Ryanair, Europe’s No.1 airline, today (08 Jan) celebrated carrying 15 million passengers to/from Bratislava with the launch of its brand-new summer schedule, offering 21 exciting routes to the likes of Corfu, Edinburgh, Kaunas and Lanzarote and increased frequencies on another 3 popular routes incl. Dublin, Eindhoven, and London. This new schedule will see Ryanair base 2 aircraft ($200M investment) at Bratislava Airport and support over 600 jobs incl. 60 high-paid pilots, cabin crew and engineer jobs.

Ryanair’s Bratislava Summer ‘24 schedule will deliver:

• 21 routes incl. Corfu, Edinburgh, Kaunas, & Lanzarote
• 2 based aircraft ($200M investment)
• Over 130 flights per week
• 0.6M passengers to/from Bratislava p.a.
• Over 600 jobs incl. 60 high-paid pilots, cabin crew and engineer jobs

Ryanair will operate over 130 weekly flights to/from Bratislava in Summer ‘24 giving Bratislava’s citizens/visitors the widest choice at the lowest fares in Europe when booking their Summer ‘24 getaways and growing both inbound tourism and jobs at the same time. This unrivalled growth is underpinned by Ryanair’s commitment to Bratislava Airport where it has 2 aircraft based ($200M investment) and supports over 600 jobs.

Bratislava’s citizens/visitors can now book a well-deserved Summer getaway at Ryanair’s low fares from just €33.99 one-way for travel until October ‘24, only available on Ryanair.com.

Ryanair’s Head of Comms for CEE Alicja Golebiowska, said:

“As Europe’s biggest airline, Ryanair is delighted to celebrate carrying 15 million passengers through Bratislava after almost 20 years of operations at Bratislava Airport with the launch of our Summer ’24 schedule, providing 21 routes to the likes of Corfu, Edinburgh, Kaunas and Lanzarote offering Bratislava’s customers/visitors even more choices at the lowest fares for Summer ’24. This new schedule is underpinned by Ryanair’s commitment to Bratislava by basing 2 aircraft ($200M investment) and supporting over 600 jobs, incl. 60 high-paid pilots, cabin crew and engineer jobs.

While Ryanair hopes to continue making these investments at Bratislava Airport to boost connectivity, tourism, and jobs for the city of Bratislava and the wider Bratislava region, this can only be achieved on the basis of competitive airport charges – which it is incumbent on airports to deliver to ensure they remain competitive within Europe which is still working to return to pre-Covid capacity levels.

To allow our customers and visitors to/from Bratislava to book their Summer getaway at the lowest fares, we are launching a special promo with seats available from just €33.99 for travel between Apr and Oct ’24 at www.Ryanair.com.”

Brastislava Aiport’s Chairman of the Board and CEO, Ing. Dušan Novota, said:

“For us, such an anniversary number of Ryanair passengers in Bratislava means crossing a symbolic threshold. It is a confirmation that this airline has been a stable and reliable partner for us since 2005. Ryanair offers the Slovaks dozens of interesting destinations within Europe from our airport throughout the year. I firmly believe that our cooperation will continue to develop in the future.”

Ryanair, Europe’s No. 1 airline, has today (05 Jan) announced a major recruitment drive for 150 cabin crew to join its London Stansted base as customers continue to flock to Ryanair’s low fares, unrivalled route choice and exemplary service.

To help find the perfect candidates for these exciting new cabin crew roles, Ryanair is holding 3 recruitment events this January as follows:

Chelmsford Wednesday 10th January from 10:30am Moulsham Mill Business Centre, Moulsham Mill Parkway, Chelmsford, CM2 7PX

Colchester Thursday, 18th January from 10:30am  Best Western The Rose and Crown Hotel, East St, Colchester, CO1 2TZ

Stevenage Wednesday, 24th January from 10:30am Holiday Inn, St George’s Way, Stevenage, SG1 1HS

Attendees will meet with some of Ryanair’s existing crew members and learn about life as cabin crew at Europe’s No.1 airline group and what these roles can offer them, including Ryanair’s industry leading 5 days on / 3 days off roster, excellent remuneration package, fast track career opportunities, a once-off ‘New Joiners’ Allowance’ of £1,200 as well as discounted travel, giving crew the opportunity to travel across Ryanair’s industry leading network of 230+ destinations.  

