Ryanair announced new reduced checked bag fees (and increased check-in bag sizes) to encourage more customers to check in bags

Ryanair today, as part of its “Always Getting Better” programme announced new reduced checked bag fees (and increased check-in bag sizes) to encourage more customers to check in bags and reduce the number of customers with 2 bags at the boarding gates. As too many customers are availing of Ryanair’s improved 2 free carry-on bags service, and with high load factors (97% in August) there is not enough overhead cabin space for this volume of carry-on bags, which is causing boarding/flight delays.

To encourage more customers to check-in some bags and reduce the volume of carry-on bags, Ryanair will introduce the following bag policy changes on all flights from 1^stNovember next:

• The check-in bag allowance will increase from 15kgs to 20kgs for all bags
• The standard check-in bag fee will be cut from €/£35 to €/£25 for this 20kg bag
• Only Priority Boarding customers (including Plus, Flexi Plus & Family Plus) will be allowed to bring two carry-on bags on the aircraft*
• All other (i.e. non-priority) customers will only be allowed to bring one smaller carry-on bag on board the aircraft, while their second (bigger) wheelie bag must be placed in the hold (free of charge) at the boarding gate.

Ryanair’s Kenny Jacobs said:

 These bag policy changes will cost Ryanair over €50m p.a. in reduced checked bag fees. However, we believe offering bigger bags at reduced fees will encourage more customers to consider checking-in a bag, which will reduce the high volume of customers we have with 2 carry-on bags at the boarding gates, which is causing flight delays due to large numbers of gate bag and cabin bag offloads.

 We hope that by restricting non-priority customers to one small carry-on bag – their  wheelie bag must be placed in the hold, free of charge at the boarding gate – this will speed up the boarding of flights and eliminate flight delays being caused by not having sufficient overhead cabin space on busy flights to accommodate over 360 (182 customers x 2 bags) carry-on bags. These lower bag fees and increased bag size allowances will come into play for all bookings for travel after 1^stNovember, and we hope our customers will enjoy the savings of our new simplified bag policy.”

* Priority Boarding can be purchased for just €/£5 at the time of booking or added to a booking for €/£6 and is available up to one hour prior to scheduled departure.