Erasmus student with Ryanair discount

katnie

Hi everyone,

I did not know who to ask to as I am an international student here in Ireland and have nobody familiar with Irish law. I hope you can help me out.

I booked a flight with Ryanair on September 29 using ESN which is a network of international students. ESN offers a card that allows members to get a discount of 15% on max 8 Ryanair flights + 1 free 20kg luggage per flight. I have been using this card since approx 26 September 2018 as I am studying here for 1.5 years. It is valid for exactly 12 months.

When I booked the flight, my old card was already expired and I had already bought a new card but did not verify it on ESN.org before October 1. To book the flight mentioned, I was able to use my old card number which was still in the system. It showed me that I was able to book 4 more flights with the existing card even though it had already expired 3 days before. Everything went fine, I got a 15% discount and the 20kg extra for the two flights I booked to fly home during Christmas. However, today I received an email saying that the ESN membership is not valid and I need to pay additional 95€, not stating for which exactly they were for. The overall costs for the flight which I payed before was only around 93€.

I explained the situation to Ryanair and told them that I was able to book even though the card had expired and that I have a new card with a new number they could use to validate my booking (FYI I already booked a flight for November with the new card in October and had no problems). I gave them all the information I had about my new number but I was told that the booking is not valid as I did not use the new card for it and that I would have to pay the 95€ or I wont be able to checkin for these flights.

Being a student, 95€ is a lot of money for me which is why I have not payed it yet. I was wondering if it is acceptable that I was still able to login under my old Ryanair account and make a booking with my old card number even though my membership for ESN expired already.

Thank you!

Kathi

fritzelly

All covered in their T&C, to summarise: card must be valid (and will be verified before the booking is confirmed), cannot use on flights already booked (i.e. the new card means nothing)
Going to have to pay the extra

katnie

Thank you Fritzelly. I have received a booking confirmation the day I booked the flight (29 September) which was fine. It was only today that Ryanair told me it was not. I know that I will most likely have to pay the 95€ or otherwise celebrate Christmas in Ireland on my own, but I was really not sure if Ryanair did not make a mistake themselves.

fritzelly

When you going? Might be able to pick up a flight cheaper anyway - usually around 2 weeks before the flight is when you usually get the best price

katnie

I thought so, too, but unfortunately not. It is close to Christmas (13th December) and back on the 5th of January. Price is 112€ each ... Anyways, thanks for your opinion

Riskymove

will Ryanair refund the cost if you cancel under these circumstances?

then rebook new flights using card to get discount