For more information, visit careers.ryanair.com.

Ryanair’s Chief People Officer, Darrell Hughes, said:

“We are delighted to announce a major recruitment drive for 150 cabin crew positions at our London Stansted base and we invite those interested in applying to come along to one of three recruitment events taking place this January to meet the team and learn more about these exciting new roles.

As Europe’s No. 1 airline, these cabin crew opportunities offer candidates the chance to secure the best cabin crew jobs in aviation, where hard work is rewarded with fast-track promotions. Our cabin crew enjoy industry-leading “5 days on, 3 days off” rosters – equivalent to a bank holiday every week – fantastic remuneration packages, world class training, outstanding career development as well as a once-off ‘New-Joiners’ Allowance’ of £1,200.

We look forward to welcoming our new cabin crew members on board in Summer 2024, as Ryanair continues to grow to carry 300 million passengers by 2034.”

RYANAIR CALLS ON DAA TO REVOKE CONTRACT AND INITIATE A FULL PUBLIC AND COMPETITIVE TENDER AS REQUIRED BY EU REGULATION

Ryanair, Europe’s No.1 airline, today (4 Jan) called on daa to explain why they breached EU regulation by awarding a €33m PRM (Person with Reduced Mobility) service contract without a tender or consulting airlines whose passengers are forced to pay the excessive airport charges at Dublin Airport which are funding this misguided contract.

daa have not been able to produce a single alternative quote before awarding this lucrative 3-year contract to the existing supplier (OCS) despite a recent significant 27% increase in price and their terrible performance over the last 2 years of contract, which resulted in almost 400,000 Ryanair passengers being delayed in 2023 alone due to performance delays by OCS. daa have not answered why they awarded a new lucrative 3-year contract without a tender less than 1 month before their former contract expired. daa’s own website states that: “daa is committed to the achievement of value-for-money in the acquisition of works, supplies and services.  Procurement practice is conducted with probity and integrity and conforms to the core principles of accountability, competition, equality of treatment, fairness, and transparency” yet daa has manifestly failed to meet these standards through its awarding of a 3-year PRM contract to the existing supplier without a tender.

This is the latest mismanagement by daa, who just like the 32m passenger cap failed to plan and lodge a planning application which will now mean that Dublin Airport’s gateway to grow and support the Irish economy is blocked.

Ryanair calls on daa to immediately revoke this 3-year PRM service contract and initiate an orderly and transparent process to ensure continuity of service while a competitive tender is carried out (as required by EU regulation) to find a fit-for-purpose provider that can actually deliver adequate PRM services to the most vulnerable passengers at Dublin Airport.

Ryanair’s Chief Operations Officer, Neal McMahon said:  

“It is inexplicable that daa (a state-owned company) did not follow a tender process before awarding a €33m contract to a PRM provider who has repeatedly failed to meet the most basic quality of service standards for the most vulnerable passengers over the past 2 years.

This is simply the latest episode in a long series of daa mismanagement at Dublin Airport, who just as they did with the 32m passenger cap, have again failed to adequately plan to ensure a fair and diligent tender process for a PRM provider, and instead have breached regulation by hastily awarding this €33m contract without a tender or without consulting the airlines whose passengers are forced to pay for this service.

It seems passengers, airlines, and the Irish economy have to suffer the effects of daa’s mismanagement in their failure to lodge planning applications on time or now to award a €33m contract without a tender.”

Ryanair Holdings plc today (Wed, 3 Jan) released December 2023 traffic stats as follows:

OTA Pirate Update:

In early Dec, most of the larger OTA Pirates (such as Booking.com, Kiwi, Kayak, etc.) suddenly removed Ryanair’s flights from sale on their websites. This welcome removal may be the result of pressure from Consumer Protection Agencies or a response to the recent Irish High Court ruling, which granted Ryanair a permanent injunction against screenscraper Flightbox from unlawfully scraping Ryanair.com content for OTA’s, or in response to Ryanair’s KYP (Know Your Passenger) customer initiatives such as verification.

