agree.get using all these cheap flights now.It will not last forever they are still cheap even with all the extras.10 years ago areturn to europe was in excess of £300 schedule so enjoy now and stop moaning!!
I’m with Antony on this one – it’s thanks to Ryanair that we can manage to get away as often as we do. The headline about the £48 charge is a bit misleading – that’s the charge if there are 4 of you, when obviously most things are going to be more expensive. Easyjet are good but we live in the West Midlands and using them means factoring in the cost of getting to/from Liverpool or Luton, at least Ryanair use Birmingham Airport.
People should put this into perspective, big deal, i have just paid £9 from LBA to Barcelona and back. £9 all in with taxes, so it would now be £21, so what, its cheap as chips dammit and these guys have to make some money to keep us flying round europe for next to b____y nothing!
Quit moaning and get flying before the bubble bursts!
O”Leaery and Rip Off Air are just a pair of greedy……