Ryanair is to charge a £4/€5 fee for its priority booking service, regardless of where passengers check in.

 

The optional service previously only charged airport check-in passengers, while web check-in passengers received the offer free-of-charge as a way of promoting online check-in.

 

However, from June 3, Ryanair will introduce the same fee of £4/€5 for priority boarding when passengers use the online check-in. Web check-in itself will continue to be free and all passengers will be able to pay for priority boarding either at the time of booking or at the airport.

From June 3 it will also introduce an online name change facility that will allow passengers to make name changes up to 24 hours before travel, a service previously only offered through the Ryanair call centre.

 

Ryanair’s Lorna Farren said: “These new charges will make the sale of priority boarding fairer for all passengers.

"Because of the success of our web check-in facility, which allows passengers to avoid airport queues, many flights are now selling out all of our allocation of 80 (40% of) priority boarding seats.

"By charging the same fee for priority boarding for both web check-in and airport check-in passengers, we hope to ensure that priority boarding seats will always be available for sale at airports for family members and groups who wish to purchase it.”