Ryanair passengers face yet another charge for the privilege of booking from later this week.
The budget airline will force customers to pay a 2% credit card fee from Friday, adding £2 to a £100 booking.
This is in addition to the £6 each-way (£12 return) admin fees levied by Ryanair when booking flights, regardless of how you pay.
Until tomorrow, you can escape the £6 booking fee by using a Ryanair Cash Passport prepaid Mastercard. From Friday, everyone pays the charge, which we revealed earlier this month.
Ryanair blames the Office of Fair Trading for the new charge, but the watchdog says this is nonsense, as its recent probe led to airlines agreeing to be transparent, not to add new fees.
The silver lining to the increased costs is that Ryanair can no longer hide them until the end of the booking process.
Ryanair spokesman Stephen McNamara says: "To cover our credit card processing costs and to comply with the OFT's recent ruling, we are introducing a 2% credit card handling fee from 30 November 2012."
The OFT has hit back. A spokesman says: "We have not required any airline to introduce new payment charges, increase their credit card charges or scrap any discounts.
"We took action to make sure debit card charges are included in the headline price and credit card charges are transparent and not sprung on shoppers towards the end of the booking process."
The budget airline will force customers to pay a 2% credit card fee from Friday, adding £2 to a £100 booking.
This is in addition to the £6 each-way (£12 return) admin fees levied by Ryanair when booking flights, regardless of how you pay.
Until tomorrow, you can escape the £6 booking fee by using a Ryanair Cash Passport prepaid Mastercard. From Friday, everyone pays the charge, which we revealed earlier this month.
Ryanair blames the Office of Fair Trading for the new charge, but the watchdog says this is nonsense, as its recent probe led to airlines agreeing to be transparent, not to add new fees.
The silver lining to the increased costs is that Ryanair can no longer hide them until the end of the booking process.
Ryanair spokesman Stephen McNamara says: "To cover our credit card processing costs and to comply with the OFT's recent ruling, we are introducing a 2% credit card handling fee from 30 November 2012."
The OFT has hit back. A spokesman says: "We have not required any airline to introduce new payment charges, increase their credit card charges or scrap any discounts.
"We took action to make sure debit card charges are included in the headline price and credit card charges are transparent and not sprung on shoppers towards the end of the booking process."
