Ryanair customers face check-in charges during web upgrade

Ryanair passengers who fail to check-in for flights online ahead of a five hour suspension of the airline's website on Tuesday night will be penalised €45, the company has confirmed.

Check-in services will be offline from 9pm on Tuesday to 2am on Wednesday. Customers flying on these days have been advised of the need to check-in early and the airline said all those with reservations would be contacted.

However, for anyone who fails to check-in early, the airline’s standard rules will apply. That means, according to terms and conditions set out on its website - passengers would be charged an “airport check-in fee” at a rate of €45.

“It is each customer’s responsibility to ensure they have completed the check-in process as required,” the airline said.

It is not the first time the carrier has closed its online operation for what it has described as a systems upgrade. Similar suspensions were reported last June and in May, 2012.

In a statement, the airline cautioned that new bookings or changes to existing flights would not be possible for the duration of the website suspension. It said customers would be contacted ahead of their flights by text or email.

The closure in 2012 was carried out in order to “significantly upgrade and enhance the processing capacity”, tripling that of the existing system.

This “brief off-peak closure” it said in reference to the time of day, “is to allow for essential system maintenance in preparation for the launch of our brand new personalised website this autumn”.

Meanwhile, it released performance-related information showing that 90 per cent of its 57,000 flights arrived on time in July. It carried over 10.1 million passengers for the month.

There was less than one complaint per 1,000 customers and 99 per cent of these were addressed within seven days.

“All Ryanair customers can now also book their flights even earlier on our improved website and app with mobile boarding passes,” it said in a statement on Tuesday.

Ryanair has been in talks with British Airways owner International Airlines Group and Aer Lingus about providing transfer connections for its rivals' long-haul services for the first time in its 30-year history.

Chief executive Michael O’Leary confirmed the move as a major change in how Europe’s largest low-cost carrier operates. It had previously shunned the interlining market due to costs.

“What we see over the next five, 10 years is that we become a feeder for other long-haul airlines,” Mr O’Leary said.

“The advantage for them is they would get much cheaper short-haul feed than they would from anybody else, but what they have to get themselves mentally over is that they would have to take responsibility for missed connections.”

Connections would be a "reasonably small part" of Ryanair's business, he said, but low-cost carriers could feed up to 50 per cent of passengers to long-haul carriers flying from Europe within five to 10 years.