Woman 'charged £50 to take a water bottle on Ryanair' flight
13 February 2025, 09:43 | Updated: 13 February 2025, 09:45
A woman has described how she was charged £50 to bring a water bottle on a Ryanair flight after airline workers said she had broken their baggage policy.
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Ruby Flanagan told The Mirror how she was flying back to London from Dublin on February 4 when she was stopped by staff at the gate.
They told her to check the size of her carry-on backpack using the box, and it fit - but staff pointed at her water bottle and told her she needed to put it in her bag.
She questioned the staff - as she had been allowed to carry the bottle on the flight out. They insisted, saying all ‘extras’ needed to be inside the bag.
When she got back to the gate after re-packing, she was told her bag was too big and she needed to pay £50.
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She said she had watched other passengers holding laptops, Burger King bags and travel pillows pass through the gate with no problems.
Staff told her if the water bottle wasn’t packed it was “a second bag” and “in, the bag’s too big, so you'll need to pay."
She reluctantly paid the £50, twice the price of the water bottle itself, and got on board.
yanair told the Mirror: "This passenger booked a Basic Fare ticket for this flight from Dublin to Stansted (4 Feb), which allowed them to carry a small personal bag onboard.
“This passenger attempted to board with an additional carry-on, and as it would not fit within their permitted bag, she was correctly required to pay a standard gate baggage fee (€60).
“Once payment was made, this passenger travelled on this flight from Dublin to Stansted (4 Feb).”
Simon Calder, travel correspondent at The Independent, said: “I have sympathy for Ruby. But Ryanair was in the right. In addition to her dimension-compliant bag she was carrying a very chunky water bottle.
“The correct way to look at stories like this is that Ruby got away with the bumper bottle on one leg of the flight.”
