Karle Ofarrell was about to board a Ryanair flight from London Gatwick to Dublin when staff told her that her bag was too big and that she’d have to pay an extra charge
A group of passengers stepped in to try to save a woman from paying a £75 Ryanair cabin bag charge.
Karla Ofarrell was travelling from London Gatwick to Dublin when a Ryanair worker asked her to make sure her luggage fit in the bag sizer. And when the 35-year-old was told it was too big, a group of men offered their belts.
As a team, they tried to wrap the belt around the bag to squash it down and pass the check. But the staff member wouldn’t back down. The intervention came after a Mirror reporter was forced to fork out a significant chunk of cash to take her water bottles on a Ryanair flight.
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“Staff came directly over to me while I was sitting down and asked me to put my bag in the bag holder,” Karla, from Dublin, told Luxury Travel Daily. “It fit in, but the staff said it didn’t, and I would need to make the case shrink somehow to fit it behind the tape.
“They didn’t pull anyone else’s bag, and when I argued that it fit, she said the bag was a danger to fly with, so I would need to make it smaller or else it wouldn’t fly. Three or four men who were standing nearby started to offer their belts.
“I tried two different ones that were too small, and then finally one belt that would fit and make the case smaller. The flight attendant wasn’t happy about it, shushed the crowd and said they were disturbing other passengers.
“Someone shouted out, ‘Micheal O’Leary is charging €10 for having the craic’. The flight attendant got more and more irate and wouldn’t accept the bag with the belt. They ignored my attempts at boarding. She made me wait until last and said she wouldn’t let me fly unless I paid the fine and I could ‘take all the pictures I wanted’.
“Me and the other passengers agreed that she wanted to make an example out of me, so she doubled down because she was embarrassed.”
Karla had already forked out £385 for the return flight on 9 July and £40 for priority boarding. She claims that when she pointed this out to the staff, they threatened to ban her from flying. Karla says she made a complaint to Ryanair.
She added: “The fines are an unbelievable waste of time and bad press. Unfortunately, we had to fly Ryanair due to flight times for meetings.”
A Ryanair spokesperson said: “This passenger booked a Regular fare for this flight from London Gatwick to Dublin (9 Jul), which allowed them to carry a small personal bag and a 10kg cabin bag onboard. As their cabin bag exceeded the permitted size, they were correctly charged a standard gate baggage fee (£75) by the gate agent at London Gatwick Airport.”