

Ryanair now presents you with a Recaptcha every time you search for a flight - ewoutkleinsmann
http://ryanair.com

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macuenca
To put people who may not know Ryanair in context: is a low-cost Irish airline
that operates in Europe. You can get round trip flights starting at EUR 0.01.
His CEO is a very controversial person who has been on the press for
suggesting aggressive measures to make air travel even cheaper, like run
flights where passengers stand during the journey, removing toilets from
aircrafts and the most recent one, providing paid porn movies on board. Once,
I travel Madrid-Paris with them for less than 20 euros. Most of their fleet
are Boeing 737-800.

Wikipedia entry: <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ryanair>

~~~
gergles
Well, .01 EUR plus 'fees' (more fees than I've ever seen in my life -
[http://www.ryanair.com/en/terms-and-
conditions#regulations-t...](http://www.ryanair.com/en/terms-and-
conditions#regulations-tableoffees)) including a minimum 6 EUR "Admin Fee" for
the privilege of buying a ticket and a 40 EUR fee if you lose or don't print a
boarding pass...

~~~
tptacek
I didn't downvote you but I find it a little amusing that people in Europe can
get worked up over an $8 ticketing fee on a $0.02 ticket. In the US, it can
cost as much as $500 one-way to fly from Pittsburgh, PA to Philadelphia, PA.
$79 one-way Chicago-Atlanta is considered so spectacularly cheap that the
offer consumes most of the above-the-fold real estate on Southwest Airlines'
website.

~~~
MoreMoschops
You get ripped off, so you laugh at other people who don't like getting ripped
off. Nice.

~~~
tptacek
Tee hee!

------
myared
For those who haven't read the Ryanair story, it's pretty remarkable. The Ryan
family had a small commuter flight business in Ireland (what is Ryanair today)
and a large, profitable business leasing planes to airlines in the opposite
hemisphere during peak demand. When the latter business was ready to IPO, it
went really, really badly and the Ryan family had taken out massive loans
throwing their entire fortune into question. They appointed a family friend,
Michael O'Leary, as CEO of Ryanair and made a deal with him to give him 10% (I
think) of all profits. O'Leary came to the US, studied what Southwest was
doing, and took it to the extreme. He went on to become one of the most
successful CEOs in Europe.

Knowing the story, my reaction to this headline is: wow, through testing, they
figured out that people buy the ticket rather than wanting to fill out the
CAPTCHA.

Great read: [http://www.amazon.com/Ryanair-Story-Controversial-Low-
Cost-A...](http://www.amazon.com/Ryanair-Story-Controversial-Low-Cost-
Airline/dp/1845132939/)

~~~
ticks
Interesting. Low frills airlines don't like price comparison websites, so the
CAPTCHA is likely there to stop spiders. If one of these airlines has a free
seat sale then bargain hunters are on the case before regular customers have a
chance. Those bargain hunters - who use these third party websites to find
cheap tickets - probably aren't the target audience for the sales.

------
rolandboon
Looks like Ryanair is trying very hard to get customers to use their website,
instead of meta searchers that scrape their website. I think however, that
they realize the complete opposite. Their website is now even more unusable
and meta searchers still include Ryanair tickets.

------
kingofspain
Though this is pretty minor in the scheme of things, I'm constantly surprised
at how horrible they can purposefully make the experience and still have
people clicking to them. Myself included. From every interview I've seen with
MD you get the impression he _despises_ his customers. But they still make
money. I guess until someone comes along who can compete and at least pretend
they give a damn then it'll continue to work. I wont pretend I know how they
could do it but the moment I have another option, Ryanair have lost me for
ever.

~~~
gommm
Whenever I've had the choice between EasyJet and Ryanair, I've always chosen
EasyJet. They're a bit more expensive but at least I don't feel as much
treated as cattle.

~~~
kingofspain
Oh definitely. Unfortunately for where I live now, the only routes I'm
interested in are Ryanair or BA. Much as I'd love to, I can't justify the 600%
premium.

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codesink
They don't like scrapers, they don't even allow links _to_ their website
without permission.

From their TOS:

"5. Links to this website. You may not establish and/or operate links to this
website without the prior written consent of Ryanair."

