Ryanair passengers who wish to check in bags will need to arrive at the airport earlier from 10 November. Europe's largest budget airline announced that check-in and bag drop services at all its airports will close 60 minutes before the scheduled departure, up from the current 40-minute deadline.
The airline says it will open check-in desks earlier to accommodate the change. Ryanair stated the move aims “to provide more time for passengers to get through airport security and passport queues which will reduce the very small number of passengers who currently miss their flight departure as they are getting stuck in these airport queues.”
Since the EU entry-exit system became mandatory at all Schengen area frontiers on 10 April, some passengers on easyJet and Ryanair have missed flights due to passport control delays. Ryanair noted that only one in five passengers currently checks in a bag.
Ryanair’s chief marketing officer, Dara Brady, said: “From Tuesday 10 November, Ryanair customers will see airport check-in and bag drops close 60 minutes before scheduled departure, instead of today’s 40 minutes. This will allow these 20 per cent of our customers who check in a bag more time to clear through airport security and passport queues, and get to their departure gate on time, especially during busy travel periods when some of these airport queues can be longer.”
He added: “The 80 per cent who don’t check-in a bag will be unaffected by this small 20-minute change, as they will continue to check-in online before they arrive at the departure airport and they go straight through airport security to their departure gate.”
Ryanair is installing self-service kiosks at over 95 per cent of its airports before October. When the airline began flying jet aircraft between the UK and Ireland, its check-in deadline was just 20 minutes.
