Ryanair boss Michael O’Leary has admitted the cancellation of flights due to pilot holidays is ‘a mess’
Ryanair’s chief executive has admitted the ‘mess’ over its mass flight cancellations could cost the airline nearly £18million and promised those affected will discover their fate tonight.
The under-fire carrier will be dropping up to 50 services a day over the next six weeks, leaving passengers stranded or out of pocket.
Ryanair said air traffic control delays, strikes, bad weather and a backlog of holiday has led to punctuality falling to below 80 per cent over the last two weeks.
Chief executive Michael O’Leary admitted: ‘It is clearly a mess.’
He added: ‘We’re working very hard at the moment to make sure we finalise the list of flight cancellations, which will affect less than two per cent of our customers, and also look after those customers who are disrupted.’
O’Leary said customers whose flights have been cancelled will receive an email by Monday evening.
This will inform them what flights they can transfer to, which will be ‘hopefully on the same or at worse the next day’.
Ryanair faces a compensation bill of up to £17.7 million (€20 million) for the flight cancellations ‘mess’, Mr O’Leary said.
He told a press conference: ‘Clearly there’s a large reputational impact for which again I apologise. We will try to do better in future.
Ryanair will drop 40-50 flights a day over the next six weeks, leaving passengers stranded or out of pocket
‘In terms of lost profitability we think it will cost us something of the order of up to about five million euros (£4.4 million) over the next six weeks and in terms of the EU261 compensation we think that will be something up to a maximum of 20 million euros but much depends on how many of the alternative flights our customers take up.’
One passenger told BBC News: ‘Ryanair left me stranded in Krakow and gave me no option to get home in a reasonable amount of time so I took matters into my own hands.
‘I spent £500 on tickets for myself, my partner and my mother to get back to London on another carrier.
‘We’re about halfway through what’s going to be an all-day journey involving a taxi and two planes and it’s been a really frustrating experience. Frustrating and costly.’
Another added: ‘Pretty disappointed about it. Even if they gave me a week’s longer notice it would have been much better for me but they didn’t.
‘They texted me the evening before the morning I was supposed to fly out so, yeah, pretty disappointed.
Mr O’Leary said: ‘If they’re not satisfied with the alternative flights offered they can have a full refund and they will all be entitled to their EU261 compensation entitlements.
‘We will not be trying to claim exceptional circumstances.
‘This is our mess-up. When we make a mess in Ryanair we come out with our hands up.
‘We try to explain why we’ve made the mess and we will pay compensation to those passengers who are entitled to compensation, which will be those flights that are cancelled over the next two weeks.’
Mr O’Leary insisted the airline is ‘not short of pilots’ as he explained the reason behind the cancellations.
He said: ‘What we have messed up is the allocation of holidays and trying to over-allocate holiday during September and October, while we’re still running most of the summer schedule, and taking flight delays because of principally air traffic control and weather disruptions.’
Some have alleged the airline is trying to steer customers away from claiming compensation by not making the offer clear on its website.
It tells passengers: ‘We offer you two options to choose from: 1. Apply for a refund 2. Change your Cancelled Flight’.
However, Ryanair fails to inform them it is required to pay €250 to €400 under EU rules, nor the obligation to pay for flights on other airlines ‘at the earliest opportunity’.
It does have a link outlining the EU regulation at the bottom of the page and only travellers who follow the link and read the small print will be able to see this.
Paul Charles, former communications director at Virgin Atlantic, has slammed the move.
He said: ‘It’s misleading to give customers only half the true picture.
‘They are entitled to EU compensation because of the cancellations so why aren’t Ryanair being upfront? It smacks of the Ryanair of old.’
Aviation minister Lord Callanan has demanded that Ryainair pays compensation to customers as soon as possible.
Ryanair suddenly removed 160 scheduled services to destinations across Europe on Fridays furious (stock photo)
He told the Times: ‘We expect all airlines to fulfil their obligations to their customers and do everything possible to notify them well in advance of any disruption to their journey.
‘In the event of any disruption or cancellation, airlines must ensure customers are fully compensated and every effort is made to provide alternative travel arrangements.’
Rory Boland, travel editor of consumer group Which?, said the airline must arrange alternative flights or provide a full refund.
Ryanair will drop 40-50 flights a day over the next six weeks, leaving passengers stranded or out of pocket
He added: ‘It’s also essential that Ryanair release a full list of flights that will be affected so that passengers have as much time as possible to make alternate arrangements.’
Ryanair chief marketing officer Kenny Jacobs said the company will ‘continue to send regular updates’ to passengers.
The airline explained there will be a two per cent reduction in its 2,500 daily scheduled flights until the end of October.
Ryanair also said a ‘slightly higher number’ of flights were cancelled this weekend, and it will bring in additional standby aircraft to help restore punctuality.
A spokesman said the number of flights delayed or cancelled was ‘unacceptable’.
Ryanair chief marketing officer Kenny Jacobs said the company will ‘continue to send regular updates’ to passengers
Some travellers said last-minute cancellations had left them out-of-pocket due to non-refundable accommodation costs, or with no choice but to book expensive alternative flights or transport.
Others said they had been left stranded in their holiday destination and many urged Ryanair to publish a list of all flight cancellations.
The vast majority of UK cancellations affected Stansted. Some Dublin flights were also dropped.
Writing on Ryanair’s Facebook page, Lucy Dwyer said she is due to travel on Thursday and needs to know if the flight will go ahead.
She wrote: ‘It’s three days before the flight. Can you tell me before I book airport transfers? This is an absolute joke. My anxiety is through the roof! Thanks Ryanair.’
Another passenger, Lizzie Gayton, said she had to spend almost £700 to get home on Sunday after her flight from Lisbon to London Stansted was cancelled with less than 48 hours’ notice.
‘You weren’t able to offer me another flight in time for me to get back for work,’ she wrote.
‘It is lucky that I had a credit card on me and don’t have six kids to pay for! It is outrageous to think you are treating paying customers like this.’
Harriet Kathryn Ross wrote: ‘What they need to do is confirm and publish a schedule of which flights will be cancelled over the next six weeks… it’s wrong to leave people in suspense at the last minute. It’s not fair.’
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