Ryanair passengers will need to ask cabin crew for permission to visit the toilet
Exclusive: Demand for use of onboard facilities may diminish because tea and coffee will not be served
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Your support makes all the difference.Ryanair’s chief executive has provided more details of how the inflight experience will change when the airline resumes large-scale flying in July.
Europe’s biggest budget airline is planning to launch about 40 per cent of its original capacity for the summer – with a wide range of protocols for passengers.
Everyone on board must wear a face covering. While inflight sales will continue, they will be for a limited range of goods, with contactless payment rather than cash.
The seatbelt sign will remain on through the entire flight, and queues for the onboard toilets will be banned – unless authorised by cabin crew.
“People will be able to request to go to the toilet by ringing the call bell,” Michael O’Leary told The Independent.
“The cabin crew will be less busy with the inflight service.
“They will allow people to go to the toilet on a controlled basis when the toilets are free.
“There are three toilets on board. We will be able to accommodate a lot of people, we just won’t allow the kind of free-for-all queueing that can normally take place, particularly towards the front of the aircraft.”
The demand for use of the onboard facilities may diminish because, said Mr O’Leary: “We won’t be doing teas and coffees.”
Onboard sales are expected to fall, he conceded.
“Frankly we’re better off to get people again, even at low air fares. That’s a far better outcome than having no flights, no passengers and no ancillaries.”
Ryanair has released a video on the changes for social media. It recommends that passengers select priority boarding and fast-track security.
“It’s a way of minimising social contact during the journey,” said the airline’s chief executive.
Mr O’Leary also lambasted the UK government’s proposals for mandatory quarantine for arriving travellers: “The quarantine isn’t based on any science, because if it was based on science you wouldn’t be giving exemptions to the Irish and the French.”
“Isolation is bonkers because it’s uncontrollable and unimplementable. Nobody respects bad law.”
The UK government has promised to reveal further details of the scheme.
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