Ryanair’s random seat allocation policy under pressure

On BBC Watchdog, a programme aired on Wednesday night, the BBC talked to Dr Jennifer Rodgers from the University of Oxford who helped conduct an experiment where four researchers booked onto four Ryanair flights and were split up each time onto single, separate middle seats throughout the plane. Watchdog said that each time the group was able “to determine from the seating availability charts online that there was plenty of room on the plane for them to be allocated seats together”. But they were not.

The BBC consulted Dr Rodgers who found that the odds of that happening randomly were “astronomical”: “you have a greater chance of winning the lottery”.

In a statement* Ryanair denies they changed the random seat allocation policy, Ryanair claims that more and more passengers are reserving aisle and window seats hence passengers who choose random seats are more likely to be allocated middle seats.

Yet the passenger complaints on Twitter and other social media are piling up.

* Ryanair statement

Random Allocated Seating

We haven’t changed the random seat allocation policy. The reason for more middle seats being allocated is that more and more passengers are taking our reserved seats (from just €2) and these passengers overwhelmingly prefer aisle and window seats which is why people who choose random (free of charge) seats are more likely to be allocated middle seats.

Some random seat passengers are confused by the appearance of empty seats beside them when they check-in up to four days prior to departure. The reason they can’t have these window or aisle seats is that these are more likely to be selected by reserved seat passengers many of whom only check-in 24 hours prior to departure. Since our current load factor is 95%, we have to keep these window and aisle seats free to facilitate those customers who are willing to pay (from €2) for them.

The exception proves the rule 😉

Featured image: By Ruthann from Western Ireland (EI-DPN, Ryanair 737-8AS cabin layout.) [CC BY 2.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0)], via Wikimedia Commons