While these OTA Pirates only account for a small fraction of Ryanair’s bookings, we expect the sudden removal of our flights from these OTA websites to reduce short term load factors by 1% or 2% in Dec and Jan and also to soften short term yields as we respond by making more low fares available directly to consumers. We do not expect this recent removal of OTA Pirate bookings will materially affect our FY24 traffic or PAT guidance.

Ryanair will respond to this welcome removal of our flights from OTA Pirate websites, by lowering fares where necessary to encourage all passengers to book directly on Ryanair.com where they are guaranteed to always get the lowest air fares without OTA Pirate overcharges, fake contact info, or other pricing/refund scams. In the meantime, Ryanair continues to make its fares available to honest/transparent OTA’s such as Google Flights, who do not add hidden mark ups to Ryanair prices and who direct passengers to make their bookings directly on the Ryanair.com website.

EXCESSIVE AIRPORT CHARGES CAUSE FURTHER CAPACITY CUTS TO/FROM PORTUGAL FROM SUMMER 24

Ryanair, Europe’s No.1 airline, announced today (22 Dec) that it has further reduced its schedules at both Faro and Porto for Summer 2024 following ANAC’s bizarre decision to rubber stamp ANA’s unjustified airport charge increases of up to 17% from January 2024. These excessive and unjustified charge increases will damage Portugal’s connectivity, tourism and jobs – particularly in Madeira and the Azores whose economies are dependent on air travel for connectivity with mainland Portugal and wider Europe. This damage has already been evidenced by Ryanair’s closure of its Ponta Delgada base, the airline’s removal of one (of its two) aircraft ($100m invest.) from its Madeira base, and the Summer 2024 cuts at Faro and Porto announced just last month. On top of these already announced cuts, Ryanair has today further reduced capacity across 40 routes at its Faro and Porto bases for Summer 2024 as a direct consequence of these unjustified charge increases.

ANA’s airport monopoly faces no competition in Portugal, which allows it to increase prices without penalty. In Lisbon alone, 2024 passenger fees will increase by up to +50% compared to 2019, despite most European airports cutting passenger fees post-Covid to recover traffic and growth. The Portuguese Govt. has failed to ensure that its airports – which play a vital role in national infrastructure – are used to deliver growth to benefit Portugal’s citizens and its economy, rather than solely lining the pockets of the French-owned airport monopoly operator –VINCI.

ANAC must prevent further damage to the Portuguese economy by immediately reversing its short-sighted decision and prohibit ANA’s excessive and unjustified 2024 charge increase. Ryanair calls on the Portuguese Govt. to immediately reopen the concession for the new Montijo Airport to break up the ANA/VINCI airport monopoly, which will bring much needed competition to the Portuguese aviation market.

Ryanair’s Eddie Wilson said:

“We are appalled that the Portuguese Regulator, ANAC, has rubber stamped ANA’s monopoly airport charge increases of up to 17% from January 2024. This bizarre decision will have a devastating impact on Portugal’s connectivity, tourism growth, and jobs, especially in Madeira and the Azores where Ryanair has already closed its Ponta Delgada base and removed one of our two aircraft from Madeira – a loss of $100m investment – due to ANA’s excessive charges.

The ANA monopoly should follow the example of its European counterparts and lower airport charges to help stimulate traffic and tourism recovery, not increase charges by up to 17% to line the pockets of the French owned airport monopoly operator –VINCI. Instead, these unjustified airport charge increases will erode Portugal’s competitiveness and drive-away much-needed inbound tourism in the off-peak season – as evidenced by todays incremental capacity reduction in both Faro & Porto. 

These excessive airport charge increases have today resulted in Ryanair further reducing capacity across 40 routes at our Faro and Porto bases. The Portuguese Govt. must immediately intervene to protect Portuguese tourism, airlines, passengers, and island-economies from ANA’s excessive monopoly pricing that is driving away much needed tourism growth.”

Ryanair today (20 Dec) welcomed the EU General Court’s rulings that €7bn Covid-19 State aid granted to Air France-KLM in 2020 and €4bn in 2021 was illegal. Ryanair now calls on the European Commission to order France to immediately recover this multi-billion euro illegal State aid package from Air France-KLM and impose adequate remedies to repair at least some of the damage to competition done by this massive State bailout.

