Trevor Laffan: Rowdy, drunken passengers should be barred from flying

An irate Ryanair passenger recently told a newspaper that she will never fly with the budget airline again after being ‘forced’ to pay £62 (€75) to take her suitcase on a flight.

Her cabin bag was ‘slightly out of line’ when it was placed in the bag’s checker, as the wheel extended over the airline’s marker.

She had to pay the airline’s standard oversized baggage fee to board the flight.

After returning to the UK, the passenger complained to Ryanair about her experience but while it apologised for the ‘inconvenience’, it would not refund the excess baggage fee.

Stories like this can be found every day of the week. 

Passengers complaining about the treatment they got on budget airlines, and how they had to pay extra for something they didn’t agree with.

Now they swear they will never use the airline again, but I am sure many of them do, because they’re usually cheaper than the alternative.

I fly with budget airlines several times a year. 

I use Ryanair, EasyJet and Wizzair because they suit my pocket, and they get me from A to B. There are some glitches from time to time, but generally speaking they fulfil my needs.

All these airlines carry out checks on hand luggage in the departure lounge, and as long as you play by the rules, there’s no hassle. I know this so to make life easier, I have an appropriate cabin bag. It fits the criteria set out by the airlines, so I don’t get any aggravation from the staff.

I travel light and just bring what I can fit into the bag so there isn’t a problem.

I have flown with all the budget airlines and what you see is what you get. You don’t get plush seating or fancy meals, but you’re not paying for them either. You get a certain baggage allowance, and if you need more, you pay for it.

Most of the flights operated by these airlines are short haul anyway and not particularly expensive so I don’t expect too much.

Long-haul flights are a different story. They are demanding on the body, and you pay enough for them, so I feel entitled to expect a certain degree of comfort.

There is another downside to flying with budget airlines though. 

It’s not unusual to encounter troublesome passengers on these flights. Noisy, drunk people making a nuisance of themselves and causing discomfort for other passengers. They can make life difficult for the cabin crew as well.

I’ve been in close proximity to these idiots many times and, on one occasion, I had to remain in my seat for some considerable time after the plane landed until the police could board the aircraft and remove the clown.

Two drunk women caused mayhem on another flight I was on last year, and they too ended up in police custody and were sent back home the following day. Holiday over before it started.

There was a story recently in the Scottish media about a flight from Glasgow that had to make an emergency landing due to allegedly intoxicated women on board. It was forced to land in Italy as the pair were taken off the plane.

The EasyJet service had been flying from Scotland to Egypt last month, and the cabin crew claimed they were unable to calm the two women, who they said continued shouting and walking up and down the aeroplane despite instructions to remain in their seats. Police arrested the women.

A spokesperson for EasyJet said: “EasyJet’s cabin crew are trained to assess and evaluate all situations and to act quickly and appropriately to ensure that the safety of the flight and other customers are not compromised at any time.

“While such incidents are rare, we take them very seriously and do not tolerate disruptive behaviour onboard. The safety and wellbeing of our customers and crew is always EasyJet’s priority.”

Are such incidents all that ‘rare’ on budget airlines though?

In another case last year, a ‘drunk’ passenger was removed from an EasyJet flight to Turkey amid claims she assaulted a man. A witness said the woman was intoxicated and caused disruption onboard the plane as it was about to take off.

The captain made the decision to return to the terminal, where police were waiting. The company insists that staff on-board acted appropriately.

I travelled from London Gatwick to the continent a few weeks ago with EasyJet and there were four lads in their early twenties sitting three rows behind me. They were already under the weather when they boarded the aircraft, but they got worse when they started drinking from their duty-free bottles.

A cabin crew member spotted them and took the duty-free and placed the bag in the overhead locker out of harm’s way. They mouthed off at her, but she handled it well.

She was calm but firm and insisted that they relax and behave themselves, but they continued to be a pain in the backside.

There’s not a lot you can do with these people when you’re 30,000 feet above ground.

The right thing to do would be to maintain a register of offenders and share the list between all the airlines, and bar them from further flights or charge them double next time.

That won’t happen though because GDPR would probably have an issue with it. Unruly passengers would claim their human rights were being infringed and the Gen Z kids would claim they were being denied their entitlement to be annoying.

The rest of us will just have to accept that sometimes there’s a downside to flying with low budget airlines, but it won’t stop us.