The Lemon Fool

It's abysmal.

I was going to post this in bitter lemons but I'm not bitter - I'm frustrated.

Ryanair have taken my money and now changed the departure time of my flight (it's a minor irritant and I could work around it but why should I).

After a few clicks on the chatbot you eventually get the option to click an option of "I need to speak with support". Excellent, I can speak to a person not Molli the Chatbot.

Except I can't, as when you click on that it comes up with a "Do you need further assistance - search the FAQ".

Aaaaaaarrrrggghhh. I don't need to search the FAQ you muppets as otherwise I'd not be here asking to speak to support. Cretins, the lot of them.

EDIT - I just managed to fool the chatbot to allow me to actually speak to an agent - "We apologise that due to high volumes of contacts all our agents are busy right now. If your query relates to COVID-19 Travel Restrictions, Flight changes, cash refunds or online travel agent booking please visit info.ryanair.com. If you still require to speak to an agents please try again later. "

Simply wow.

In my frustration the last conversation ended:

Molli the Chatbot: We apologise that due to high volumes of contacts all our agents are busy right now. If your query relates to COVID-19 Travel Restrictions, Flight changes, cash refunds or online travel agent booking please visit info.ryanair.com. If you still require to speak to an agents please try again later.

Me: No

Molli the Chatbot: You got it!

I think that is Chatbot 1 Me 0.

Time for some Pinot Grigio.

The ubiquitous and insulting "due to the current high volume of calls" lie should be made illegal

Dicky99 wrote:The ubiquitous and insulting "due to the current high volume of calls" lie should be made illegal

Martin Lewis has been banging on about almost this on the R5 recently. He reckons when the "due to the exceptionally high volume of calls" excuse is played routinely by a company all the time it is self-evidently a lie and is, or should be, illegal.

Mike4 wrote:

Dicky99 wrote:The ubiquitous and insulting "due to the current high volume of calls" lie should be made illegal

Martin Lewis has been banging on about almost this on the R5 recently. He reckons when the "due to the exceptionally high volume of calls" excuse is played routinely by a company all the time it is self-evidently a lie and is, or should be, illegal.

It's a deliberate choice of Ryanair to basically say "we're too busy, come back later". That is a nonsense.

"You are number XY in the queue" is a common thing now - that's what you should get with periodic updates.

The frustrating thing for me is that despite all my my moans about Ryanair both here and to others I know in person, they're sufficiently so much cheaper that I'm prepared to (still) put up with them.

If Swiss Air flew where I wanted, I'd pay their premium prices but when it's Ryanair or Jet2 it's price only.

Mike4 wrote:

Dicky99 wrote:The ubiquitous and insulting "due to the current high volume of calls" lie should be made illegal

Martin Lewis has been banging on about almost this on the R5 recently. He reckons when the "due to the exceptionally high volume of calls" excuse is played routinely by a company all the time it is self-evidently a lie and is, or should be, illegal.

Translation 1: Yes, we blame the customers, it's 'cos so many of you are calling in to complain; it's your fault.

Translation 2: Yes, we've failed to employ sufficient people, our call centre is chronically understaffed.

mc2fool wrote:

Mike4 wrote:Martin Lewis has been banging on about almost this on the R5 recently. He reckons when the "due to the exceptionally high volume of calls" excuse is played routinely by a company all the time it is self-evidently a lie and is, or should be, illegal.

Translation 1: Yes, we blame the customers, it's 'cos so many of you are calling in to complain; it's your fault.

Translation 2: Yes, we've failed to employ sufficient people, our call centre is chronically understaffed.

And of course, Translation 3:

"We only get to be this cheap and still wring a profit out of it by offering an abysmally low standard of customer service."

Dicky99 wrote:The ubiquitous and insulting "due to the current high volume of calls" lie should be made illegal

As should the expression 'As a gesture of goodwill.'

A translation of, "Well, we were going to keep all your money and use a number of techniques to wear you down till you give up, but unfortunately your case has been taken up by the xxxxx magazine/ xxxxx paper/ xxxxx programme, so we now have to pretend that we give a damn so nobody realises that we're a bunch of corrupt thieving b******s. Naturally, if the situation were reversed, you'd have no ****** chance, since we can afford expensive lawyers and you'd be mincemeat. So we're still going to deny any wrongdoing and make it look like we're being really, really nice! What a shame the magazine/paper/programme doesn't give you the chance to comment on this decision. Haha!"


Steve

Hi,

I'm mildly surprised at this thread, because airlines are notorious for being shabby scammers once they have your money. I waited 2 years to get Covid flight money back with one airline, whilst with others (including Ryanair) I had to resort to chargeback via my bank, not difficult to prove during Covid.

As for moving flight times, that happens all the time, but obviously more so with budget airlines. It's all in the game. I've learned to build in temporal contingency, especially where flight connections are involved.

And as for the "high volume" garbage, that is not just limited to airlines. It's a pandemic...

Taurus

Yeah, it's no surprise people are talking about airlines being a bit shady with refunds. Waiting ages for Covid money back is frustrating, and sometimes you gotta go through your bank for help, like with Ryanair. Flight times changing is just part of the deal, especially with budget airlines. And yeah, blaming "high volume" isn't just an airline thing—it's happening everywhere during the pandemic.

Aleksa wrote:And yeah, blaming "high volume" isn't just an airline thing—it's happening everywhere during the pandemic.

What pandemic would that be, then?

BJ

I am due to return on Ryanair from Morocco, a country that has no QR code boarding pass recognition. Thus the boarding pass can be downloaded but, it seems, still has to be printed in order to avoid a €55 penalty at Ryanair check-in.

I am tempted to scream "FARCE" and "MICKEY MOUSE RIP-OFF"... but then I'm only paying £20 to fly home.

There's the rub, and one that is so often overlooked by people expecting something for nothing. These people enable my cheap flights....