Ryanair Prime: airline offers flight discounts in return for annual fee

Ryanair launches annual membership for £79, but Which? suggests passengers steer clear.

Low-cost airline Ryanair has launched a yearly membership scheme, enabling customers to sign up for discounts in exchange for a £79 annual fee. 

Members receive discounts on flights and access to free reserved seats, as well as travel insurance and monthly access to a flight sale. 

Ryanair claims it can provide customers with up to £410 in savings over a year and £50 discounts on flights. 

The scheme called Ryanair Prime joins other existing airline membership schemes on the market, including those run by EasyJet and Wizz Air. 

However, consumer group Which? has given Ryanair’s the thumbs down, suggesting customers examine the small print before joining, the Guardian reports.

There are only 250,000 places available on the scheme and only customers from Austria, Belgium, France, Germany, Greece, Italy, Ireland, Netherlands, UK, Poland, Portugal and Spain are eligible to join.

They must also have a valid online Ryanair account. 

According to the Terms and Conditions, the free reserved seats are only available on certain types of seats.

If no more of these are available, members are assigned a randomly allocated seat – as with standard customers – or charged (minus the cost of a Prime seat). 

The travel insurance can only be used on journeys incorporating Ryanair flights and customers aged over 70 are not covered by the medical provisions.

It is also not available to customers in Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Israel, Jordan, Luxembourg, Montenegro, Morocco, Serbia, Switzerland and Turkey.

Meanwhile, only members (who must be aged over 18) can access the discounted fares, meaning that other family members, including children, will not qualify for the cheaper rates and may have to sit elsewhere on the plane. 

Which?: Ryanair scheme is ‘full of caveats’

Editor of Which? Travel, Rory Boland, advised flyers to “think twice” before joining the scheme. 

“The service is full of caveats when it comes to seat selection, while Ryanair’s travel insurance offers poor cover compared with cheaper policies that are rated highly by Which?,” Boland told the Guardian newspaper.

“There’s little detail on Ryanair’s exclusive deals for Prime subscribers, or how they would differ from the many offers and deals Ryanair already sends out to customers or features on its website.”

Alternative offers from other airlines

Wizz and EasyJet also run membership schemes with a range of pricing. Wizz’s costs £51 to £327 annually, offering priority boarding, flight discounts and a free cabin bag allowance. 

Depending on the membership level you choose, one to five additional friends or family members can also access the discounts. 

Meanwhile, EasyJet Plus costs £249 per person and offers fast-track security, speedier boarding, free earlier return flight switches, discounts on food and drink purchased on board the plane, and an allowance for overhead cabin baggage.

Only the member can enjoy these benefits, but children under 16 can be added for an additional £155 a year and partners for an extra £215.