Tuesday, March 17, 2009

No more check-in desks for Ryanair at Alicante

Ryanair have announced that, as from October, it will no longer be operating check-in counters at Alicante Airport. Instead everything will be done online and passengers will be able to access their boarding passes as much as 15 days before they fly or as little as four hours before the flight is due to depart.

Passengers who have not booked baggage on a flight will be able to go directly to the departure lounge controls and those who have baggage to book in, will be able to do so at a special ‘drop desk' check-in counter.

The service will be free to passengers travelling with just hand baggage but a charge of five euros per person will be charged for those who register baggage, with a 10 euros charge being levied on those who turn up with luggage that has not been registered.

The new system will be initiated in three phases starting on March 19. The first phase will allow non-EU citizens, people travelling with luggage and disabled people to register online.

Phase two, which starts on May 1, will require people making new reservations to carry out the online check-in service for which a charge of five euros will be levied. Anybody turning up at the airport without a reservation will be charged 20 euros extra at the time of making the booking.

On October 1, phase three will go into motion and all of the company's check-in desks at airports used by Ryanair will be closed. From this date all passengers will be required to do everything online and passengers who declare luggage will have to use the ‘drop desk'.

Ryanair, like EasyJet, do not allocate seats to passengers so their check-in procedure is simple. Carriers like Jet2.com, Monarch  and BMI Baby do allocate seats which obvisoulsy takes more time. You can book your seat online with these airlines but they charge you for the privilege.

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