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Why spoiled British travellers should shut up and start loving Ryanair

Sure, Michael O'Leary is easy to dislike, but you have to love his work - Getty
Sure, Michael O'Leary is easy to dislike, but you have to love his work - Getty

“Who else hates Ryanair?” asks Ryanair fan site I Hate Ryanair (ihateryanair.co.uk).

The website inspired by an unfathomable loathing for the Irish carrier invites other passengers gripped by animosity to vent their spleen on “The World’s Most Hated Airline” - though it appears submissions have run a little dry of late.

Ihateeasyjet.com, too, is not the hive of activity it used to be. The founders were “sad to announce” late last year that they were “unable to dedicate the required time” to hating EasyJet, so shut up shop. A sad day.

But for those who really detest the two largest budget airlines in Europe, never fear, because the vitriol has found a new home in and among the webs of social media (#hateryanair is particularly busy and there are few tumbleweeds on #hateeasyjet), while more than 6,500 people “like” the I Hate Ryanair Facebook group. Hating cheap airlines has never been easier.

But how many of them vote with their feet and fly with other airlines? Very few, it would seem.

Easyjet is the eighth largest airline in the world - Credit: Getty
Easyjet is the eighth largest airline in the world Credit: Getty

Last year EasyJet saw nearly a 10 per cent rise in passenger numbers, up to 81 million; while Ryanair welcomed 129m presumably furious customers, up 10 per cent on 2016.

Four of the five airlines with the best load factors in the business are low-cost airlines on which British holidaymakers regularly fly - Ryanair, Jet2, EasyJet and Wizz, the other being Indian domestic airline Spicejet. Ryanair of course rules the roost, filling 96 per cent of its seats. Every year more and more people travel on low-cost airlines and pay very little for the privilege.

Standing room only | How do airline load factors compare?
Standing room only | How do airline load factors compare?

In January, Ryanair was selling seats to cities including Oslo, Stockholm and Barcelona (admittedly some to secondary airports), from £7.99. EasyJet, too, regularly offers flights to continental hotspots, from £22. A £22 rail fare from the capital would barely get you to Reading.

I asked flight comparison website Skyscanner for a list of the European cities to which it is possible to book a flight and receive change from a £20 note. The list is long: Warsaw, Frankfurt, Bremen, Cologne, Gdansk, Edinburgh, Poitiers, Belfast, Aalborg, Grenoble. Enough city breaks for at least a few years.

I could not find analysis of the cost of European air fares since the founding of EasyJet (1995) or Ryanair (it adopted its no-frills approach in the mid-Nineties), however, one exists for America. It was, after all, US airline Southwest that practically invented the modern low-cost model. According to Airlines for America, the real cost per mile of flying fell from about 32 cents in 1980 to 14 cents in the mid-Noughties, where it has stayed, a fall of more than half.

At a glance | How many people fly each year?
At a glance | How many people fly each year?

It is no coincidence, then, that the number of people flying in Europe, the US, and elsewhere around the world has soared, from 2.14 billion in 2005, to 4.1 billion last year, and is set to keep growing, to 7.8 billion by 2036, in part thanks to the growth of low-cost airlines in India and Asia.

Low-cost airlines have done for air travel this millennium what the introduction of the Boeing 747 did in the Seventies, opening up the world to the masses.

Yet where the Queen of the Skies is the subject of awe, Ryanair and EasyJet are subjected only to scorn.

I have a friend who has a “Ryanair fund”, into which he saves a little bit each month so that when the time comes to book a flight, he has, he says, a little extra to book with another airline.

Personally, I fail to see the point. Passengers flying with a low-cost airline are likely to spend three or four hours in the air at most, during which a supposedly better airline will have little opportunity to impress. And will they do that? Not as so-called legacy carriers - think British Airways - are increasingly reducing their services to tighten their belts.

Ryanair has the fullest planes in the world - Credit: Fotolia
Ryanair has the fullest planes in the world Credit: Fotolia

Last summer, Ryanair came under even more fire than usual, when it was embroiled in a controversy over its random seat allocation. It was accused of splitting up any passengers, friends or family who did not pay extra to reserve a space, a charge it denied (though it did admit to keeping window and aisle seats free when “randomly” allocating seats).

But so what? You’ve paid the cost of a large Domino’s pizza to fly 1,000 miles, and chose not to pay extra to guarantee seats together. The airline could seat me on the wing and I would still be grateful to cross the continent for less than the price of a cinema ticket.

I find holidaymakers’ objections to luggage restrictions yet more baffling. The rules are fundamentally clear - there is a limit to what you can bring, should you go over the limit you will be charged. Yet I’ve witnessed (who hasn’t?) confused rage at the gate when someone is caught out and forced to pay an additional cost. They will likely go home and set up some sort of website.

48 unbelievable quotes from Ryanair CEO Michael O'Leary
48 unbelievable quotes from Ryanair CEO Michael O'Leary

Travellers also seem to take their frustrations out on “heartless” and “rude” crew. I can not remember a flight attendant - on any airline, to be honest - who was anything less than polite. More than can be said for my fellow passengers.

Last week, I flew to Belfast with EasyJet (£35 return). As we took our seats a lady in front of me, aggrieved her wheely suitcase had been placed in the hold as space ran out in the overhead cabins - an increasingly common scenario - decided to take it out on one of the flight attendants.

Despite having the time it took to board to get over the mild inconvenience of a six-minute wait at the other end, she was so entitled, having paid her tuppence to fly over the Irish Sea, that she felt she needed to register her outrage. Pathetic.

The growing ubiquity of low-cost air travel has spoiled holidaymakers, who now want the best of both worlds: the golden age of travel replete with fine dining, silver service and down pillows, and 21st century prices.

But frankly, when you’re paying fifty quid to fly to the south of France and back, you barely deserve a seat.