Ryanair responds to criticism over "misleading" adverts

Low-cost airline Ryanair has come under criticism for allegedly misleading customers as to how close they land to the cities their flights claim to serve.

A recent report by the consumer magazine Holiday Which? revealed that on a number of routes, Ryanair does not actually land at the major airports of numerous cities. Passengers flying to Bologna landed at an airport 37 miles away from the Italian city, whole travellers on a flight to Copenhagen instead landed at Malmö in the south of Sweden.

The magazine said that Ryanair made "a song and dance" about the value presented by its bargain fares but that it kept quiet about the "smoke and mirrors" technique it employed to keep those prices down. The report also claimed that Ryanair, more than any other budget airline, flew to locations some distance away from their advertised location.

Ryanair's competitors seized on the revelation, with rival budget airline Go using the information in their own advertising, stressing that in comparison to Ryanair's "misleading" routes, they flew direct to major airports near the intended destination.

Ryanair responded to the move by filing a complaint with the Advertising Standards Authority, which rejected two of the airline's objections, but upheld a third, in which Go had claimed Ryanair had hidden details of the airport taxes their customers would have to pay.

Ryanair's Marketing Director, Tim Jeans, refuted claims that Ryanair aimed to mislead consumers and rounded on Holiday Which? describing the report as a "piece of poorly researched nonsense".

"We don't advertise flights to Copenhagen – we fly to Malmö. As for Bologna we carry more passengers on this route than either British Airways or Go, who both use the other Bologna airport."

He added that Ryanair had not had a single complaint about the Bologna service and that they worked closely with the Advertising Standards Authority when formulating adverts.

(CL)