Ryanair has responded to the claims of a passenger who claimed that he was 'lied to at the gate' before a holiday with his girlfriend.
Scott McCormick and Helena Boshwick used the common travel hack of not paying for seats in a bid to save some cash, but they claim this proved to be their downfall as the couple were stopped at the gate.
They were travelling to Mallorca from Birmingham Airport for a week-long getaway when they were told that the gate that the former wouldn't be allowed on board.
Despite saving anywhere between £4.50 and £33 for not booking seats, the Brits claimed that they were only told right before the flight that only Helena could board the plane.
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They claim a Ryanair staff member told them this was because they 'hadn't reserved a seat', but allegedly later promised they could get a refund on both tickets and travel on a later flight.
However, they later found out only one ticket was refunded and had to shell out an extra £100 to travel.
But now, Ryanair has issued a defiant response.
They said in a statement to LADbible: “This flight from Birmingham to Palma de Mallorca (1 May) was not ‘overbooked’ – it was scheduled to operate on a 737-8200 (197 seats) but for operational reasons had to be swapped to a 737-800 aircraft (189 seats). As a result, 1 passenger was unable to travel on this flight, and was reaccommodated onto the next available flight to Palma de Mallorca.
“Mr. McCormick’s travel companion was not refused boarding but chose not to board and travel on this flight from Birmingham to Palma de Mallorca and was required to pay a Missed Departure fee (£100) to be booked onto the next available flight.
“Mr. McCormick was notified by email on the day of travel (1 May) that he was entitled to claim back reasonable receipted expenses, however Mr. McCormick has yet to submit any expense receipts to Ryanair.”
The airline also explained that Scott was not entitled as he was allowed onto the next available flight, while he can also claim 'reasonable receipted expenses' under EU261.
They added that he has not submitted any claims yet.
While they believed that they'd be assigned randoms seats, Scott and Helena were told in the boarding queue that there was only one seat on the flight.
The reason they claimed they were given was that they 'hadn't reserved a seat', and that the flight was full.
So they could either travel separately and be reimbursed for the second seat, or wait for the following flight.
Choosing the latter, they were allegedly told by the flight attendant that 'you can do that, we will fully reimburse both tickets and put you on the next flight for free'.
But the pair said this wasn't the case, as the ticket desk told them they could only be reimbursed for one ticket, meaning that it would cost them another £100 and hours of waiting until the next flight, where they could both get on.
Joshua Nair