~~~
toddmorey
That's fairly standard legalese for large companies. I'm not saying it makes
any sense, I'm just saying I've seen it a lot. I believe this is an attempt to
lay some groundwork to support the removal of links from sites that you don't
want any corporate association with.

~~~
nekojima
Hopefully pg will remove the link, so HN isn't associated with Ryanair. ;-)

------
rafski
I am the biggest Ryanair supporter, they are the best airline in Europe: they
are cheap and their planes are just as comfortable as city buses but they're
always on-time and cheap if you know how to book. They're actually the most
punctual airline in Europe.

This said, I just gave up booking a ticket with them after the third captcha.
They'll scrap that stuff as soon as they notice the drop in sales.

~~~
TorbjornLunde
Doesn’t also SAS and Lufthansa claim to be the most punctual airline?

(Seems like different airlines are the most punctual depending on how you
measure it…)

~~~
rmc
I believe Ryanair are more likely to cancel a flight if it's delayed (e.g. by
snow). This may or may not be a good way to ensure that "number of flights
that arrive late" is low.

------
bdfh42
They have gone completely and utterly insane. The ONLY way they get custom is
through their web site - and now they are trying to put people off.

No matter what the problem was this is the wrong solution.

~~~
toyg
Actually, I don't think that'll happen.

Who flies with Ryanair ? People trying to save money. If their website is too
easy to use, these people will peruse it for hours, trying to find out the
cheaper combination of flights to go from "somewhere near Madrid" to
"somewhere near Berlin".

If RA raises the bar a little bit, these people will probably give up one or
two queries earlier, hence picking some more "natural" route that will likely
make RA a bit more money. Most customers won't think (or know) about the
competition, RA has a very strong brand, so the chances that they'll just give
up and go elsewhere are fairly slim, especially after having invested all that
time going through captchas.

Captchas are very unfriendly towards older and less computer-literate people,
but those segments are more likely to go through phone or agencies anyway.

(Not that I care, I stopped using RA years ago.)

~~~
rafski
A lot of airports they fly to are in main airports for large cities, including
capitals like Madrid, Dublin, possibly others.

~~~
rmc
As well as Dublin & Madrid, they also fly direct (ish) to: Nice, London (ish.
Gatwick is a big London airport), Birmingham. etc.

However they do sometimes take the piss. Until recently you couldn't fly near
Barcelona. Paris is still Paris (Beauvaus (sp?)). Rome, Brussles likewise.

I think they once advertised flights to Copehagen, the capital of Denmark, but
the flight landed in Sweden!

------
cvander
Amazing to throw away more and more usability in their platform and still
retain customers because their price scheme is cheap.

I guess their budget is not good enough to hire a good programer. I wonder if
the CEO hire his nephew, the one with some frontpage/dreamweaver skills for
the job.

~~~
toyg
They just don't care about "good anything", they only care about cheap. If it
was practical for them to provide only a telnet server, they would do it in a
heartbeat.

------
stef25
The entire Ryanair experience is painful: airports far out of the city center,
baggage fees, a crew / staff that cuts you zero slack and now the website.

They know their business, people will put up with a lot if it saves them money
and that's what Ryanair is good at.

~~~
marquis
I flew from Spain to Morocco with RyanAir, the hassle was so great (getting a
bus an hour out of the city), and the pilot seemed to be in training
considering how the wings were waggling on approach to land (no wind). Never
flown again with them since, I'll pay the extra euro for Vueling, EasyJet or
the big carriers every time.

------
D_Drake
When I opened the link I thought it was a domain squatter. Wow.

------
AlexMuir
This reminded me to finish a post I drafted a while back:

[http://www.alexmuir.com/2011/12/stupid-is-the-new-
business-c...](http://www.alexmuir.com/2011/12/stupid-is-the-new-business-
class/)

------
valjavec
And they serve Google Ads when you search for a flight. Unbelivable.

~~~
blahpro
It’s not that much different from flying with them. The cabin is laden with
ads: <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Ryanair_B737-800_Cabin.jpg>

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AJ007
That's almost as good as Amtrak. You have to confirm your email address every
time you buy a ticket, even after you've logged in to your account. And the
form blocks paste, so you get to type it out each time.

~~~
davidblair
I've never run into this issue and have booked many tickets (on the northeast
line).

