Which Ryanair Passport to get

My son is studying in Scotland and has 3 more years to go. He travels Ryanair, 6-7 each way per year, and flights usually orignate in Edinburgh if booking a return flight! I do all the booking with my own Credit card (of course!) and I am trying to avoid any more Ryanair admin charges - I used to use Neteller to avoid these.
But I am not sure which Ryanair passport I should get? UK or Irish? Should I use the UK or Irish website? Does the card have to be in the name of the person that is travelling?
Really appreciate any advice anyone can give me!

Hi,

This key post might give some advice.

If you run the search option on the main page just using Ryanair you may get some other useful threads.

MOREORAN i have found out from the card company. i will answer your last question 1st ,, no the card can be in your name, and you can book a flight for anyone. if you have a card bought in ireland it will be in euros , and if you are booking flights from scotland to ireland return, the prices quoted will be in sterling, you will have to pay an exchange charge of whatever it is on the day ,. dont forget that if you want to get a ryanair cash passport you will need a passport issued in the country in which the ryanair cash passport is issued. in other words if you want a sterling account you will need a british passport when purchasing the ryanair cash passport. i have just checked an email they have sent me and there is another charge called the foreign exchange charge and its a hefty 5.75% , which makes it a no brainer . if you want to avoid admin charges you will have to get a ryanair cash passport that originates in britain.

Appreciate the reply Moonman.
Seems the UK passport is the best option but I gather I will need a UK bank account to set this up. If I get an Irish passport and book flights one way then I'll cut my admin costs in half . Ryanair sure do make it hard, little reward for the frequest traveller!!

yes it looks that way , as your son would need a uk passport and a uk bank acct to get a ryanair cash passport . the only other way he could do it , would be if he had a friend who was a uk native and he/she had one , the friend could get a one way from scotland to here in ireland , and your son could fix up with him/her.and you could book the return leg of the trip. my family have saved a lot since i got one , i have saved my wifes sister and her family so far 72 euro and i have saved my daughter and her husband and children over a hundred between their holidays and a trip to a wedding in england . there are 5 of them and on return flights for them there is a saving of 60 euro 6euro pp each way . between my wife and myself i have saved around 200. so it is worth while getting one yourself.

Another way of avoiding the foreign exchange costs would be to plan in advance for when he's coming home and book this as the return leg of his previous trip over there.

Homer said:

Another way of avoiding the foreign exchange costs would be to plan in advance for when he's coming home and book this as the return leg of his previous trip over there.

Click to expand...

Or even if this isn't possible (if dates aren't fixed that far out) simply book two one ways so at least half the flight is payable in Euros ... should still save I think as the Ryanair fees are levied on a per segment not per ticket basis so booking two oneways

My partner has just informed me that the UK cash passport as of Dec 1st will no longer waiver ryanair admin costs, but so far the irish version of it does, I have one , bit of pain to get and load etc, but maybe wait another month and see if it cancels ireland as well, as the joining fee and if you dont use it etc etc , this is the email below
[FONT=&quot]

[FONT=&quot]Dear Cardholder,[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot]Firstly we would like to thank you for purchasing a Ryanair Cash Passport card. We have seen thousands of our cardholders benefit from the offer of avoiding the admin fee charge on Ryanair.com since the launch of the card on 1st October 2011. We thank you for your continued support.[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot]It is with regret that we write to inform you that, as a result of decisions by the UK Office of Fair Trading, Ryanair Cash Passport card users will no longer benefit from avoiding the £6 admin fee for transactions made on Ryanair.com from 1st December 2012. While we are disappointed at this development, Ryanair is obliged to honour the decisions of the UK Office of Fair Trading.[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot]We are committed to providing you, the cardholder, with further updates on card promotions and intend on notifying you shortly on our planned changes in the card offering.[/FONT][/FONT]
[FONT=&quot][/FONT]

More . For "obliged to honour the decisions of the UK Office of Fair Trading" read "no longer permitted to advertise fares without including this €6/£6 per-journey charge".

I imagine the Irish cash passport scheme will continue until it falls foul of some equivalent EU directive.

I checked last week with in relation to the Irish Cash Passport card and received this reply.

Thank you for your email and inquiry. Currently there are no changes to the benefits of the Ryanair cash passport purchased in Ireland.

Yours sincerely

Customer Services Administrator | Business Operations
Access Prepaid Worldwide


But that does not mean it won't go the same as the UK card in the future... For Ryanair it may now cost too much to administer the card (even via a 3rd party) if they do not have the UK card included.

looking at that post by deeheg,, it will be interesting to see what they come up with when they say something about their planned changes for cardholders. i thought that all booking sites had to offer at least one free booking arrangement, and thats why aer lingus have theirs as vectron, and ryanair previously had neteller etc. has anyone any further thoughts as to what they may come up with.

the planned changes are in this mornings independent . they are going to add another 2% to the final bill, and in february they will add the 6 euro charge to all fares , and they will remove it as a seperate charge on the bill. they add that if you want to avoid the 2% credit card charge you can pay by debit card, and not exclusivly their cash passport version of a debit card