A Ryanair spokesperson said:

“One of the EU’s greatest achievements is the creation of a true single market for air transport.  The European Commission’s approval of the French State aid to Air France-KLM went against the fundamental principles of EU law, like the principle of non-discrimination on the basis of nationality. Today’s judgments confirm that the Commission must act as a guardian of the level playing field in air transport and cannot sign-off discriminatory State aid issued by national governments. The Court’s intervention is a triumph for fair competition and consumers across the EU. 

The EU Commission’s spineless approach to State aid since the beginning of the Covid-19 crisis allowed Member States to write open-ended cheques to their inefficient zombie flag carriers in the name of faded national prestige.

During the Covid-19 pandemic over €40bn in discriminatory State subsidies was gifted to EU flag carriers. The EU General Court has already ruled in other cases concerning Covid-19 State aid that billions of euros in aid received by SAS, Lufthansa and certain Italian airlines were unlawful.

The European Commission’s Directorate General for Competition has still not acted to force recovery of the unlawful aid, nor has it imposed any measures to remedy the damage to competition caused by the Swedish, Danish, German, and Italian governments favouring their local airlines over other EU airlines, in breach of EU law. Today’s judgments underline the need for the European Commission to immediately act to recover these illegal State aid packages and order remedies to restore at least some of the damage done to competition.

Undistorted competition eliminates inefficiency and benefits consumers through low fares and choice. Unjustified subsidies, on the other hand, encourage ineffectiveness and will harm consumers for decades to come.”

RYANAIR CALLS ON EU COMMISSION PRESIDENT TO TAKE ACTION OR RESIGN

Ryanair, Europe’s No. 1 airline, today (18 Dec) called on the EU Commission President, Ursula von der Leyen, to take urgent action to protect overflights and EU citizens’ freedom of movement during ATC strikes with passengers facing further unnecessary disruption today due to French ATC strikes.

There has been no action from the EU Commission to date, who continue to ignore over 2 million fed-up EU passengers who have signed Ryanair’s “Protect Passengers: Keep EU Skies Open” petition calling on Ursula von der Leyen to take immediate action to protect overflights and EU citizens’ freedom of movement during repeated ATC strikes.

So far in 2023, there have been 67 days of ATC strikes (13 times more than in 2022), forcing airlines to cancel thousands of EU overflights from Germany, Spain, Italy, Ireland, and the UK, while France uses Minimum Service Laws to protect French local flights. This is unfair. France (and all other EU states) should protect overflights during ATC strikes as they do in Spain, Italy and Greece and cancel flights to/from the affected State.

Ryanair again calls on Ursula von der Leyen to act on the petition of over 2 million EU passengers as follows;

• Respect the strike rights of ATC unions
• Protect 100% of flights overflying strike-affected countries
• Require 21-day advance notice of ATC strikes
• Require 72-hour advance notice of participation in ATC strikes

Ryanair’s Michael O’Leary said:

‘We are still waiting on Ursula von der Leyen to take action to protect EU passengers’ Freedom of Movement by keeping EU skies open by protecting overflights during repeated ATC strikes. It is unacceptable that passengers face more disruption from French ATC strikes again this Mon, (18^thDec) which is the 67^th  day of ATC strikes in 2023 alone.

As a result, even more passengers will have their flights delayed due to this French ATC strike, disrupting millions of EU passengers’ Christmas travel plans despite not even flying to/from France. This is because France unfairly uses Minimum Service Laws to protect French flights while forcing disruption on overflights from Germany, Spain, Italy, Ireland, and the UK. We have no problem with French ATC unions exercising their right to strike, but the EU Commission should insist that cancellations due to national French strikes are allocated to French flights, not those overflying France flying to another EU destination.

The EU Commission President continues to ignore over 2m EU citizens who have signed our Protect Passengers – Keep EU Skies Open petition. It is disgraceful that Ursula von der Leyen has failed to act on this petition which Ryanair has delivered directly to the EU Commission offices in both May and Sept last.

EU passengers are sick and tired of suffering unnecessary overflight cancellations during ATC strikes. The EU Commission must now act upon the petition of more than 2m EU passengers’ signatures – there is no excuse for EU passengers not flying to/from the affected member state to bear the burden of national ATC strikes that are completely unrelated to them. Ursula von der Leyen must immediately put a stop to this or answer to the 2m passengers who she has failed to protect, by offering her resignation.”