A six-year-old boy was left crying after he boarded a Ryanair plane to find a stranger sitting in his seat after the airline double booked it. Ryan Bandli's family had specially booked the window seat as it helps the youngster stay calm during the fight.
But when they told the woman she was in his seat she refused to move, showing them an identical seat reservation. And despite pleas for her to change her mind, the woman refused to switch seats leaving flight attendants having to find an alternative seat for the youngster.
The airline has insisted the seat was not double booked. It blamed an IT hitch and says it has now refunded the reservation fee, reports the Mirror.
Ryan's mum Adi told how she had paid to reserve the specific seat on the plane run by the budget airline subsidiary, Buzz, for the flight from Budapest in Hungary back to the UK. They were shocked to find the stranger sitting in their seat and after she refused to move they had no alternative but to spend the flight on an aisle seat.
She said her son is "very reactive" and struggles in stressful situations. She said: ""Ryan was really upset and anxious and he cried. He didn't understand how this could happen. We sat separately and it was really stressful."
She added: "How can something like this happen?"
The incident happened at the end of August when Adi, Ryan and his dad were flying into Manchester Airport, to get home to Stoke-on-Trent. Knowing how nervous flying made Ryan, Adi forked out for three different seat reservations to ensure that they'd all be sitting together.
Failure to pay for a specific seat on a Ryanair flight - which typically cost between £15 and £30 - means you generally end up separated from your party and in the middle seat. "Ryan likes to sit next to the window," Adi explained. "It calms him down a bit and he likes to lean his head against the wall."
She said the incident was very stressful for Ryan. "My poor child was crying. People gave him sweets and were so kind," Adi said.
Since landing Adi has been pushing Ryanair for an explanation and compensation. She claims the airline rejected the request and told her that the seat was given to someone else as it was by an emergency exit.
"The CAA requires that UK airlines have procedures to ensure that customers are seated where, in the event that an emergency evacuation is required, they may best assist and not hinder evacuation from the aeroplane," a Ryanair employee wrote to Adi.
"Only those customers who appear reasonably fit, strong and able to assist the rapid evacuation of the aeroplane in an emergency should be allocated seats that permit direct access to emergency exits."
Under the rules, children are not considered suitable passengers to sit by the exit. Adi says they were not sitting in an emergency exit row. She has also questioned why they were able to book seats in the first place, and why they weren't allocated a row with a window seat elsewhere.
Referring to the company's Polish subsidiary, a spokesperson for Ryanair said: "This Buzz passenger’s seat was not sold twice; this misunderstanding was as a result of an isolated IT glitch. Unfortunately as the flight was fully booked, there were no other window seats available.
"Buzz regrets the inconvenience caused to Ms. Bandli and her son and a member of our customer services team will contact them directly."
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