Irish low-budget/no-frills/crappy-service airline Ryanair called bloggers idiots and lunatics this past Wednesday after a customer pointed out some flaws in their website.
In a fit of patriotic support, Dubliner Jason Roe was booking plane tickets on his home country's airline, when he thought he found a glitch in the system that allowed him to book free tickets. So to be helpful to the Irish airline, he wrote about it on his blog, and posted a message to Twitter:
Not too surprisingly, other people tried to repeat what he had done, but without success. Roe later confirmed that he had made a mistake, and actually had to pay for the tickets to begin with.
However, after being made aware of the possible security glitch, Ryanair sent him a nice, polite thank you email, with two free tickets as their show of appreciation for alerting them to the problem.
Just kidding. You don't make the Laughing Stalk blog for that. You make the blog if you're a complete and utter idiot.
What actually happened was a Ryanair staffer put a few a-hole responses on Roe's blog.
"You're an idiot and a liar!! fact is! you've opened one session then another and requested a page meant for a different session, you are so stupid you dont even know how you did it!" (No, you are so stupid you don't even know what an apostrophe does.)
"Website is not perfect, Life is not perfect...If you would work in your pathetic life on a such big project in a such busy environment with so little resources, you would know that the most important is to have usual user behavior scenarios working rather than spending time on improbable and harmless things."
So, Roe traced the IP addresses of the postings straight to Ryanair headquarters in Dublin. Because as any idiot should know, there ain't no anonymity on "teh Interweb." Them pipes all lead somewhere, Chester.
At least one other idiot didn't know that, because he confirmed said abuse to CNN.
"Ryanair can confirm that a Ryanair staff member did engage in a blog discussion," said Stephen McNamara, Ryanair's Head of Communications. "It is Ryanair policy not to waste time and energy in corresponding with idiot bloggers and Ryanair can confirm that it won't be happening again. Lunatic bloggers can have the blog sphere all to themselves as our people are far too busy driving down the cost of air travel."
No, your people are far too busy driving away customers, and generally being douchebags. Just remember that bloggers are travelers too.
Stephen McNamara can be reached at 011-353-812-1598 and possibly mcnamaras@ryanair.com (this email is unconfirmed -- Erik). I urge you lunatic idiot bloggers out there to let Mr. McNamara know how you feel.
"You can only imagine how many customers (Ryanair) could lose by treating them like this," Roe told CNN.
"They treat their customers with contempt. We know that Ryanair doesn't put any store on customer relations," said Frances Tuke, spokesman of the Association of British Travel Agents. "This is the way Ryanair conducts its business. Their clear goal is to provide cheap flights but we don't believe this is the way to provide customer satisfaction. Our members don't do this -- their customers expect a high level of service."
All I can say is Richard Branson's Virgin Air never treats their customers like this. That's why I'm proud to follow the guy on Twitter. It's also why I urge all Irish travelers to stop flying Ryanair.
At least until Stephen "The Lunatic Idiot" McNamara is forbidden to speak to the press.
---
Like this post? Leave a comment, Digg it, or Stumble it.
In a fit of patriotic support, Dubliner Jason Roe was booking plane tickets on his home country's airline, when he thought he found a glitch in the system that allowed him to book free tickets. So to be helpful to the Irish airline, he wrote about it on his blog, and posted a message to Twitter:
More Ryanair security issues http://tinyurl.com/cbgv7l
8:35 AM Feb 28th from TweetDeck
Not too surprisingly, other people tried to repeat what he had done, but without success. Roe later confirmed that he had made a mistake, and actually had to pay for the tickets to begin with.
However, after being made aware of the possible security glitch, Ryanair sent him a nice, polite thank you email, with two free tickets as their show of appreciation for alerting them to the problem.
Just kidding. You don't make the Laughing Stalk blog for that. You make the blog if you're a complete and utter idiot.
What actually happened was a Ryanair staffer put a few a-hole responses on Roe's blog.
So, Roe traced the IP addresses of the postings straight to Ryanair headquarters in Dublin. Because as any idiot should know, there ain't no anonymity on "teh Interweb." Them pipes all lead somewhere, Chester.
At least one other idiot didn't know that, because he confirmed said abuse to CNN.
"Ryanair can confirm that a Ryanair staff member did engage in a blog discussion," said Stephen McNamara, Ryanair's Head of Communications. "It is Ryanair policy not to waste time and energy in corresponding with idiot bloggers and Ryanair can confirm that it won't be happening again. Lunatic bloggers can have the blog sphere all to themselves as our people are far too busy driving down the cost of air travel."
No, your people are far too busy driving away customers, and generally being douchebags. Just remember that bloggers are travelers too.
Stephen McNamara can be reached at 011-353-812-1598 and possibly mcnamaras@ryanair.com (this email is unconfirmed -- Erik). I urge you lunatic idiot bloggers out there to let Mr. McNamara know how you feel.
"You can only imagine how many customers (Ryanair) could lose by treating them like this," Roe told CNN.
"They treat their customers with contempt. We know that Ryanair doesn't put any store on customer relations," said Frances Tuke, spokesman of the Association of British Travel Agents. "This is the way Ryanair conducts its business. Their clear goal is to provide cheap flights but we don't believe this is the way to provide customer satisfaction. Our members don't do this -- their customers expect a high level of service."
All I can say is Richard Branson's Virgin Air never treats their customers like this. That's why I'm proud to follow the guy on Twitter. It's also why I urge all Irish travelers to stop flying Ryanair.
At least until Stephen "The Lunatic Idiot" McNamara is forbidden to speak to the press.
---
Like this post? Leave a comment, Digg it, or Stumble it.